On Being a Curator

In 1991 I was offered the job of Director at the Douglas Hyde Gallery in Trinity College, Dublin, and I held it for roughly a quarter of a century,  considerably longer than anyone expected. What I didn’t know when I took on the position, however, was that there were serious challenges that needed  to be addressed urgently. The main obstacle, I discovered, was a substantial deficit, more or less equivalent to the amount that might typically have been spent annually on exhibitions, and there were no obvious ways of dealing with it. 

To my surprise, the process of clearing the debt turned out to be less onerous than I anticipated. Our funders, Trinity College and the Arts Council, were not unduly concerned, even though the gallery had suffered similar and more severe difficulties not many years before, and our financial support remained stable. Today their approach would almost certainly be less benign; much closer attention is paid to issues of this sort, everybody being more conscious of the implications of adopting a relaxed attitude to financial problems. I soon realised that nobody was interested in giving the gallery money to cover old debts - benefit auctions, familiar now, were then scarce - and that I’d have to find another solution. The answer was based on common sense. First of all I cut back general expenditure; then, as a second step, I added modest ‘contingency’ sums to the exhibition budgets which, in the past, had often been exceeded. If it wasn’t spent, the contingency money would be used to help pay off the debt. Neither of these ideas was particularly innovative, but they were effective. Over a number of years the deficit was cleared, and further accumulation of savings meant that the gallery could afford more publications and occasional improvements to the infrastructure, such as modest architectural changes and the development of Gallery 2.

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More unusual, perhaps, was another plan. I wondered if it might be possible to adapt the exhibitions themselves to budgetary restraints, and I began to develop a way of doing this creatively. A shift in direction followed a conversation with Christian Boltanski. One day I was musing on the costs of shipping, and he said, with a smile, ‘Why don’t you ask artists to send you work that doesn’t have to be expensively transported or that isn't materially valuable?’  His advice was illustrated and embodied by his own exhibition, entitled ‘Lost Property’, in which he covered the entire floor of the gallery with old clothes and other paraphernalia. Most of it was sourced locally and had no obvious financial value.

I was reminded of Christian’s thoughts when I saw images of an exhibition by Gabriel Orozco, his first at a commercial art gallery in New York. Composed of a handful of yogurt pot lids, one attached to each wall, it became celebrated for its daring minimalism. When I later approached Gabriel about the possibility of working together on an exhibition, he was politely reticent. I didn’t give up. During our discussions I had a dream about him flying my house low over the Irish countryside, while I was at the window waving at surprised neighbours and onlookers. I may be mistaken, but I believe that he became more interested in the possibility of working with us after I told him the story. Our subsequent exhibition was centred on a new work that was constructed from scraps, waste, and fragments that he found in the gallery’s stores and workshop. It was not always possible to work with this strategy, but it opened up new possibilities.

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In the past it was rare to have had any specific training as a contemporary art curator, and I was no exception. Nonetheless, I had already accumulated a fair amount of practical knowledge of the arts by the time I was offered the job in Trinity. I had spent several years working in the National Gallery of Ireland, where I learnt many aspects of administration; I had taught art history at the National College of Art and Design, spent a year as a presenter on an RTE television arts programme, and freelanced as a journalist in the visual arts and contemporary music. I had begun to reflect on the possibility of trying to bring together some or all of these different interests when the directorship of the Douglas Hyde Gallery was advertised, and I thought I might have a reasonable chance of success. It was a job that I really wanted to do .

The basic skills involved in running a gallery of modest size and selecting its exhibitions are elementary.  It is often forgotten that the word ‘curator’ originally meant ‘keeper’ or ‘custodian’, and that the personal selection and aesthetic display of artworks were once of less importance than the curator’s core responsibilities, which amounted to putting things up on walls, in cabinets, or on floors, and looking after them. This, of course, is a simplification, but in later years, whenever thoughts and discussions about curating became too grandiose, I reminded myself of its truth. Putting together an exhibition is rather like writing a book; many people can make a fist of it, but few will do it well. A good exhibition is infused with something special, its substance having more to do with the ineffable, the ‘unknown known’, than with artistic skill and expertise. As a general rule, though, ‘curating’ a show means having responsibility for the initiation and development of an exhibition and having at least some influence on the choice of work.

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A curator should be willing to identify and explore his or her personal convictions, tastes, and influences. Many are not obvious and often lead to unconscious biases and emphases. Awareness of why you make certain choices is enlightening,  and it helps you to understand them.  I learnt not to be overly concerned about the opinions of anyone but friends and a few others, mainly artists, in whom I had confidence. We all want to be liked and admired, but I found it worth remembering that many judgements, be they positive or negative, are superficial and not especially discerning. I concluded that one of the most effective ways of earning approval is not to need or seek it.

The most important aspect of a curator’s work is the desire to share what you love with other people, and if this is done consistently, you develop a personal voice and vision. Visual flair, so often thought to be a defining element of an impressive exhibition, is no more important than many other qualities, and similarly, although following trends and fashion may seem to be insightful, it is usually unsatisfying. A curator may also choose to respond attentively to what are thought to be the needs and tastes of a particular audience, but while this can appear to be caring and pragmatic, it is rarely enough.  Too much concern for gallery visitors’ expectations or tastes is not unlike that of a teacher who continually asks pupils what they’d like to learn; more often than not the audience doesn’t have the knowledge to answer the question with much discernment. I worked on the assumption that because the gallery was associated with a university it was reasonable to pitch our exhibitions at a comparable level;  I also believed that if I considered something to be interesting or worth showing,  it was very likely that others would agree. In any event, I soon discovered that our most regular visitors were drawn from art colleges and the art world, and that they were well able to follow the evolution of the programme. With regard to everybody else, we tried to be welcoming and to provide ample information and guidance for those who wanted it.

 

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While I was working at the National Gallery of Ireland, ‘connoisseurship’ was thought to be a curator’s most important skill. This meant the ability to identify works of art, deciding how old they were, where they came from, who had made them, and how ‘good’ they were. I found learning about connoisseurship both compelling and enjoyable, but it had no obvious use in the field of contemporary art, where curators habitually assess contemporary work without much historical perspective and with more interest in the immediacy of a work than in its singularity. In the world of historical art it was considered  important to have an ‘eye’, an intuitive recognition of  ‘quality’, as well as the capacity to identify an artist’s idiosyncrasies and sensibility. The same term is sometimes used in contemporary art, but its meaning is different; a curator who ‘has a good eye’ is said to be able to recognise an interesting artist or artwork, or to install an exhibition attractively. Current evaluation of  ‘quality’ is generally based on monetary value or critical reputation, and less frequently on anything more profound. There is nothing wrong with this, but it is a perspective that has many limitations. In my experience,  the most enlightening and penetrating responses to contemporary art are often those of artists themselves, because they tend to look at it more carefully and intently than the majority of curators or critics.


Another reason why the notion of ‘quality’ is not greatly respected by many  curators is their sympathy with critical theory, which leads them to consider  ‘quality’ and ‘beauty’ as privileged and ‘élitist’ concepts.  There is truth to this, of course, but the alternatives are usually reductive.  When I taught art history at art college in the 1980s, I became aware that my respect for old-fashioned ‘connoisseurship’ was not shared, and I decided that I needed to deepen my knowledge of modern philosophy and cultural studies. I joined a reading group composed of students and colleagues, slowly familiarising myself with the ideas of many of the writers who were thought to be relevant to what is now called ‘art practice’.  This was intellectually stimulating;  I was glad to absorb new ideas, and it wasn’t long before I began to use them in the reviews and texts that I was sometimes asked to write. In due course, though, I became more sceptical. I realised that I was quoting contemporary theory mainly because it seemed to add weight and contemporary credibility to my texts, not because the references were particularly clarifying or revealing. I also admitted to myself that I didn’t have a comprehensive or sound understanding of the ideas I was quoting, and that I was merely drawing attention to points that suited my arguments. This seemed superficial, so I rid myself of the habit. My real aesthetic interests and values lay elsewhere.

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There was much that I had to learn when I became a curator. Having little knowledge of financial matters and procedures, I was concerned that this might be a problem, so I was prepared  to develop more expertise in that area. Fortunately, however,  in an organisation of modest scale and few staff, little was needed other than good planning and the capacity to keep track of ongoing expenditure. I had part-time help with salaries and book-keeping, which lightened the burden enormously, and eventually I was able to carry most of the essential facts  in the back of my mind.

I also found that planning exhibition budgets could be unexpectedly engaging. There were various options which would be discussed with artists or their agents; individual artworks could be transported from different locations, which was expensive, or there might be a single consignment from one place, which was more reasonable. Limits on size and weight of individual pieces could be agreed if necessary, and occasionally, when artists were open to the possibility, works might be transported in soft wrappings,  without crates, which would save money. Sometimes, when budgets were really tight, exhibitions would be composed only of small pieces that could be fitted into one or two boxes. As I grew in confidence over the years, these discussions and arrangements became more enjoyable and less of a worry.

Another aspect of gallery administration that I had to learn was how to collaborate with a Board and, as a Director,  how to work closely with colleagues. This was not something I had done before, and it was harder than I anticipated. I took a brief course in management, which was not particularly illuminating, although it helped me to become aware of those facets of my personality that were likely to influence dealings with other people. I read books on administration, emotional intelligence, and what is now called ‘human resources’, but although they all had something to offer, they weren’t a great deal of help when it came to day-to-day interactions with colleagues and fellow-workers. It was really a matter of learning through trial and error, and by the end of my career I had worked out a set of strategies that seemed to work reasonably well. Now, with greater emphasis on personal and political correctness, it must be even more difficult to get such things right.  ‘Human resources’ is not, perhaps, a skill that young curators expect to have to master, but it is unavoidable, especially in smaller organisations where there is no personnel department.  Obvious, but worth emphasising,  was the need to maintain an atmosphere of trust in the workplace; if that was clear, mistakes, misunderstandings, and misjudgements could almost always be overcome. I tried to be conscious that the gallery was completely dependent on the hard work and good will of my colleagues, and that my decisions would be useless if they were not happily implemented by others. I did my best to share all that I knew.   

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Two themes, ‘Identity’ and ‘Transformation’, helped to frame the reasons why the shows were chosen. Over the course of time, resonances and echoes were noticeable, and some of the connections and oppositions became clear.  Eventually the themes faded away, to be replaced by other perspectives and emphases that emerged quite naturally.  Because the exhibitions tended to follow a train of thought that inevitably came to an end, there were moments when I suspected that I might be running out of ideas and inspiration, but it was never long before a new sequence would emerge and unfold.

I’d seen most of the exhibitions at the gallery before I went to work there, and many had impressed me. Two of them, ‘Ebb’ by Dorothy Cross, and ‘Jason’ by Anselm Kiefer, were particularly meaningful in terms of their content and the ways in which they changed perceptions of the space; both helped to set my curatorial agenda. Later, in my early years in charge, other significant shows revealed something important.

The first was a pollen piece by Wolfgang Laib. When he came to the gallery on an exploratory visit he asked what I’d like him to show. I had in mind a small and varied selection of  work, but Wolfgang wanted something much simpler - a single pollen piece in the middle of the floor in the cavernous space, with all the windows concealed. It was the first time I’d ever seen such a reduced and elemental installation in the gallery, and I was amazed at the strength of its impact; after that I was never much concerned about stripping exhibitions back to a bare minimum if that seemed desirable or appropriate.

The second was Marlene Dumas’ exhibition of paintings and drawings that took place not long afterwards. In contrast to Wolfgang’s restraint, Marlene was uninhibited,  adopting an expansive and intuitive way of hanging a show that I hadn’t seen before. Frequently engaging in discussion with the technical crew, she listened to their opinions carefully, as well as to mine. Then she moved swiftly,  juxtaposing pieces that had nothing in common but a felt connection, and, to my surprise, attached a series of unframed large drawings to the main wall with a hammer and pins. This broke all the rules I had learned in the past, but the consequent small holes in the corners, as well as others that had been made in the studio, didn’t stop a major museum from subsequently purchasing them. Pinning unframed works on paper to the wall later became commonplace in contemporary art exhibitions, but I’d never seen it done before. Many other shows revealed to me fresh or different ways of installing, such as Tal R’s ‘maximal’ hang of paintings from floor to ceiling, and Mike Nelson’s ‘fake’ installation in the main space, with the ‘real’ show in place behind false walls. Gabriel Orozco’s simple suspended installation was radical, as was Christian Boltanski’s covering of the main gallery floor with ‘lost property’, but Wolfgang’s and Marlene’s exhibitions influenced me most strongly.

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I always enjoyed the day or two - it was seldom more, unless we were repainting the walls - when the gallery was completely empty, resting in suspension between the departure of one show and the arrival of the next. The experience was cleansing and full of quiet expectation. Nevertheless, as many have remarked, the gallery is an imposing and somewhat overbearing place. In its earliest form, it had a brown floor carpet, movable felted seating, and fabric-covered partitions that hung from the ceiling and could be reconfigured to suit different exhibitions.  The walls, built with clearly delineated cement blocks, had tall narrow windows that were protected with heavy diagonal metal bars. Although architecturally distinguished in some respects, its combination of brutalist architecture and 1970s interior design dated quickly and was unsuited to many contemporary exhibitions. Step by step, starting with the Kiefer show, the room was taken back to basics, with some of its obvious weaknesses either removed or disguised, and slowly it became reasonably acceptable from an aesthetic point of view, even though there was often discussion about how it might be made a more beautiful space. Best suited to large sculpture and installations, it was never easy to show small work there, particularly as exhibitions would be viewed as a whole and at a glance from a height, as visitors approached along the balcony and descended into the main room. In its favour, however, it had a strong and distinctive character that was impossible to ignore; many artists came to like the gallery space after being there for a while, even though most found it challenging.

My first experience of being in charge of an exhibition at the gallery was not as straight-forward as I might have wished. The show, already scheduled when I arrived, was an exhibition by Howard Hodgkin, whose paintings I knew and liked, but its installation was fraught with unforeseen difficulties; with more experience I would have taken these drawbacks in my stride, but at the time it was gruelling. It all worked out well, though; Howard was happy when he left, and so was I. Following years brought about several such incidents, one or two of them fairly serious, but they all ended reasonably amicably. As in many situations in life, common sense and a willingness to compromise opened the way to solutions.
 

When it looked as though the artist and I were going to disagree on how to hang or install an exhibition, I’d always say that we should work on the assumption that we both wanted to present the art to its best advantage, adding that, if it came to deadlock, the artist’s choice would prevail. Sometimes I’d also suggest that just as I would learn from the process, the artist might enjoy seeing how the work subtly changed its meaning and effect in a different gallery and exhibition programme, and in the context of a particular curator’s taste. An incident with Peter Doig illustrates the point. He had brought a small painting as a ‘filler’, and to his surprise I proposed that we might place it in a prominent position with plenty of space around it. We asked the two technicians who were helping to hang the show what they thought, and when they agreed that it was strong enough to hold its own, Peter was happy to consent.  In contrast, Luc Tuymans adopted a  different attitude. He made it clear at the outset that he wasn’t very interested in a curator’s views and opinions, and that he intended to install the exhibition himself. From time to time I would go and tell him that the show was looking fine, but he paid little attention. There weren’t many pieces in the exhibition, but he tried more or less every combination of them. It was intriguing to watch, and the result was impressive.
 

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The successful installation of exhibitions is a skill, largely intuitive, that has to be developed in relation to the characteristics of particular rooms and galleries.  I very much enjoyed learning how to hang or install shows, and gradually, informed by the views and responses of artists, I developed a particular way of working, making use of negative space and syncopated rhythms, often placing by eye instead of by rule. This became simpler  and more effective with practice. I grew to like the resonance of emptiness,  off-beat and interesting juxtapositions, and occasional inversions of conventional aesthetic rules. In the past I’d seen most exhibitions installed with an emphasis on balance, symmetry, and neutrality; individual works were displayed without much regard for their relationship to the space, and in the case of paintings the intention was to create a series of pictorial ‘windows’ into which viewers could gaze. In museums, chronology and consistency of subject-matter were important too.  In contrast, I became more interested in putting together exhibitions in which visual relationships and their positions in the space were almost as important as the individual objects.

This approach was influenced by ‘installation’ art, and probably by the realisation that much contemporary work didn’t lend itself particularly well to close scrutiny.  Before long I found reflections of this way of hanging in other galleries, where it seemed to have become a self-conscious style, not the result of thinking and feeling through different possibilities in specific circumstances. In due course, after I had found ways to make our difficult space ‘work’ with different kinds of exhibitions, the tricks became a little too predictable, and even when the overall effect was appealing,  I sometimes found it unconvincing. As a consequence, I eventually went back to simpler ways. Avoiding precise measurements and allowing for small discrepancies in height and gaps,  a more relaxed and natural attitude led to subtle visual variations and movements that were perceptible but not immediately obvious.

When I started at the gallery it was usual to work deep into the evenings while setting up exhibitions, a practice that I followed for a while but eventually abandoned.  We also rarely did much technical work on opening days, preferring to have everything in place long before visitors arrived. This structured way of installing suited most artists, but a few preferred to work for as long as they could.  Koo Jeong-a, for instance, who made much of her exhibition in the gallery during the installation period, liked to be left alone  after we all went home so she could concentrate on working without any interruptions. Because she sometimes came in late, we were told not to touch anything when we arrived for work, and to keep the ongoing installation exactly as she had left it, including all the tools, scraps of paper, random objects and detritus on the floor.  This gave rise to an amusing situation on the day of the opening. Scaffolding had been left in place so Jeong-a could use it on the final evening, and on the next day we didn’t move or dismantle it, following her instructions. The artist didn’t appear and couldn’t be reached, so with some trepidation I decided to leave it where it was.  When Jeong-a eventually turned up, the opening already underway, she was puzzled and asked why it hadn’t been stored; when I explained what had happened she laughed. The scaffolding stayed where it was for the rest of the evening.

The first day of  an exhibition, following an intense period of installation, was often an anticlimax, the start of a period of office-work and administration that extended until the show closed, when the cycle began again. Sometimes, however, daily checks would bring you into close and pleasurable contact with the work again. In Toshikatsu Endo’s exhibition, one of his sculptures was a circle of charred black poles, their top ends hollowed and filled with water; every day I was expected to remove dust from their surfaces and, if necessary, refill the hollows to the brim. This meditative exercise was a wonderful way to start the morning, and it provided a useful opportunity to spend time with the work.  My perception and understanding of exhibitions usually altered as the weeks went by. Some seemed to become stronger and sustained their interest; others didn’t. I  also came to realise that most shows could readily be installed successfully in several ways, and I often wished that we could take everything down halfway through the exhibition and start again - not because the original installations were weak or wrong, but in order to accentuate different characteristics of the art and to create new relationships between the pieces.

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It wasn’t common to have serious disagreements with artists, but there were one or two confrontations. I had to learn to be careful about how much to reveal to artists about exhibition budgets and other financial matters, because the complications that arose tended to be about money. There were other topics that could be problematic too, such as the design of invitations and publications, or the content of exhibitions, and unfortunately there were occasional personality conflicts. In the early years I struggled through these challenges as best I could, but as I gained in experience I was better able to avoid or overcome them. I found, for instance, that it was often possible to wait before making a firm commitment to an artist if I had any early doubts about the project, to be somewhat vague about budgets if they later became an issue, or to postpone an exhibition indefinitely if a potential crisis loomed on the horizon. I rarely had to cancel a show, and then only in cases when the artist concerned was unlikely to suffer much from the consequences, usually because there were plans in place for forthcoming exhibitions elsewhere.

The question of whether or not it would be helpful to draw up contracts with artists was discussed at Board level on several occasions, and I talked to colleagues abroad about the wisdom or otherwise of implementing them. It was eventually decided that legal contracts would tie down both sides unnecessarily, and that they would remove the freedom to renegotiate the situation informally were there a need to do so. The artist and I, and usually their agent, would talk through details of the exhibition at the outset, and a reasonably flexible agreement would normally be set down in writing. This process may now have become more formal, as full ‘transparency’ is the norm, with possible claims for compensation when there are mistakes or disputes, but at the time it seemed appropriate. A handful of artists did request contracts, usually to guarantee dates and the payment of fees, but discussions dealt adequately enough with those issues.

In the gallery’s early days, fees were not always considered necessary because the exhibition itself, often in combination with a new publication, was thought to be sufficient, but progressively, with encouragement from the Arts Council, reasonable fees were expected and provided. It was never easy to be completely fair about payment; sometimes artists asked for money for materials and fabrication of work, and such requests, when related to installations, were taken seriously and often agreed. A few artists thought of our modest contributions as tokens of goodwill; one asked for cash and stuffed it into his back pocket; another went shopping and bought an expensive handbag. Most, however, appreciated and perhaps needed the fee. As a rule of thumb, when it came to a decision as to whether or not the gallery should pay for the making or fabrication of new work, I felt that if a piece of art could be taken away and sold after a show, it wasn’t our responsibility to pay for it. There were exceptions, but in days when the majority of exhibitions consisted of paintings, relatively conventional sculpture, and photographs, that position didn’t seem unfair.

A related question was the sale of work during exhibitions. Some colleagues abroad had formal agreements with the artists’ commercial galleries about taking percentages, but in my experience they were often pointless. On the few occasions when I was aware that work sold during one of our shows we received no payment at all, and it is possible that occasional sales happened without my knowing about them. The issue didn’t bother me greatly; because the gallery was publicly funded I didn’t feel that selling art was  part of its purpose, and I was happy to leave it to others. I sometimes suggested to artists that in the event of a substantial sale they might wish to give a small piece to the university’s collection, but as far as I know that only happened once or twice.

As with so many transactions in life, trust and respect were at the core of congenial agreements. A degree of friendship helped too. Before email took over most business proceedings, I would often have lengthy and enjoyable conversations with artists on the telephone. This could give rise to some odd requests and discussions, as when James Lee Byars, then living permanently in a hotel near Cairo, asked me to write a text, summing up all my knowledge of the world, that could be inscribed on the surface of a sphere, but normally we focused on general talk about art and the art world, and how work for the exhibition was progressing. All of this was helpful background to the time spent with artists when they came to install their shows, and to the texts that would be written for publications.

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I developed stronger relationships with some commercial galleries than with others, and although, once in a while,  this gave rise to negative comments, reasons for doing so were straightforward. Sometimes my curatorial interests coincided with those of particular galleries, which meant that I might show a significant proportion of their artists over a number of years. A few were especially helpful, but other than occasional support with openings or publications, we never received any financial incentives to show an artist’s work. The most you would hope for was co-operation over transport costs. Once or twice I brought complete exhibitions directly from commercial galleries abroad, but this was simply because consolidated transport from a single location was all we could afford. Sometimes we would be asked to return art to different locations at our expense, but as far as I recall, we never did.

The gallery’s reputation was such that most requests to show work would be taken seriously, although they were not always successful. The more celebrated artists, as well as the most fashionable, were often beyond our reach because we didn’t have the prestige or resources with which to attract them. Nevertheless, if they had nothing left to achieve or prove, and if our gallery could afford to transport and insure their work,  well-known artists would often consider  requests seriously, especially if they sensed that the interest was genuine. I could often assess the gallery’s status when asking about an artist who was in vogue; I would know, by the tone of their agents’ responses, just how we were perceived.
   
Commercial galleries liked to offer us exhibitions by  artists who were either young and unproven or finding it difficult to show at more celebrated institutions. Sometimes their suggestions were interesting and appealing; more often they weren’t. In any event, it is rare for a commercial gallery to convince a curator to show an artist who isn’t already familiar and admired, although this can sometimes happen. Curators prefer to believe that they’re independent and well-informed; understandably, they like to ‘discover’ relatively unknown artists who later become successful.

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During my first few years at the Gallery I aspired to collaborations and connections with other colleagues and institutions, both at home and abroad. They helped to establish friendly relationships; artists tended to like them; and they occasionally saved money. The Arts Council approved, too, and in that light once arranged meetings between all the public galleries in Dublin so they would share information about their exhibition programmes.  The idea, a good one, was to discuss plans and objectives, but the meetings soon foundered, and the scheme faded away. In time I discovered that collaborations with other galleries were not always as clear or mutually beneficial as I had imagined. Joint ventures were often determined by the self-defined status and ambition of collaborating institutions, and this meant that unspoken hierarchies quickly emerged. For example, I found that comparable galleries abroad were often happy to work with for us on exhibitions that they had initiated, but were much less enthusiastic about anything I proposed, even though, on several occasions, colleagues subsequently  followed up on those ideas and worked on them independently. It is quite possible that I unconsciously did the same. Nor did collaborations always save money. Budgets for shared exhibitions tended to be based on the needs of the gallery that conceived the project, and although there was usually some room for manoeuvre, the shows were rarely any cheaper than arranging them yourself, especially when the project was initiated by a larger and better-funded organisation. Similarly, the savings derived from sharing exhibitions with galleries that were smaller or worse-off than us were seldom enough to justify the extra work and responsibility that ensued, so when such collaborations happened they were mainly instigated by goodwill.


Not all collaborations involved other galleries. An exhibition with the twins Christine and Irene Hohenbüchler, who were interested in multiple authorship and working creatively with people outside the art world, was a good example. Their project in Dublin, most of it realised on-site with people with disabilities, was gently anarchic, and it either delighted or dismayed almost everybody involved, as well as many of those who saw it. A catalogue was shared with other galleries abroad, but the show, as well as another modest publication, was our own. On another occasion we helped to arrange a residency in Cork for Lois Weinberger.  His work was eccentric and ecological; on an early visit to the gallery he told me that he painted traditional icons, having learnt to do so at a Greek monastery, and I laughed, thinking that he was making a joke. When he arrived to install the show he brought me one as a present, and we included it in the exhibition. It was positioned close to a window that had sprung a leak, so we wrapped it in plastic. He also showed several pieces that he had made during the residency, one of them made from a glass sphere of the kind that usually contains artificial flowers and is seen in Irish graveyards. Lois, however, had filled his globe with mud from the Cork estuary. One day it exploded in the gallery, and when Lois came back from lunch I told him what happened. He smiled, but said nothing, and I went out to find a replacement.  

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When I took up the job at the gallery,  distinguished exhibitions curated by previous directors had ensured that most Irish artists wanted to show there, and although its status was to change after the foundation of the Irish Museum of Modern Art and the development of other programmes of contemporary art around the country, this remained true.  Accordingly,  I never found it difficult to find good Irish artists to take their place in the programme beside their international counterparts;  their exhibitions were always accomplished,  sometimes excellent, and many of them, of different generations, became good friends. It would be inappropriate, perhaps, to mention any names here. I also tried to ensure that the programme maintained a reasonable balance between men and women, and included minorities as well as a spread of different media. It was hard to be sure what people really thought of the mix, but I wasn’t aware of any serious complaints.

In the early 1990s, however, there was some controversy about a perceived emphasis on ‘minimal’ and ‘installation’ art from abroad. There were grumbles and murmurings, and even a brief period of correspondence in ‘The Irish Times’ about the gallery’s exhibition policy; one well-known artist remarked, without obvious irony, that Douglas Hyde, the Irish president after whom the gallery was titled, would have been troubled by what was being done in his name.  This was hard to understand, as we hadn’t shown anything that could have been considered confrontational or controversial, and today the same art would be regarded as conservative. The brief public debate was probably more of a comment on what was excluded than on what was actually being shown.

I hoped that exhibitions would be visited, liked, and favourably reviewed, but popularity was never a goal; I preferred to have a modest amount of visitors who enjoyed and were engaged by a show than a larger number who saw the exhibition but had little interest in it. It was not a view, though, that was always shared by the University or the Arts Council; higher attendance figures and greater effort expended on achieving them were considered a priority. I understood this but didn’t agree with it. My belief was that the purpose of funding galleries with public money was to enable exhibitions to take place that probably wouldn’t have been achievable otherwise, and that people who needed or wanted to see them would find their way to the gallery. Society pays for many activities that don’t appeal to minorities, and in turn, it is not unreasonable to expect support for minority interests that don’t have wide appeal.  I wasn’t sure that it was a public gallery’s duty to find ‘new audiences’ or to convince people that its exhibitions were interesting. Fortunately, our most popular exhibitions attracted substantial numbers of visitors of their own accord. The number of shows we held varied, but at best we showed six or seven annually in each of the two galleries.

There were occasions when, out of obligation, necessity, or opportunism, I worked with artists with whom I wouldn’t normally have collaborated.  Their exhibitions were all satisfactory, but I usually felt that something was lacking, and it is probable that the artists sensed that I was less than fully committed to them. What I learnt from these experiences was that it is almost always a good idea, at least insofar as it is possible, to follow your heart when choosing exhibitions. From time to time I selected shows that I thought other people might enjoy more than me, but this strategy wasn’t especially effective either.  Most of our successful exhibitions came about because I really wanted to see them happen, believing that there would be other people who would feel the same way, even if the artists weren’t well known or  admired.

Two events, both far from the gallery’s main focus, made that clear. The first was the visit of a group of Tibetan monks who came to the gallery to make a large mandala out of sand. The art world didn’t like the exhibition very much, but the public felt differently, and it was by far the best attended show that was ever held at the gallery.  Without any advertising and long before the existence of social media,  the success of the mandala developed effortlessly through word-of-mouth recommendations. We had a generous sponsor, and the project, which involved bring four monks from India, putting them up for about a month and making a substantial financial contribution to their monastery, was not impossibly expensive. On the final day of the exhibition, before the mandala was ceremonially destroyed and its sand poured into the Liffey, our public donations box filled up so quickly that it had to be emptied several times in a matter of hours, which astonished the monks. The second, which took place many years later, was a performance by the musician Cat Power. Several people in the music business whom I consulted discouraged the idea, as she was known at the time for her temperamental and unreliable performances, but I went ahead nonetheless, because it was something that I really wanted to do.  Every ticket was sold within hours, and not only was Chan Marshall (Cat Power) extremely warm and friendly, but her music, performed in candlelight on a rainy autumn evening, captivated the audience. It was like having a favourite musician play for friends at home. Both these events helped to define the gallery’s image and ethos for a long time afterwards.

*

I was uncertain of the benefit of too much explanation of contemporary art. I knew that a certain amount of prior knowledge is helpful when viewing exhibitions, just as it is with any other subject or activity, and I was aware that public galleries have an obligation to help visitors understand or approach difficult work. On the other hand, I believed that most of us have a basic grasp of the aesthetic codes that prevail in our own cultures, and that there were very few, if any, exhibitions in the gallery that would be incomprehensible to visitors who were prepared to open their minds and sensibilities to the encounter.  I also thought that facile interpretation weakened aesthetic experience, and I wasn’t convinced by the frequent assertion, often by people who worked in museums and galleries, that any response to contemporary art is as good and valid as the next. Understanding usually takes some effort.

Nevertheless, there were talks, lectures, and discussion groups to back up the exhibition programme. Their intention, not always realised, was to share, not to tell, teach, or instruct. We also held regular talks and discussions with artists  before their exhibitions opened, and while many in our audiences may have been hoping looking for explanations or revelations, more often they were offered something else. A few conversations had a psychoanalytic slant; one or two were combative; others were opportunities for the artist to deliver a solo performance. Scarcely any were dull. Jockum Nordström, for instance, was so good-natured that his laughter and jokes made the occasion more like a cheerful chat round a campfire than a formal event, but it was greatly enjoyed.

My scepticism about excessive explanations of art was drawn from personal experience. When visiting museums and galleries I have always been tempted to read labels and explanatory notes before looking at the art itself, and I know I’m not alone in this; I’ve seen bigger crowds in rooms containing introductory information than in the exhibitions themselves. Most of the shows in question posed no obvious problems of interpretation, so the popularity of the explanatory material was possibly due to insecurity,  a need for a reassuring and over-arching narrative. It has now become commonplace to find major exhibitions full of visitors holding audio-guides to their ears, listening to commentary that may be helpful from one perspective, but is nonetheless diminishing from another. 

With regard to 'mentoring', which was then encouraged by the Arts Council,  I tried to look at the issue from a different perspective. We offered occasional year-long studentships with stipends and responsibilities, hoping that this would help young curators to develop some grounding and practical knowledge. The successful candidates turned out to be excellent. Nor was I enthusiastic about the idea of ‘volunteers’, people who were prepared to work for nothing in order to gain experience in what is often called ‘the cultural sector’;  I thought it was important to pay our student helpers and part-time assistants.  Once or twice I proposed to the University that a degree or diploma course in curatorial studies night be set up in conjunction with the Gallery, but this was never seriously considered.

When applying for funding grants, it became increasingly important to emphasise what was variously called ‘education’, ‘outreach’, and ‘audience development’. This was doubtless well-intentioned, but I also suspected that it was partly motivated by the view that expenditure on the arts, being perceived as ‘elitist’, had to be justified in terms of definable social and economic benefits.  In our case I felt that this was unnecessary, believing that people who were interested in contemporary art would find their way to the exhibitions, while others, not our main audience, would be gladly received and made welcome. The gallery was a quiet haven in the midst of the city’s and university’s bustle, and this, at least to me, was one of its most important characteristics . We counted our visitors, and the annual attendance figures,  more than those of some of our peers and less than others,  were always respectable.  I agreed with the well-known artist who once said, when questioned about the issue, ‘ art may be elitist, but it is an elite that anyone can join’.

*

In the art world, as elsewhere, it was thought important to ‘network’ with colleagues and artists. Exhibition openings and dinners, conferences, art fairs, and biennales could be used to elevate the profile of your institution, meet interesting people, and establish contacts that might prove helpful or beneficial. At first I joined in with some eagerness, and many of the gatherings I attended were congenial. Nevertheless, disposition towards social occasions is coloured by taste and personality, and in my own case I rarely felt at ease in these situations, finding the gallery’s own openings and celebrations just as difficult to handle as those elsewhere. More importantly, the conversations I held with artists and colleagues on those occasions were hardly ever fruitful and never essential. ‘Networking’ is worthwhile for some people, but not for all. I often found it exhausting. Once, while walking in the woods near my home after a period of installation and an exhibition opening, I lay down beside a path and fell asleep. I woke to find two passers-by looking at me with concern and alarm, wondering if I were still alive.

Trips abroad to see exhibitions and visit artists were pleasurable and instructive, but as the years went by the benefits diminished. I became steadily more conscious of the costs of travel -  financially, environmentally, and otherwise - and the returns grew less. Eventually I  found travelling valuable mainly because it would enable me to spend time at museums, where I could engage with art that had enduring quality,  which was an important contrast to the novelty that dominated contemporary art. I also realised that during brief trips to see current exhibitions, biennales, or art fairs I usually found myself drawn to fashionable work or that of familiar artists, mainly because I didn’t have the time or attention to discover anything else.

Something similar happened with visits to artists’ studios. As a young curator I liked them very much, but I came to conclude that although such visits might be rewarding in many ways, they had a downside too. Better-known artists sometimes made me feel that I had an obligation to go to see them in order to demonstrate commitment and credibility;  younger artists often gave the impression that I could give them something they badly wanted if only I chose to do so. Neither feeling was comfortable. The most pleasant time to visit an artist’s studio was when you had already agreed to work together and there was a possibility of seeing work that would be part of the show; such occasions could be relaxed and intimate, rather like chatting in the kitchen before having a meal together. I also noticed that many artists didn’t much like studio visits, considering them necessary opportunities to show their work to curators, but that they also harboured a suspicion that not all visitors had much interest in what they were seeing. There was often some truth to this, because it was not unusual for curators to help to account for their travel abroad by making as many studio visits as they could.

I found that it was usually more productive to invite artists to come to the gallery, where they could see the space and discuss what they would like to show there, and it was during those visits that I was best able to get to know them, developing a degree of familiarity that was often followed up with conversations on the telephone. Once a friendly relationship was established, talk would usually be all-embracing, and when, as often happened, there were public talks with artists before their openings, I could share much of what I had learnt about them and their interests with the audience. It was like marking a transition from a personal project to the public domain. Most productive relationships with artists tended to unfold without special effort, and not infrequently they turned into friendships. I was asked many times how I managed to come up with new ideas about art and artists without much travelling or ‘networking’, and my answer was to say that if you are genuinely committed to what you are doing, unexpected ways of moving forward tend to open up naturally. Conversations and friendships with artists provided many such opportunities, and I would frequently ask them for suggestions about work they thought I might enjoy; often their replies would spark unexpected developments .   
 

*

In major art institutions,  even those with substantial resources, fundraising is normally a priority; I used to hear stories about how curatorial proposals for interesting and original shows were turned down because their projected income, based on sponsorship, tickets, and sales, was not sufficient. This was less frequently the case in more modest galleries, whose aim was to avoid over-expenditure, and where it was always hard to find any kind of income other than an annual revenue grant. As an inexpert curator I sought advice from an experienced fundraiser at an important museum; she told me that funders and sponsors almost always wanted something in return for their support, and that it was important to discover, early in negotiations, exactly what was expected. I learnt, too, that substantial sponsorship would often be dependent on conditions that were not always easy to fulfil. Smaller gifts,  predictably, tended to come with fewer demands.  

When I first began to look for financial support for the gallery, the most prominent sponsors in Ireland were banks and companies that sold alcohol and tobacco. I was particularly uncomfortable with the latter, so I decided not to approach them, and the banks weren’t interested in what we were doing.  The commercial support that sometimes came our way, while welcome, was more symbolic than valuable.  The most straight-forward funders were governmental arts departments, private foundations, and charities, both at home and abroad, which sometimes provided moderate sums of money that would help to enable exhibitions to take place. Over time, though, even this changed; there was growing stress on the perceived ‘ambition’ and ‘visibility’ of projects, which made it more likely that weighty exhibitions with big budgets would receive assistance. It was important, nevertheless,  to project - or, more realistically, hope for - extra grants or subsidies, as they were always attractive to major funding bodies, but they often turned out to be unattainable, or more limited than anticipated.

The 2008 global financial crisis  led to pressure on publicly-funded institutions to raise money for themselves and to reduce their dependence on state or public support. In Ireland, however,  it was unrealistic to expect art organisations rely on local sponsorship and philanthropy, so many institutions decided to rent their premises to commercial companies on an occasional basis in order to show ‘initiative’ and earn some extra cash. In my experience this often caused complications, and I was generally reluctant to hand over the gallery for anything other than events that were compatible with our programme.

*

There was a time when interesting graphic design helped to create a gallery’s identity. Every morning a handful of exhibition invitations and publications, varied and striking, would arrive in the post from around the world. In that context it seemed important to develop a graphic style that would convey and embody the gallery’s values and interests, and over a number of years this was to become another aspect of our programming and curating. It was a way of extending the gallery beyond its walls, and as such it was one of the ideas that gave rise to the later concept of  ‘Gallery 3’. Websites and social media didn’t then exist, so invitations and leaflets were sent out widely, both home and abroad, to remind people of what we were doing and how we were doing it.

Prior to the internet, exhibition catalogues were also one of the main sources of information about contemporary art, and they were valued by both artists and the public. Even simple publications were costly to produce, but it seemed important to keep publishing them, even though it wasn’t always easy to maintain good quality and value for money. Different designers, often guided by the artists, meant that there was no visual continuity between the catalogues;  each had a different budget, and while some sold well, others didn’t, and large numbers of them were left untouched in the storeroom for years afterwards. A longstanding practice that continued for a while after I became director, it was thought justifiable because the publications were considered to be a form of indirect payment to the artists.

Having decided that it might be fruitful to develop an overall style or visual language for our printed matter and publications,  it became obvious that in order to do this it would be necessary to work regularly with a single designer. Inspired by some of the books and catalogues that were being produced in Europe, I also wondered if it would be a good idea to start printing abroad. With that in mind I began to work with a young Irish graphic designer, and for a number of years we had a very rewarding professional relationship. I was usually happy to be led by his ideas, and together we tried all kinds of graphic experiments, many of which were fun, innovative and effective.  As well as invitations, leaflets, and catalogues on individual exhibitions,  we also produced a handful of unusual publications, among them ‘the bread and butter stone’ and ‘Patmos’, which had some impact when they were first published. In due course our collaboration came to an end, after which I worked with several other designers, but never with the same degree of intensity.


The visual character of the gallery’s publications came to be even more sharply focused.  Based on a small hardback format that could be reconfigured internally to answer almost any aesthetic need,  this new strategy had obvious practical benefits. Costs remained relatively constant, and discussions about design were greatly reduced. The approach worked well; traditional but off-beat, the new style was often admired and sometimes copied. Not everybody thought it was a good idea; I was told that at a Dublin conference about art publishing, someone from a major international gallery bookshop picked up a copy of one our publications and remarked that it was a good example of how not to produce art books, because its visual restraint meant that no one would pick it up from a crowded bookshelf or table. This may have been so, but it didn’t take into account the fact that most of the catalogues were sold in or from the gallery, and that their cumulative effect was more than the sum of its parts. By the time it ended, the series included about sixty books and had continued for more or less a decade.

When our revenue funding was substantially cut, the gallery could no longer afford that style of publication, even though it was not particularly expensive, and a new design strategy became necessary. Another format came to mind,  influenced by a few little hardback books that we had produced in the same period as the earlier series.  It was a modest white paperback with a dust jacket, designed in house and printed digitally on demand, which would radically reduce costs. Just as Gallery 2 was conceived as an intimate space, I hoped that the new format might evoke associations with prayer or poetry books, and that the little publications, which were easily affordable, might be tucked casually into a visitor’s pocket without much thought. Pushing the ‘anonymity’ of the earlier series even further, they were identified only on their spines and had a small single image on the front cover. The books were popular, sold well, and because they were inexpensive it was possible to publish them for almost every main exhibition and sometimes on other occasions too. About the same time, and also for financial reasons, we reluctantly stopped producing the printed invitations and exhibition leaflets that had always been distributed free of charge. Our infrequent advertising, always in the art press, came to an end as well.

*

I was familiar with art writing before taking up the job. Besides a handful of art historical pieces, I had already written plenty of journalistic criticism and  some catalogue essays, so I continued to write regularly for gallery publications, my style gradually changing and evolving.  I wasn’t drawn to critical theory, but nor was I at ease with traditional descriptive writing or close formal analysis. Other perspectives were not obvious, but I had noticed that many artists were uncomfortable discussing their work in any depth or detail, and I’d discovered that one of the best ways of learning more from them was to talk about something else and not to spend too much time addressing the art directly. Often, in the public conversations I held with artists before their exhibitions opened, this was the approach I adopted. I began to move in that direction with art writing, choosing to explore the ideas and feelings that the work evoked, rather than attempting to describe or explain it. My essays became more intuitive and open-ended, which I enjoyed, but some artists preferred the theory and analysis that I had abandoned. It was a method of art writing, based on loose associations between disparate ideas, which was perhaps best suited to the more general topics and publications,  and it may also have been most effective in relation to the different tone and ideology of the writing that was then dominant in the art world.  The little white books provided a contrast to mainstream contemporary art values, which was suggested as much by their visual style as by the texts they contained.
   
This form of intuitive and relational thinking had been present in the exhibition programming before it was manifested in my writing, and it grew to have a direct effect on other gallery activities. Every now and then, using our savings, we expanded the reach of the exhibitions with music, occasional talks, and films. Cat Power, Sufjan Stephens, the Unthanks, Vashti Bunyan, and Jandek were among the musicians who played at the gallery;  writers  and others, including Adam Phillips and Rebecca Solnit, came to talk.  The events rarely had a direct connection to the exhibitions and  were not presented as normal ‘educational’ activities; they were intended, rather,  to have some resonance in the context of the programme. I also hoped that they would appeal to people who might not otherwise visit the gallery.  These occasions often came under the rubric of ‘Gallery 3’, a conceptual ‘space’ that included intermittent small exhibitions that took place outside the gallery, as well as several publications.  Gallery 3 projects, in all their variety, were chosen as deliberately as the exhibitions in Galleries 1 and 2.

*

The new millennium was marked by an exhibition of the work of Felix Gonzalez-Torres, which included a cascade of light-bulbs, stacks of printed material that visitors could take away, and an image of a solitary bird in the sky that was displayed on billboards around Dublin. The work was intended to convey a sense of  generosity and freedom. The year 2000 was also when Gallery 2, soon to play an important in the exhibition programme,  came into being. Its creation was straight-forward and relatively inexpensive, paid for by savings we accumulated after the debt had been cleared.  Instead of creating extra room by building, part of the existing storeroom and workshop was converted into a new exhibition space. The idea was simple; I had in mind a space that might recall a side-chapel in a church, quiet and contemplative, where we could hold exhibitions that would counterpoint those in the main gallery. I also liked the notion of taking ‘dead’ space and bringing it to life.  Gallery 2 turned out to be an approximate double cube, with a low ceiling, no natural light, and an imposing large door that could be configured in a variety of ways; it had an unassuming presence that didn’t detract from the main gallery,  high-walled and underground, which was often unkindly described as a ‘bunker’.

Gallery 2 was not conceived as an ancillary or ‘project space’ for younger or local artists; on the contrary, I thought that it would be interesting to invite some of the artists with whom we had already worked to come back and show there, asking them to respond to a particular theme, that of  ‘The Paradise’. The series ran for over a decade, encompassing about forty exhibitions, and most of the artists who took part in the project  responded to the theme imaginatively. Over time, however, the exhibitions lost momentum, and the prolonged sequence came to an end. Other possibilities soon appeared, among them ideas that I might not previously have had the confidence to pursue, such as exhibitions by relatively unknown ‘outsider’ or self-taught artists, as well as shows of crafts and ethnographic objects. Presented without much explanation, these unassuming and informal exhibitions made most sense in relation to those in the main gallery, their purpose being primarily to show handmade artefacts, usually simple and functional, as a contrast to the self-conscious reflexivity of most contemporary art.

Visitors seemed to enjoy the Gallery 2 shows, often more than those in Gallery 1. Diversity was crucial to their impact; they included a small but substantial group of paintings by Hilma af Klimt, visionary drawings by K.F. Schobinger, a vast collection of handmade envelopes by an elderly Japanese grandfather, curious walking sticks carved by Seanie Barron, varied collections of textiles from Japan and Africa, as well as from Ireland, Indian folk drawings and matchbox labels, Turkmen children’s clothes, Coptic fragents, and different kinds of pots and ceramics. I was sometimes told that the appeal of these objects was much stronger than that of the art in Gallery 1, and this may well have been true. I have no doubt, however, that the Gallery 2 shows gained much strength from their juxtaposition with the main exhibitions.

*

Once an exhibition was up, I always looked at it attentively over a period of days in order to determine what I thought of it. Formally, of course, I had to support all the shows, and in public contexts I always tried to be enthusiastic, even though my approval was not always heartfelt. It was important, though, to be truthful to yourself about whether or not you really appreciated a particular exhibition, and to decide if anything could have been done to improve it. There were very few shows at the gallery that I thoroughly disliked, but there were many that I didn’t find especially meaningful. Most were interesting and reasonably compelling;  a few yielded nourishment and interest that increased over time. I also learnt that my preconceptions rarely coincided with reality, which didn’t necessarily mean that exhibitions were weaker than I had hoped, but that they were not what I’d anticipated. Many different factors coloured their outcome.  I also realised that all one could expect from an artist was competence and commitment; anything more than that, such as inspiration or brilliance, was a bonus. I found that good one-person exhibitions rose above the intentions of both artist and curator,  taking on a life of their own; group shows, on the other hand, were usually reflections of a curator’s taste and ideas, and then subjected to practical parameters. In my own case, I enjoyed selecting them, but they seemed to lack the coherence and strength of the best solo exhibitions.  The displays of ethnographic or vernacular objects and images in Gallery 2 were a different matter; I felt very comfortable with their unassertive presence and, in any case, they weren’t ‘curated’ in the usual way.

Like most curators, I  kept an eye on what was happening in galleries and museums at home and abroad, and I was always keen to find out how my colleagues chose and installed shows.  Curiously, what struck me most forcefully about the galleries I visited, regardless of size or importance, was their atmosphere, and especially the amount of care and attention that had been invested in them. This didn’t necessarily coincide with the quality of the exhibitions.

Despite cordial relations with many of them, I didn’t learn much from fellow curators;  normally we would talk to each other only about everyday matters, seldom revealing much about the essence of things. I gathered more from conversations with artists, who would often tell you about the art they liked, what they thought about particular curators and institutions, and which exhibition programmes they respected. I knew that they would have similar discussions with colleagues elsewhere, so I hoped that they had learnt something from our collaborations, and from the experience of hanging or installing their work in our particular space. Sometimes artists took a long time to adjust to the peculiar proportions of Gallery 1;  a few, however, were so much at ease with working in galleries all over the world that they were able to install their work fast and expertly, without much concern about my opinions, or those of anyone else.

I occasionally listened to talks and read articles by curators about what they often called their ‘practice’. Most referred principally to intellectual and conceptual matters; they seemed to have risen above practical considerations.  I was never sure how I matched up against them. Although I considered myself  to be competent, I frequently sensed marked differences between us; successful curators usually appeared to be more motivated, better-informed, and focussed than me; their relentless search for new and thought-provoking art seemed to be beyond my ability to keep pace.  My own taste did keep developing, albeit slowly, but I was aware how often I unconsciously measured current developments and fashions against older and more fundamental aesthetic experiences; few of my core values had changed. I knew that longstanding interests and influences, generally formed in early adulthood,  had deeply affected my choice of exhibitions.

I tried to work with at least one well-known artist a year, but while there were many whose work I appreciated and would like to have exhibited, our increasingly slender resources meant that the possibility of collaborating with them was remote.  Curiously,  this realisation was not troubling, and nor did I feel that I would have preferred to work on a larger scale. The limited scope and ambition of our exhibitions suited me, and I was content to work in a particular space in a specific context, with an adequate amount of funding, and, most importantly, with the independence to select shows that I thought would be interesting and engaging. I rarely had to explain what I was doing, but because I kept tight control over the budgets and had  researched the work and reputations of the artists whom I invited to show,  I knew I could provide plausible explanations for everything in the programme if I were asked to do so. Besides, much of the thinking behind the exhibitions was explained in the gallery’s publications and catalogues.

*

I didn’t know of many renowned contemporary artists who addressed the subjects of goodness and beauty,  but one of them was Robert Adams. His photographs, writings and correspondence were a guiding example, and they strengthened my determination not to be swayed unduly by fashion or peer pressure.  I tried to keep a balance between choosing exhibitions that might be stimulating or challenging and others that reflected values which I found deeper and more nourishing, but in my final years I  was increasingly inclined to think of the gallery as somewhere that might encourage  reflection and contemplation. I steadily returned to the influence of the Indian aesthetics that I had first studied as an undergraduate, coming to the conclusion that benign inner values and beauty were at the heart of the art that I wanted to experience and share with others.  It became more evident to me that it is important to make decisions with the heart rather than with the head,  basing them, as often as possible, on  a feeling of attentive and affectionate ‘presence’. I remain convinced that we live in a universe in which thoughts and feelings are the source of  ‘reality’, of that which we believe to be true.

After twenty-five years as director, I would happily have continued, but it became obvious that there were others who wanted renewal. It may not have been coincidental that cultural transformations were taking place in society, changes that challenged the liberal individualism which I reflected. Egalitarian values were in the ascendant. Besides, my curatorial inclination would have been to move even further away from  mainstream contemporary art;  as well as the unconventional shows in Gallery 2,  comparatively traditional  painting and photography had begun to dominate the programme in Gallery 1.

Curatorial work was usually enjoyable and absorbing; I miss it. Nonetheless, although I was uncomfortable about leaving, I’ve adjusted to the change.  I still respond warmly to some current art, but most of it interests me less than before; I now enjoy reading, gardening, and walking,  and  I’m drawn, as always, to the countryside,  to classic and overlooked art, music, good films, oriental rugs, and spirituality. Above all, I delight in quietness and stillness, even though they’re not always easy to achieve. In short, although I’m reluctant to say so, it may have been the right time to move on. The essence of what I valued as a curator stays with me, both in the recollection of the art that touched me and in memories of artists who were generous with their passions and talents. More than ever, I treasure curiosity, joy, wonder, and what Keats once called ‘negative capability’; I still firmly believe that we should search and yearn only for what magnifies our spirits.  More prosaically, I also recall how fruitful and pleasant it was to work with supportive friends and colleagues, and I’m grateful to them. Inspiration and good fellowship are the lot of a fortunate curator.