PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE

Interviewing Nazgol Ansarina

Interviewing Nazgol was a good experience, I’ve learnt a lot from my mistakes. Listening back through the audio I realised I made a lot of agreeing noises and I was trying too hard to get her to like me.

I was so nervous in the lead up to this interview. I spent a few days trying to think of questions, asking friends and family members what I should ask her, because for some reason everytime I’d think about the interview my mind would go blank. In the end everything was so rushed I forgot to take my wallet or my painted canvas book. I had to get my dad to send it to me via Iranian Uber. And in the meantime, Nazgol bought me my coffee and I was very embarrassed about that. I had a few weird questions shoddily writing on my ipad. None of which were really hitting the mark on what I wanted to know. Sometimes I feel a big disconnect between my feelings and the languages I need to convey them. Anyway, Nazgol was really cool. And with my minimal input she answered all my questions with such elegance and detail. I got so much out of this interview. But that was definitely thanks to Nazgol.

She told me that it would have been a real shame if I hadn’t shown her the canvas book. She gave me some good feedback and liked how I had it wrapped in some unprimed canvas to protect it. She liked the object-ness of it and the act of flicking through the pages. At that moment it reminded me of my dad’s ja namazi prayer mat.

In the future I will be more prepared. I would like to research more about interviewing by listening to podcasts and reading other interviews the artist may have already done. I gained a lot from the experience and the whole time I was weary of my lack of confidence in farsi. There were certain words that I had to learn as she explained and this was a motivation for me to improve on my farsi. I like my casual way of speaking to the interviewee. If I were to do this again I would keep this same relaxed atmosphere. Although I'm not sure if this was relaxed, I was pretty frantic because of my absent mind. Barein mind this interview came 2 days before my flight back and after a month abroad filled with I doubt she’ll wanna see me again. But, it does make me think if I would be more confident if it was an English speaking interview. How the experience could have differed.

Curating: Transitions

On the 19th of October Laura Porter, Lauren Mcnicoll and I had an exhibition at the Cave in Pimlico. This gave us the opportunity to curate our own show. I really enjoyed the curation process. I felt that me and Laura made a good team and have similar artistic visions. We received praise for the show. We gave space to small works and combined others in complementary ways. Finding the narrative between pieces creating visual journeys. The Cave staff were great and we made good connections with them. I even managed to land a potential gig for my mum selling her stained glass tealight holders there (hit me up if you reading this are interested).

The whole thing was artist lead and gave me a good understanding on how to organise such a group show. I created the poster. Also it gave me an idea of timelines. We started panning this exhibition 4 months prior and it took a while to gather all our material and liaise with the gallery staff.

In the room next to us, Artangle had hired the space for a screening which was good timing for us as the people waiting to go in would have to wait at our exhibition. To show in such close proximity to an established art organisation gave me a sense of seriousness. I was able to take myself and my art more seriously. I had some interests in my work, and a few of us are planning on putting on another show in 2023.

On the Committee for Church/Factory

I volunteered to be part of the marketing side of the exhibition committee, mainly focusing on branding and poster design with peers Marie and Titash.

This gave me the opportunity to sit at one level with my tutors. This was a new experience for me and I enjoyed working with the marketing team designing the poster. There were a few challenges when it came to deciding the name and some of the meetings we were missing a lot of key voices. I was happy that I was able to attend and have my voice heard as a representative of my fellow classmates. The poster design was a great success and Marie did a fantastic job on the design, with the help of me and Titash i feel like we made a good poster. It was nice working as a group of creatives and the end result was fantastic. Creating as a team had its challenges but overall our individual strength really shined through.

Church/factory installation:

During the installation at the exhibition, my whole series of work was site responsive which meant I had to be there everyday and wait till I could start painting. I think I built a good relationship with the curators and they were very happy with my work. Mark in the opening event told me how he wishes I took more control over the space and didn’t worry about asking them if I should paint somewhere or not. This has given me the confidence to not always be so polite in my positioning of wall paintings. And I will expand on this as I continue my journey as a professional artist.

Leading a Group crit with the 2nd year BA’s

This was a nice opportunity provided by Lana. Although it felt like we were given no debrief. I wasn't sure at what stage their paintings were supposed to be… What the students were told to focus on, whether it was to comment on the overall compositional skill vs the idea of the painting or if it was purely about concept and how that was expressed in the medium. So I found it hard to begin with. And we were only a group of 2 but the group expanded as more students came in and joined. It was meant to be a student lead crit. But, I found that everyone was too nice, no real critique or deep evaluation. So I tried to help. Also, I soon realised to just ask around the group how they felt about the work. This helped and also gave me a flashback to our MA crits, specially the first group crit we had … the tutor was asking others before making their own comment. I realised that doing this helped give me a second to collate my thoughts while also responding to the comments made by the group.

All in all I enjoyed the experience and was able to give the students advice to keep pushing their ideas. To keep working on their paintings, and paint them again with different techniques until they could reach a point where they could look back and decide at what point their work felt best to them. The students seemed surprised when I gave that feeling back and it was as though they had never been told to do that before. So that was really a moment I cherish from the experience.

After the crits were over, I spoke with one of the BA painting tutors. Who told me about the salary, how it works, and more of the logistics of the job. What paths could lead me to the position, which was very useful to know. He told me that the teaching part with the students is the fun part but there can be a lot of stress all in the background, the stress of the institution. This is something I hadn't really considered, all though I had seen teachers striking so I knew that there's still a lot of changes needed to be made to the institution. However teaching is something I am considering once I have more experience as a professional artist.

Future Plans/Concerns/General Thoughts

Worries about entering the art world:

I don't like the idea of being commodified as a British-Iranian artist, especially in the context of what's presently happening. I don’t want to create pieces for a western gaze. Or having to overly promote my ‘otherness’ for some people to fetishise over and like a trend it will become old once there's a new underrepresented repressed minority. During all these protests some interesting lights were shed og Shirin Neshat (insert the screenshots) And, I don't know, there's something that makes me uneasy about being part of stuff like these all Iranian or asian lead collectives promoting these voices. Like why does there have to be a special category? Why do I have to think and consider these things? And why does it feel like something I could use? Maybe I’m looking at this all wrong and rather cynically. Maybe I feel like an outsider, like I always have from both my people and the english. This is definitely rooted in my upbringing. My state of otherness was both present in the playground and at home. My mother, father and brother were all born in Iran, they experienced a war together, I have secondhand memories of them hiding under staircases during air raid sirens. So whether my worries are based in a, sort of, collective reality or my personal experience this will be something that I will have to carry into the art world with me until I find or make my own place. Maybe, I will feel accepted by the groups once I ask to participate or maybe I will isolate myself further due to some childhood trauma. I guess it’s important to note that the professional and personal lives of an artist are very intrinsically connected and I think it’s important to recognise that. I will be working on myself and hopefully will allow myself the agency to be the voice for those who may feel like me. I will also work extra hard not to let my ego take control of me.

Also I plan on creating a servus of paintings straight onto the walls of people's houses from images that they choose, kind of like a tattoo for your house.. £250 for smallest size and working up from there.

Upcoming opportunities

Bertha Artivism awards

I have the opportunity to sit as a part of the jury on the selection committee for Bertha Foundation’s second annual Artivism awards. “The Bertha Artivism Award is an opportunity for activist artists, arts collectives and organizations around the world to use the arts as a Call to Action – to nonviolently instigate measurable change in a community.” I have been helping Creative Director Adrian Kawaley-Lathan in the administration side of the awards and starting tomorrow I will be reading through the 41 proposals and start my judicating process. This is a fantastic opportunity for me to see the otherside of project proposals, to get an idea of how the selection process works and to also have a voice in selecting. The committee meeting will be held in the last week of November!

Swanfall Gallery