http://designobserver.com/feature/lisa-congdon/39265
Notes from podcast - BLACK
My annotation - BLUE
Lisa Congdon wanted to go into politics, that was the career path she was pursuing after leaving school. Studied history.
She questioned herself when she found herself miserable working in a law firm, she wanted to do something meaningful with her life. Gained a teaching certificate.
I think this is where Lisa Congdon's approach to her practice differs from Shrigley's. Congdon knows she wants to do something meaningful and to make positive changes but it takes her a while to find what that is. However Shrigley knows what he does, he puts his thoughts onto paper, and the effect this has on society is comes secondary.
Social change was something she was really interested in - education felt important to this.
Lisa Congdon went into teaching for a while, nurturing young minds. I do agree that education is important to making social change but maybe not in such a direct way as this. People are still being educated at all ages by what they see in public, what they read, what they watch on television so there are other means of educating people in the media. I feel like this form of education is more relevant to my topic at the moment.
She could give something back to the world - this is what made her feel good about herself. She is a sensitive person. Making an impact on other people is important to her.
This links to the argument of selfish and selfless work. By giving something back to the world you are being selfless in a way, however the selfish aspect is that this makes you feel good about yourself. It would be interesting to hear Congdon's opinions of money in relation to this. Would the situation become more selfish/selfless with payment.
When she became an artist she felt guilty because it felt like a selfish act and she wasn't giving back to the world.
This makes it sound like she saw art as something only for herself, a very introverted process.
Can social responsibility play a part in the way you conduct yourself as a business person as well as as a creative?
Finding what you want to do is about finding what makes you want to get out of bed in the morning.
"This is the dirty part of the business that no one ever talks about. All of the other stuff, making art, working with clients, promoting the business, etc, felt easy and fun. But I was in debt after years of careless spending while I had a decent paying full time job. I knew that if I was going to be self employed I needed to pay off my debt and become as adept as possible at managing my money."
Co-owned a shop/gallery - learned a lot of valuable business skills though this process.
Connecting with people all over the world at this point in time was easier than ten years previous but not as simple as it is today.
Tipping point - its not one single thing that propels you to success, people start to show and interest and it just grows from there.
'A collection a day' - Book ( a year long challenge )
Making a living out of being an artist becomes "a source of great controversy".
"People who have nothing to do with the exchange between you and those who would enjoy your work start to pass judgement. Money, they proclaim, bastardises both the process and the output."
If you're making money from your work then it is seen as far less pure and maybe you are driven by different motivations if you're doing commercial work.
This implies that making art for money makes the artwork itself corrupt. In relation to the 'Design for Social Change' essay, would producing artwork for no money also corrupt the work as a creative would may use this to promote themselves rather than the actual cause.
Lisa Congdon takes an 'I don't care' attitude to this and says she will still be true to her core values.
This is a similarity between Congdon and Shrigley. It is probably relevant to most practitioners with morals. It would be interesting to find examples of people who keep their personal morals separate from their creative practice, if there are any.
You need a strong sense of how much you deserve to be paid - you learn this as you go but having an agent to begin with is helpful money-wise.
"At some point somebody is going to realise that I don't really know what I'm doing or I sort of like taught myself how to do this. Like I'm not really a real artist, I'm sort of faking it."
What makes you 'a real artist'? Do you need structured training to be creative?
Own it as something worthwhile and as something we should be paid to do.
There is an element of 'shame' that you can't proclaim to be an artist until you have become successful, this is especially bad in women.
On reflection, there are some differences between Congdon and Shrigley's practices. Lisa Congdon talks a lot more about her desire to do something meaningful and make a difference which strongly relates to the concept of social responsibility in creatives. She also speaks about feelings of shame and guilt which I think connects to what Milton Glaser said about the status that comes with being an artist. I am starting to realise that maybe this 'status' comes with a certain pressure. I think it is interesting that people like Lisa Congdon can feel this pressure and are wanting to do the right thing. I can see that she still retains her core values however when you look at the work of David Shrigley and the attitude that comes across in the essay I analysed, I feel that he is less affected by this pressure of status and is going to remain true to what he believes and get across his own opinions.
There are elements of these notes which I feel would be more relevant to talk about on my PPP blog.
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