BTOTB GG08: Hosting an artwork

[Penny]

As someone who's always enjoyed the way that contemporary art provokes a response and sometimes makes you see things in a new light, I jumped at the chance of hosting an artwork at our home/office.
Then worried about the state of the garden itself!
I'm the first to admit that I'm no gardening expert, but over the years I've learned that, in extreme gardening (which is what you are engaged in on the seafront) it's less hassle to accept what likes growing in a very poor sandy soil. Not to mention coping with regular salt spray dowsings coupled with full-on gales (we take it for Edinburgh down here on the Prom!), plus the resident snails (things with small hard leaves, or grey hairy ones survive better than most). Apart from composting, cutting the grass and the odd bit of weeding, the garden grows despite us. It's a bit unkempt, but I like the way that contrasts and I think it softens a rather formal Georgian-style exterior.
There's nothing like an impending artwork to buck up the gardening effort and I have to admit that the garden has had more effort lavished on it in the last few weeks than it usually gets in a year. It is repaying the extra TLC handsomely, although the recent downpours have sadly devastated the roses.
There's a world of difference between going along to see exhibits in a gallery and engaging with an artist on the basics of siting their work in your garden. Fortunately 'our' artist: Anna Perch Neilsen liked the setting and was very diplomatic in describing the garden as 'mature' rather than the full overgrown untrammelled truth.
Anna liked the way that her huge "Topiary" panel could borrow from the garden so that it seems to continue beyond the edges. After much consideration and lots of measuring, she chose the site at the far end of the garden (when viewed from the Prom). At the time, I wondered whether a site closer to the Prom would give people a better view, but Anna was right: you need the distance to get the full effect of the panel blending into the garden. The painted path seems to lead you off into another dimension of the garden: a bit like the looking glass in Alice and Wonderland.
But choosing the site was just the beginning. When the artwork arrived, there were 9' high posts and a package as wide as a room! Garden Gallery curators, Amber & Duncan arrived armed with a petrol-driven post-holer. They solicitously cut the turf ready to make the post holes, promising to water the turf until it was ready to return. With the rampant grass here permanently on the point of invading the flower beds, I doubt we'll need to turf again, but it was a considerate and appreciated gesture.
About 3' down the post holer hit stones and out came my trusty garden claw to loosen them off, while Amber lay face down on the grass and grubbed out the loose stones with her hand. I doubt the curators of the National Galleries ever demonstrate such dedication!
Pints of fruit squash all round, then off they rushed off to install the next one, while we were left to delight in all the different views of 'our' artwork: no 23 in the Garden Gallery collection.
What's it like being a host?
It was a huge privilege to get an artists' view of our garden, and to see how an artwork can change so dramatically in different contexts. An ordinary gallery is quite a sterile environment in comparison to the rich variety of settings the Garden Gallery project is delivering, with real weather and the varying colours of natural light at different times of the day and night.
Plus you get to know a work so much better when you live with it. You see how the changing light alters the colours and the mood, in a way that a casual glance over the wall doesn't deliver. I'm going to be detouring past my favourite pieces again and again to fully savour the whole Garden Gallery experience.
There's no doubt that the project has inspired tremendous interest: almost every time I look out the window from our office, there's heads peering over the wall. It's almost too much interest as we feel we're getting in the way of the artwork if we sit out in the garden! When I was cutting the lawn the other day with people peering over the wall, I was so tempted to start an improvised conversation along the lines of: this is performance art you know: I've been going round and round all day. Where do you think I should go next....?
And for those who find our wall a bit high, the Prom seawall is a handy viewing platform - in fact, that's my favourite vantage point for "Topiary" from about halfway along the garden, so you get strands of foliage coming in from the front as well as the back.
I hope the other hosts have had as much fun as we are having with their artwork, and that everyone really enjoys the project.

[Maria]

According to today's 'good news' EN there may be another chance to host an art work;