An Expanded View of Drawing

At the start of 2018 I was invited to take part in 'An Expanded View of Drawing ' at the

The Riverfront Art Gallery, part of the big events and gallery complex in Newport in March 2018.

I was kind of reluctant but received several requests from the curator to show drawings, so eventually I agreed.  The drawings proposed were one or two from the 'Hybrids' series I had made some time ago, the work can be viewed on my website below:-

https://www.elinthomas.com/gallery_174478.html

This is the piece that was finally chosen to be exhibitied. I had packed the work very carefully giving full instructions on how it should be hung, as the shadows cast by the piece is important factor. I checked the work very assiduously even reinforcing the most delicate parts on the reverse.

 At some point during the exhibition or as the work was being taken down it was damaged, in fact torn, in seven places. The yellow paper shows the torn places in the work.

I had collected the work in person from the gallery, it was already boxed up and was passed to me by the curator who said she was responsible for taking down the exhibition. I didn't look at the work until I opened the box some time later. Naturally, I was upset to see the damage.

I contacted the curator and the organiser, both of whom said they were sorry but knew nothing about it. I asked who took the exhibition down and was told it was a technician. I was then told the technician also knew nothing about the damage and the organiser stood behind the technician 100% and had implacable trust in them.

So the three people who handled my work and were responsible for the care of my work denied any knowledge of the damage. They were able to back up each others stories. So, there was absolutely nothing I could do about my work being trashed. The irony is...the organiser bemoaned the 'lack of professionalism' in the arts sector in Wales. Well, I've heard some hypocritical bullshit in my time but that took the biscuit.

Google it, if you want to find out who these people are. If you are an artist, I recommend you steer well clear of these individuals.