The Exhibition Diary - Introduction

The Family Event Exhibition Feb 2010 from Naomi Kendrick on Vimeo.
Filmed by Michael Maydon and Lisa Finch This may take a few minutes to load

For all photographs from the exhibition go to
http://www.flickr.com/photos/multisensory/collections/72157623091718993/

The Exhibition of The Family Event Installation and documentation from The Family Event July 2009 is over. The Middle Room, in which the installation was shown, has now returned to being just the dining room, and The Lounge, where the documentation was shown, has resumed it's role as the lounge (though a lot better decorated than pre exhibition). It is hard to believe that it really happened, that all of those stories were revealed in the lounge and that the contents of our dining room could transport people to unpredictable places.... I kept a diary throughout the exhibition and this, the comments book and other documentation gives an insight into what happens which I'll be talking about over the next few blog entries. 


Firstly I'd like to thank the seventy-one of you who came, saw, heard, smelt, felt and responded to the exhibition. You stayed for between one and a half and three hours, spending between fifteen and forty-five minutes of that alone with the installation and the rest absorbing and responding in The Lounge. You wrote twenty-one pages of comments, made a basket full of drawings and sculptures, ate two and a half tins of biscuits and drank countless cups of tea - and I enjoyed every second of it!


It isn't easy putting on an exhibition for the first time in your own home, the advantages were that I could show the work when and how I wanted without relying on a third-party or having to secure funding. Also the Domestic setting felt right for the exhibitions content, and in fact later proved to be integral to may visitors experience. The challenge lay in the house not being a 'known' arts venue, it lacks a marketing team or a city centre location, therefore I am especially grateful for everyone's support.


The purpose of doing this was to show my installation and the documentation of the The Family Event 4th of July Event, in which my family encountered and responded to this work. Here, I wanted to go a step further with how the installation would be experienced, giving a whole new set of people the opportunity to do this, and respond to it if they wished. 


The physical artwork and the 'way' it is encountered are one and the same for me. Previously, this installation has been shown in a large space, with small groups of people experiencing it simultaneously and within a limited time frame. The work provoked a response (as evident in the July event ), but for me I had offered an unsatisfactory experience, as people had limitations on how they could interact with the work. I somehow felt I owed the installation more - it's meaning and the way in which it has to be handled to be 'known' deserved intimacy with the audience. Therefore the next step was always going to be a setting in which the individual visitor is 'given' the installation along with the time, trust and openness due - to both artwork and audience.


I wanted to know if this would change anything, would it work? Would stripping away all else, so there is just the work and the visitor, allow them to connect to it (or not) in an uncompromised and more personal way?