Tuesday 28th september 2010
When we arrived in leeds we took shots of the creative parts of the city centre and short videos of travelling from place to place. When we got to leeds art gallery we we're shown into a room and introduce to Amanda films the education officer of Leeds Art Gallery we then asked her 7 questions about her job.
1. What type of audience do you appeal to ?
amanda answered with ~ you have marketing educational and curratoril that manage keeping the audience happy we appeal to a wide range of audiences such as colleges and schools and also regular gallery goers and general staturatory education.
- How do you go about pleasing them ?
We aim to attract new comers and inspire people, challenge and entertain. We host performances, conferences and even weddings
- What date do you hold on your audiences and how is it collated?
We create mailing list to inform people of upcoming events we also send out surveys for people to complete about the exhibitions and about general fact about themselves.
2. How has technology influenced how you work in the art gallery ?
Email has definitely made my job a lot harder but a lot faster also . It has also made communications within the gallery easier. Technology has also influenced the virtual art within the gallery it is now a lot more advanced.
-Have you introduced new ways of advertising in recent years, for example face book and twitter sites? The Gallery has a twitter site where you will find lots of information regarding important dates and such, i feel that twitter has helped the gallery advertise its artwork and artists across Leeds. Within the gallery we tend to use "Word of mouth for advertisement within the gallery.
3.How do you connect to the different community's within Leeds and beyond ?
We try to keep international relationships with other galleries to lend out artwork, collections and exhibitions.
-The gallery is free to enter, how do you fund the gallery and its projects?
The gallery rents the space from the council but the council give money for salary's. As well as heating and lighting and help fund some collections. The arts council also donates money which helps towards projects. We also have private sponsors and donations. The gallery also has a cafe and a gift shop which also contributes. We also have space to hold weddings and meetings and other functions which are all hired out to the paying public.
4.What creative process is involved in creating an exhibition ?
Often artists ask us to show their work from their the senior management will look for a balance within the art and the spaces available for an exhibition, they then have a creative discussion.
-How do you decide what it is going to involve?
A creative discussion takes place within the senior management staff.
-How do you contact artists?
Often the artists contact us or we general snoop around for new and upcoming artists or even news and magazines.
-What space will you use?
There is a hierarchy of spaces some spaces are better than others for example, the - "Blue Room" has a palace like setting which appeals to most audiences.
-How many people from different agencies would be involved in putting on a exhibition?
We work with other galleries to put together exhibitions together and sometimes colleges and universities.
5.What merchandise do you have and how do you promote it ?
Due to lack of money and perceptions of selling we have no promotions at the moment. We have income targets and lunchtime talks and space to hire. We also hold seminars and book readings.
6.How would you arrange workshops?
Within a year we have 6,000 school children attend workshops we choose our workshops carefully to attract a wider audience.
- Do you have an age limit?
We have no age limit to the workshops you could be from 6 months old to 100 years old.
- How do you decide what to run a workshop on?
We mostly run funky workshops which are a little different but lots of fun for everyone.
- Do you charge? If not how is it funded?
The workshops are funded by the council and cost £50 each workshop, universities and family's go free. We also hold after school workshops once a month.
7. How do you know when an exhibition is a success?
I don't think you can ever really know its more a vibe or a feeling (intuition). The success criteria is if the gallery is busy and people are happily browsing through the art.
- What do you class as a failed exhibition?
I class a failed exhibition as a very quiet atmosphere , if its boring and doesn't attract audiences or we have complaints left in the comments books. But you never know the outcome until the exhibition has been put into practice
I thoroughly enjoyed talking to Amanda Phillips and felt that i learnt a lot about her day to day creative working life.
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