Now, it's a tricky thing being an artist, just like everyone else in the world they need food, a roof over their head, basic utilities and so on, but with one added extra. A studio.
I've griped, with good reason, in the past about all the damn middlemen in the arts. Some do a good job, especially artist/curators, but in the main part, judging by the amount of dodgy vanity gallery/art fair spam I receive each week greed in the arts is very much alive and well. Not only must an artist live, in order to succeed they must pay for materials, spending every waking hour developing their skills, pay for marketing, submission fees, transport costs, and even a whacking great cut to the more greedy gallery owners out there. Just remember one thing, most galleries, at least commercial ones, are little more than a shop with a great reputation and healthy marketing budget. They can make or break an artist, and for the lucky few it can be worth, enabling them to make a liveable wage, but for most it's a cycle of debt, usually paid off by more menial work of some description.
When I was an art student in Brighton many years back now there was a thriving squat community, unlike the dirty grebos I'd encountered over a few years of amphetamine-fuelled squat raves in the Deptford area, these guys really had their %^&* together. Their numbers included qualified builders, electricians, plumbers, they paid the cost of repairing any empty homes, eventually received funding from the local council for a while, and almost every squat the head honcho showed me, who I happened to meet during a long winded attempt to score some smoke, was occupied by artist co-ops, each working within their own "studio space". They had an accommodation rota, they had verbal agreements with many of the property owners, and the council were as onside as they could be without breaking the law. There are many who'd rather leave their empty properties to rot, as is the nature of a failing capitalist society, but what could be a better deal for an empty and derelict home in a time of recession? Yes, we've had them before kids.
Intermittently over the years I have heard about, seen and even visited various squat galleries, there was a spate of pop-up galleries in London a few years back, I was going to exhibit with one collective who I suspect might have disbanded, such are the pitfalls of squatting in and outside of the arts. Amsterdam is a great place to see the potential of bringing the squatter and arts communities together. Although as Dutch politics have leaned further and further to the right over the past decades I suspect many of the galleries I visited in the 90s have gone the way of half the coffee shops over there. Don't worry, there's always Antwerp and Portugal lol.
So I'm sure it comes as no surprise that the UK-based Empty Shops Network caught my I when I stumbled across their site recently…
"Inspired by Open Source Software and the Agile Arts Manifesto, the Empty Shops Network aims to spread the skills, knowledge and resources needed as far and wide as possible. These include free Empty Shops Toolkit, the earlier and lighter Empty Shops Workbook, and the space finding website Spare Place".
If you're an artist looking to set up your open empty shop gallery take a look at a few highly useful links:
- Example of a Licence To Occupy*
- Mapping empty shops and other useful space across the UK here>>>
- Ministry of Found – interviews with pop-up shop experts>>>
- Download the Empty Shops Toolkit here>>>
- See the latest from empty shops projects across the UK here>>>
- Download the Empty Shops Workbook here>>>
- Yahoo Group for discussion, support and advice here>>>
The Empty Shops Network's founder Dan Thompson has spoken at many meetings, conferences and seminars to share ideas further. These include the University of the Arts Alumni at the ICA, London (2010); at RIBA’s Guerilla Tactics (2009); at Chain Reaction at Canary Wharf (2009); Gloo in Portsmouth (2010); at AIR Time events in London, Brighton and Belfast (2009-10); at the E17 Art Trail (2009); at Central St Martins Graduate Week (2009) and at the launch of Spacemakers and their Brixton Village project (2009). In June 2010, he flew to Belfast to speak alongside Northern Ireland Assembly minister Sammy Wilson MP at the launch of the city centre’s first empty shops project, organised by architecture centre PLACE and Arts & Business. Contact the network to enquire about booking Dan as a speaker.
There's a great interview with Dan here.
For a national database of empty shops in the UK (and a three international squats) visit Artists and Makers.
There's also an article about the ESN at The Guardian.
Bristol is big on squat/pop-up galleries and studios, check out Capacity Bristols' blog for more info.
Here's a great resource called Spare Place which offers a useful updated map of all the empty shops in the UK!
Another useful resource is offered by www.emptyshop.org.
Plus don't forget www.theoubliette.co.uk
Finally a few squatter links:
