The language of the artwork, it turns out, is already the language of the public.
Too often, artists and galleries make the same two errors. They lose the work and their audience in jargon and international art English that make the work sound important but communicate to very few, if anyone at all. Or they slot the artwork into broad political categories — feminist, postcolonial, posthuman — that try to make it relevant, but end up masking what made it unique.
There’s another way. We can find clear, authentic language for talking about artworks and their artists that stays grounded in shared experience. In fact, when it comes to art, authenticity and public relevance aren’t at odds with each other, but one and the same. Art may invent its own language and expression, but this language doesn’t come out of a vacuum. Rather, it belongs to our shared experience and a particular place and time.
My job is to find an artwork’s shared language: where what the work is saying meets public interest. Drawing on my background as an academic, art critic and journalist, I pay deep attention to both works and their artists, because that shared language is exactly what draws audiences, earns press, and positions artists and galleries where they want to be.
I offer support through my foundational Clarity Sessions coaching and advisory, or in project-based work: exhibition texts, catalogue essays, artist talks, and more. Because art speaks for itself. I help it be heard.
