USHER GALLERY: The Moment Of Privacy Has Passed
Last week I visited the Usher Gallery in Lincoln with a friend to see the exhibition “A Moment Of Privacy Has Passed” – a group show of the sketch books. After a 90 minute journey by car to Lincoln, a beautiful town. After a warm welcome from the front of house worker, I was appalled at the result. Out of the 200 or so sketch books that were submitted with artist statements, the gallery selected about fifteen to be displayed and showcased. These artists’ work was shown in glass boxes to be viewed in two upstairs rooms. You could not open the boxes to look further at the sketch books. The other artists’ work was displayed on shelves labelled with key fobs displaying numbers akin to prison labelling, their names and written statements were also ignored. These unfortunate artists were not contacted or told that their work would be treated in this way: the exhibition also did not supply a catalogue of artists who were exhibited and there was no publicity material. This I interpreted as contemptuous to the artists and the efforts they made to supply a statement and to post their sketchbooks. The Usher Gallery’s main selling point was that cross dressing Turner Prize winner Grayson Perry had submitted a sketchbook and it was on display with his statement.
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