I posed the question for Alyson Stanfield to use at artbizblog.com:
Have you ever shown at a venue that broke or damaged one of your artworks and didn’t offer to remunerate you for the loss? What did you do?

The response was over whelming, 19 38 comments. Admittedly a few of those comments were me connecting with an artist who owned a piece of mine. Very cool this small world of ours. Still the stories ranged from work lost in fires, stolen and or mishandled and it all seems to come down to contracts and insurance.

My piece Ink Well was damaged by a gallery during installation. It was an accident and yes I had a contract with the gallery and they did have insurance on the work while it was in their possession.

What did I do? I took it on the chin.

Why?

  1. It was a public not for profit gallery.
  2. There were extenuating circumstances with the people involved that I think are to personal to publish here.
  3. I was able to piece the work back together (sort of).

While the damage to this piece brought a tear to my eye I was able to make something of it. The gallery gathered up all the fragments and most of the breaks from falling off the wall to a concrete floor below were clean.  But because this work is encaustic I could not just glue it back together.

Hesitantly I applied melted wax as slip and used my torch to fuse. I had to pass the torch over the surface to create a good bond and remove the crack lines. This process moved the current layers of wax and the colours thus creating a whole new piece.

While I still prefer the original piece I am happy that I was able to maintain the focal point at the center of the piece which was my favourite aspect of the original.

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Ink Well Before

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Ink Well After

Which one do you prefer?


Comments

comments

Kim Art Management

2 Replies

  1. Kim: This is fascinating – seeing the Before & After pictures.

    I also prefer the Before. But most people will never see that and will accept the object as it is.

    Thank you for generously sharing this. It helps all artists.

    1. Yes you are quite right Alyson people will accept is as it is.

      Only I will truly know of the difference. Well you, me and everyone else that sees the before and after images.

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