Females First: Meet Nicola

As part of my ongoing series focused on womxn who run their own companies, this week we meet Nicola Anthony.

Introductions

Who are you and what do you do?

I am a sculptor. Sometimes I spend the day in my art studio or at the metal foundry testing the limits of metal and how much I can do with it (I like to make it do a lot of twisting and bending so that it eventually appears to be defying gravity). At other times, I spend the day reading through people’s life stories, which are constantly landing in my postbox and inbox.  My work as an artist combines these two things: telling important, unspoken, unusual or universally resonant life stories through metal sculpture.

What is the best part of your job?

I believe that everyone has a meaningful life story - has been through incredible highs and soul-wrenching lows - but unless you get the opportunity to take the conversation deeper, you don’t truly get to hear those stories. I feel privileged to meet so many interesting people, and through my work I get to hear their stories and learn more about the nature of humankind. 

The other amazing part of my job is that art is one of the things in life that makes us engage the curious, playful, tactile, adventurous, wondrous parts of our brains.

How did you get to where you are today?

One of my favourite quotes is: "what didn’t you do to bury me, but you forgot that I was a seed' by Greek poet Dinos Christianopoulos. He wrote about the power within each of us to stand up for the things which we believe, and how we feel this even more passionately if society should try to bury or quieten us. Seeds have made their way into my studio this Autumn and I have been thinking a lot about that quote and how passionately I feel about giving space to the hidden, censored, or unspoken voices through my art. Just like Christianopoulos predicts, some of the things that helped me to progress and become recognised for my work have been the risks I have taken, and the challenges that I have faced which gave me even more passion about overcoming the hurdles.

What did you find to be the most challenging?

Sometimes you become aware that something is blocking you. It’s hard to know exactly what but you just know that you cannot make progress for reasons beyond your control. That’s why the phrase ‘glass ceiling’ is incredibly accurate in how it describes the experience. I have had many experiences like that, where you gradually realise after trying every workaround, (which I always do), that you are being deliberately blocked or ignored. 

However, it is hard to know exactly what the reason for that is - sometimes I think it's because of ethnicity, at other times it could be that I am a woman working in a very masculine world of metal sculpting, or sometimes it could be that I am rather small with a quiet voice and I get mistaken for the bossy intern rather than the studio director! It could range from innocent / ignorant misperceptions to a deeper and deliberate act, so it’s hard to know how to feel about it or what a proportionate response is.

I have been lucky not to experience much direct or confrontational discrimination since I left school (the playground being one of the most overt places in terms of discrimination), but this unspoken, indefinable, invisible barrier that I mention presents its own problems - if you don’t know who is blocking you or why, you cannot confront and overcome it. 

Communication and Management

What have you found to be the best way to work with funders, gallery owners, exhibition organisers?

My formula is ‘communicate + be awesome’. Clear, honest, regular communication is key (just like with any relationship), and delivering high quality work, on time, is so important. These two things build trust and a strong working relationship. I also apply that to all areas (i.e. not just around my artwork but any peripheral things like event organisation, idea generation, managing my team, consulting projects, and writing).

When you work with others, what is the best way to make sure everything runs smoothly?

When people work with an artist they may be expecting a quirky, erratic person who has oodles of charm but rocks up wearing a sequin head-dress and sipping a glass of wine at the morning meeting. (I may be exaggerating here but that’s what I think they imagine!) I like to prove myself to be less erratic and more professional (although I do throw in the odd sequin headband). Art-making or commissioning can be new territory for some clients, and I have found that setting expectations by talking the process through first is invaluable, and clear communication throughout is a must.

For big projects I will provide a timeline of all the stages and what inputs I will need from clients and when, and use team project platforms like Slack or Trello for complex projects and installations.

When you're preparing for an exhibition, what are the key things you need your team and the event manager to help you with?

When I did my first ever exhibition, I got so consumed by making the artwork that I nearly forgot that I also needed to tell people to come to the event! This is where a venue and events manager can be invaluable - they take off my plate some of the key parts of putting on a good event and give me more time to focus on the art.

I worked with a fabulous venue in Enniscorthy this year called the Presentation Arts Centre (the sister venue of the Wexford Arts Centre), where the team were amazing at putting up the artwork, taking in their stride any strange challenge I threw at them including my request for a 15ft scaffolding so I could install 100 sculpted birds from the ceiling! That sculpture (called Murmuration, 2020) was such a hit that they decided to keep it installed after the exhibition. It was truly a case where they enabled the art to happen by being totally on board and going the extra mile.

What do you find to be the most challenging aspect of preparing for a large exhibition? 

I was in South East Asia when I held my first museum solo exhibition. The overwhelm of how much work I wanted to create could be quite a challenge at times. I’d devised a project called the Human Archive Project, documenting disenfranchised peoples in the region, so you can imagine how in-depth that could get! 

In a moment of realisation, I understood that most of that pressure came from my own desire to do my best work ever. I was therefore in control of how much I experienced pressure, and how much it just came out as passion and motivation. This is the flip-side of always pushing yourself... you need to be mindful of giving yourself some kindness and time off too! The Singapore Art Museum has a wonderful curatorial and installation team who did an amazing job of hanging and curating that show, and with their valuable support it was a big success.

The Bias Question

Has anything really opened your eyes to bias in the art world in 2020?

I have been reading ‘The Whole Picture’ by Alice Procter, a book which unpacks the colonial story of the art in our museums. She describes museums as places which often hold a “national curriculum of identity”, but prefer the dominant or mainstream narratives and miss out the uncomfortable parts. She points out that many institutions are afraid to alienate their visitors by creating exhibitions about ‘controversial topics’ like queer identities or histories of enslavement, and instead they choose to quietly accept bigotry rather than push audiences to change and learn. What’s fascinating about Procter’s analysis is that she has not only given a real insight into the centuries of accumulated layers of bias which have led to this point, but she has also identified a huge appetite from audiences who want to see real histories and realities in museums.

Have you ever noticed that people treat you differently to other artists because of your gender, marital status or anything else?

It’s hard to forge a name for yourself in a male arena like metal sculpting. You are more likely to have to defend your stance, confront those who are blocking you, break rules and push boundaries further, to see success.

The art world is in general quite biased, and you find that a larger percentage of male artists have solo exhibitions and gallery representation, and more male artists are promoted to collectors so there is a bit of a cycle that needs breaking. Lot’s of race inequalities have also been made more clear to see this year too. It’s quite sad because you would think that the art world should be at the cutting edge of diversity and inclusivity, representing social change and even activism.

Do you think that there is anything we can do to make sure we don't pass bias down the line?

We often look to ‘the system’ or in my case ‘the art world giants’ for change, but I believe it will have to start with each of us. One of the key things is that every individual shows a sense of fairness, equality, and anti-racism through their conscious and unconscious actions. 

This year I discovered the ‘Better Allies newsletter’ and learned a lot about how to show that you are more inclusive in your day-to-day: through the language you use, the images in your newsletters, websites or videos, the questions you ask, even the way you use hashtags... (using capitalisation on each word is called #CamelCaps and helps screen-readers to pronounce each word separately - making your tweets accessible to those who are visually impaired.)

Another key thing about being an ally is calling out when something is wrong. Last year I made a public sculpture which stands in Aspen Colorado, emblazoned with the powerful words of Elie Wiesel: “The opposite of love is indifference”. Living by the words of this holocaust survivor we are reminded that we must not be passive or indifferent to the discrimination of others even if that doesn’t effect us - actively calling out inequality and discrimination can save hearts, minds, and even lives.

What advice do you have for young women entering the world of art?

You often get what you expect, so let’s start expecting better! It’s not an easy path in the arts as any gender or kin, because you will find you are already doing something that society doesn’t quite know how to react to. Of course it gets even harder to push through those challenges if you additionally experience inequality in the market or in the system of the art world.  

My attitude has always been to keep determined, power through those hurdles, and use each setback as a way to grow and get better than others. Another wonderful support has been to find other strong women and supportive mentors who I check in with regularly, learn from, and support in turn. 

The Royal Society of Sculptors has their ‘Pioneering Women’ series of talks which shine a spotlight on the lives, careers and legacies of talented and extraordinary women sculptors, it’s a great place to get inspired.

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If you’re looking for some unusual gifts this year, Nicola has launched an online shop. If you want to read the rest of the series, you can do so here.