Gallery

This Gallery section was opened in October 2005 with just one category, Painting. Indeed there was only one painter, Olly & Suzi: a marvellous double act travelling under single billing. I strove to think of them as two painters, and looked forward to the day when there would be more. Soon there were, and the question had already arisen of which other categories such a Gallery section should have: what other wings? (Since a website grows by unfolding its panels into cyberspace, like a power-hungry international space station orbiting the Earth, the word "wing" suggests a natural analogy.) The next category to open up was Photography, and Sculpture a bit later. There could be more categories and there probably will. In defiance of all staid notions about hierarchy, a hologram studio for well-built male performance artists in neon underpants will definitely be on the cards, but only if a performance artist in that sub-group should happen to command attention. As everywhere within the guest departments of this site, the driving force is meant to be the vivid gift, not the space available in the venue. The space available is infinite. The number of individual talents is definitely finite. Our consolation for that brute fact is the multiplicity of ways in which talent can express itself. One way or another, however, everything here in this Gallery section will be a visual image. The unity and consistency will come from no words needing to be spoken. For the proprietor, that condition has always been a provocation, as well as a necessary solace. The first question to ask of a manufactured image is: "Why should I go on looking?" Often enough to make the dialogue worthwhile, the first answer is: "Because you already are." Enough to say, for now, that there are things here which made me so covetous when I first saw them that I would have been ill with frustration if I had not been able to pass them on.

— December, 2006