My experience planning my first art exhibition.

It was not easy but it sure is doable. Hope this helps those who want to avoid exhibiting in galleries and want to organise their own solo exhibitions in their own spaces

Requirements I Process I Task I Timeline I Cost

How I went about it

I have been contemplating for more than a year on how to exhibit my work. I had more that 120 pieces paintings, sculptures and more. Also my studio had furniture's that I had made. My exhibition would not be complete or descriptive if it was conducted in a gallery. I wanted people to visit me at my work space so they could see not just a few exhibits but all of it. It did not matter where I hosted my first solo exhibition, all that mattered was how to display all my works together in one place. Galleries were not an option, one it is too expensive, two it was impossible to exhibit my learning in a constrained space also lugging around work was not a good idea. So I finally decided to conduct it in my own work studio which is a part of my residence in Mumbai. It is a rented apartment and it had already been 4 years. The house required fixing and repainting anyways. So the space was ideal.

Oct 2019 planning started. First made a list of things to do. Wrote as and when I remembered things.

Things to do

• Decide the colour theme

• Frame all paintings

• Make pedestals for all my sculptures

• Change and cleanup all electrical fixtures

• Fix the walls and repaint them to ivory white

• Repaint all cabinets to ivory white

• Make cabinet with seating

• Make doors for all open cabinets

• Drilling walls for fixtures

Digital requirements

• About the exhibition

• About the artist

• About Moonware Creative Expressions

• Workshop details

• Labels stickers for all paintings

• Inventory

• Price tags for all sculptures

• For sale boards and Please do not touch stickers

To get quality workers is a task in Mumbai. So I decided to do it all by myself. Worked on all the above single handed and some help from my cousin for heavy drilling . It took exactly 1 month to finish the above listed. A little delay of 3 to 4 days as I ended up with a fractured finger in between. I will still say it was tedious but sure is doable if we set our goals right.

Task and Glitches

Nothing works smoothly for sure. There were many many issues during the set up. The most difficult part was getting materials of any kind whether it be wood, paint, nails, hinges you name it, it was difficult to find quality materials in Mumbai. I even had to buy screws from my home town as the hardware stores sold rusted and substandard screw and nails. ( talk about standards I wonder if we have any in Mumbai. yes yes I am furious at how things are in Mumbai ) So unnecessary workload and delays for no reason

Decide the colours theme- Ivory White

I wanted a bright clean background for my exhibit. So ivory white is what I opted for walls, cabinets, furnitures, pedastals including frames for the painting. Once the colour is decided then everything gets easier.

I did not know what paint fits well on distemper(existing paint) without sanding it down completely. Every person I spoke to said I had to take down the entire old paint and then repaint it. I was not ready for that. Finally I tested it with my own paint (Acrylic binder and titanium white and water) It worked perfectly. So I decided on acrylic emulsion on the wall. Managed to get all the paints in ivory white from asian paints. So paint was sorted.

1 down.. Phew!!!!

Frame all paintings - I wanted all frames to be white but it was hard to find.

It was very difficult to get right size of frames for my paintings. Hiring professional art framing companies were not feasible as each 9x11 painting will cost me 6000 per frame again not in my budget. And since my painting were of soft pastels giving it to normal framing guys in mumbai was not a good idea. So I had to forget the idea of white frames for my larger paintings and had to go for black. Ordered all frames on amazon. I am unhappy about it. But some day I hope to frame them in white. For now it was okay. Some compromises had to be made.

Make pedestals for all my sculptures - Decide what material you want to use

I wanted to make pedestals with little effort and less wastage of materials and low cost as I did not want to store them later. I decided to cast with plaster of paris powder. Sometimes even the most simplest things can take longer than you think. This was one of those moments.

It was very hard to get a packet of plaster of paris without holes in Mumbai. The vendor removed the air in the packets by piercing them with needles so they could stack more. It was raining and the packets were lying in moisture. I had to go to atleast 8 hardware stores to get a sealed POP bag.

Change and cleanup all electrical fixtures

All the electrical fixtures needed cleaning they were ancient dirty and discoloured. With the permission from the owner I changed all the ancient tubes and fixtures that were falling apart. Pollution is one plus you do not get cleaned houses for rent in Mumbai. Inspite of calling in professionals to clean houses it still remains stained. Youtube was like the fairy god mother. Finally toothpaste was what worked in cleaning all electrical panels. Right angle is a dream in this houses. the floor and the roof where all tilted. It is very hard to get things alligned with a tape as the floor and the door and everything had no right angle. Finally my tubelight was a bit tilted. Planned to fix at the end..but was so tired in the end that I let it be.

Fix the walls and repaint them to ivory white

This house was badly built and never kept well by tenants.

So the owners still stick to cheaper options like plaster(POP)as putty and lime to paint the walls. Plaster and lime are fantastic if done properly but the painters and masons do a terrible job here. So every monsoon the walls flake and falls off. All old wooden door frames are rotten to the core so had to be filled with cement.

I did not know what paint fits well on distemper(existing paint) without sanding it down completely. Everyperson I spoke to said I had to take down the entire old paint and then repaint it. I was not ready for that. Finally I tested it with my own paint (Acrylic binder and titanium white and water) It worked perfectly. So I decided on acrylic emulsion on the wall. Managed to get all the paints in ivory white from asian paints.

Wall size that required painting

Room 1

Size - 10x10x15 feet

Wall Area - 10x10 ft, 10x 15ft, 10x12ft

Passage

Size - 3 x 9 Ft

Wall area - 3ftx3ft x 2, 10x9ft, 10x6ft

Total time taken

Took 4 days for one coat. x 2 coats

Working 3 hours everyday.

Total 8days,

All moulds and flacked walls had to be removed. All unwanted old and broken fixtures were removed with consent from the owner. Acrylic primer putty (Asian paints)was used to fill all the flaked areas then sanded to smooth before 2 coats of wall primer and 2 coats of emulsion was applied(Asian paints).

Note to self: Always paint the final coat on the walls in the end.

Repaint all cabinets to ivory white , Make doors for all open cabinets

I wanted to refurbish all my existing furniture to white. I wanted the studio to be bright and not dark. So repainted all the furnitures to ivory white. The only issue was there was no water based oil paints available in India except online. I did attempt to order paint online but amazon delivery was so terrible that paint was open and dry by the time it reached me.

Finally had no other resort but to use oil paint with turpentine are the thinner. The problem with turpentine as thinner is it take longer to dry. It takes 12 hours for proper drying. 8 hours minimum for second coat application. The smell was unbearable in spite of having fan and ventilated rooms. Finally all the doors of cabinets were stuck with wall paper instead of paint. I did not want heavy doors for the new cabinets built as it was hard to find thin hinges. Finally I used doll house hinges that I ordered on ebay.

I had got wood cut to size for making the new cabinet. But none of them were of right angle. Had to get a chisel to chisel it down. It was double but the work time increased drastically with each things going wrong. A lot of unwanted manual work.

Every knobs were handmade from air dry clay and bolt and nuts

Drilling wall for fixtures.

Drilling all curtain fixtures and holes for placing screws to hold paintings were done. There was an inch of plaster on the wall that kept falling off which each drilling. No idea how the walls are build but to drill a hole it took real power drilling. Things that you think might take a min or so ended up taking much longers.

Artworks and Prints

• Inventory

• About Moonware Creative Expressions

• About the Artist

• Workshops if any

• Sticker and labels for the artworks

• Stickers with cost

• Letter inviting the press

• Guest book for reviews

Conclusion - Anyone can organise their exhibition & it sure is cost effective

So as planned I was just in time 10 days before the exhibition everything was sorted except for my broken finger. Oh well but I sure was glad I did it. :). My studio looked so pretty. The best part was it cost me very little. Total cost was something like 30000Rs only

The exhibition looked great. People who visited it just loved it. And I was so happy for myself too. A lot of good people made this exhibition a success. Thanking everyone who supported this venture and visited the studio. I hope to keep having these exhibitions every 3 months. Also planning to let others exhibit at the studio very soon.