During my childhood, in the immediate post-war years, “Holiday Camps” used to provide cheap holidays for the working class. They were somewhat regimented affairs, very much with an emphasis on communal activities, and the accommodation was fairly basic, usually in timber huts dignified by the name of “chalets”. There were regular forms of collective entertainment in the form of dances and shows in the evening. During the day-time there were competitions, the two most-notorious of which were the “Knobbly Knees” competition and the “Beauty Competition”. I’ve no idea how the former would rank alongside today’s criteria of non-discrimination and political correctness, but the latter would probably be compelled to go the same way as “Miss World”, on which out was modelled. Although beauty contests of this kind have fallen out of favour, along with holiday camps, one remnant of the culture remains in active force …. the annual round of applications for exhibition openings by artists.
This is the season for it. This month’s edition of The Artist magazine includes invitations from no fewer then thirteen of them. This list does not include the many and various civic “Opens”, which must be very numerous indeed. For the past couple of days I’ve gritted my teeth and tried to get on with the job, first of all, of deciding which ones I will enter, and then selecting the pieces of my work I wish t offer each of them. It’s a devil off a job, resulting in a good deal of personal tension and anxiety.* I have selected five of these occasions, ranging from the prestigious national award by the Pastel Society to a local municipal venture which I don’t think has run before. Today I managed to complete the entry requirements for the first of these, battling a rococo web-site and the agonising task of trying to identify the “best” of my work competed over the past two years. By the end of the afternoon I had managed to finish the job and send in my completed entry. (We should receive the decision of the judging panel on 6 April.) The next of my deadlines is at the end of next week.
I have yet to decide in each of these cases whether I am entering a beauty competition or the knobbly knees competition. Just what ought to be the stand-out feature of my work I want the judges to notice and reward? Wish me luck!
*Not to mention expense, as each competition requires either (or both!) a general entry fee and/or a fee for each work put forward. It is quite easy to run up a bill of £100 for each competition if you are sufficiently ambitious.