Art can be a conflicted set of emotions at times, these last few weeks have made me think rather a lot about what we do with Cultivate, what I do with Organ and especailly what I do as an artist.  I mean the idea of actually painting a portrait of George Floyd is rediculously pointless, I mostly did it for me, to say his name as it were, and yes I know rediculously self-indugent thing to say and it doesn’t help anything much in any kind of way, I did try to address some of my thoughts in terms of art and curating and such via the Cultivate web pages – Inclusion, engagement, open calls, open doors, what is the policy? Can we do more? Let’s Create? Blackout Tuesday?  – I did follow those recent nurse portraits with a painting of George Floyd, portraits aren’t my confort zone, in all honesty I don’t really want to paint portraits but surerly during times like these art has to say something?  And anyway, wh othe hell needs another painting of an apple or an orange during times like these? The Other Sean says something with some of his paintings, he says far more than I do  –  ORGAN THING: Sean Scully, Blackout Wednesday, art as a force for good… . I do draw people all the time, I have mountains of sketchbooks full of drawings of people, observations rather than portraits but….

Art can’t change anything, not directly, but it is I believe, as the other Sean says, it is (mostly) a force for good, art reflects the wider society, art can’t change things, change comes out of material struggle, actual material struggle, art can help to raise conciousnessthough, art can maybe plant seeds,,,