Amora Nel

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As a gallery owner and curator, i would often get approached in the gallery by people saying they are artists wanting to exhibit. Some of these requests would come from professional artists, but the majority would come from people creating art as a hobby and hoping to create a second income from selling their art.

The gallery I owned was a contemporary gallery, which meant that these artists unfortunately just weren't suitable to exhibit there. I always found it amusing that they thought it would be that easy to create a second income from selling art in a country where very established, experienced artists struggled to keep afloat.

However, I'm not the kind of person to squash peoples creative spirit and always offered to look at their work and advise, if I could, on how and where it would be most suitable for them to exhibit.

So, one day, when a very elderly lady and her husband approached me nervously and asked if I would look at her work, my heart sank just a little. It was one of those busy days when I was preparing for an exhibition and needed to start hanging the works, a job that can take all day as I had no assistant. To set the picture, I must describe this little elderly lady. Amora had long grey hair put up in a loose, but very neat bun, dressed in a plaid woolen grey skirt, silk long sleeved blouse with ruffles. Court shoes and pearl necklace.

This is not generally the description of a contemporary conceptual artist.

I agreed to have a look. The couple shuffled out the gallery and returned a few minutes later, arms laden with two card board boxes filled, and I mean filled, with unframed watercolours. My heart sank a little more, this could take a while. Politely I pulled up 3 chairs in the middle of the gallery and relieved them of their heavy load.

I began as I always did, before looking at the works to get a bit of background on the artist. Amora tells me that she's 76 and started painting about 2 years previously...just as a hobby.
I can see how nervous she is, but also how passionate about art. I put her at ease and we chat for a while, I know how incredibly difficult it is for any artist to make that step to show a gallery their work...it takes GUTS. So no matter how busy or how much I think it's probably not something I can show or sell, I always give them my time and advise where I can, because even if I can't sell them, someone else can, the artist just needs to know where to go.

We finish chatting and I open the boxes, there must be about 100 works. I start taking out the first few works and my eyes widen. I look at Amora apologetically, and tell her how this is not what I was expecting at all. She smiles proudly.

They're landscape watercolours and inks, but not the usual traditional approach, they're different. I unpack the boxes and soon the gallery floor is covered in a mosaic of landscapes and I'm loving it. Perhaps because it was so unexpected. Who cares why? I just do. No, they're perhaps not the most contemporary or conceptual works, but they are beautiful and surprising and worthy of respect and remember that I mentioned Amora had only started creating art at the age of 74, one or two years previous to showing me these pieces.

Immediately I book her an exhibition.
The lesson in this story is that we should never judge on some preconceived notion that the appearance of a person is the window dressing to what they're about or what their abilities are. And of coarse it's never too late to be creative.
PS the exhibition was a great success and she sold incredibly well and the art students became her biggest fans.

Amora Nel
What a Night
Mixed Media
300x450mm