A part of my practice I have been asking for feedback on different elements of my work but most frequently on my creative works. This feedback has come from tutors, friends, external project collaborators and students at many different levels. What am I to make of this feedback? Should I adapt my practice and creative directions based on feedback? Should I ignore it? Should I think on the feedback with no definite outcome as regards the direction of my work and whether I use the feedback or ultimately, reject it?

In my opinion, the best feedback, by which I mean much most helpful to me, is about how my work makes my audience feel rather than technical considerations. Such feedback can be brief but most often is lengthy and involved. Reading feedback on which someone has clearly spent some time is moving as it tells me they have spent time engaging with my work especially when we all have lots of things we could be doing.

Part of my journey which will continue into my 3.3 unit is to consider what I should do with my work. This is very relevant when I think of feedback. What is my destination of my creative works, my research and my dissertation? Is this to build work with a theme and a thread which holds a limited number of creative works together which could then be put onto walls of a gallery? Is the destination about my written work and trying to find a way to help people suffering from extended grief? As such are my creative works a gateway to my written work? I have wondered about a webpage for my work but have not done this so far as there is something about an artist’s webpage that feels wrong. They can be very static and, I believe, present a strange representation of my work and of me. Are they interesting? Is there a better way or are websites an unpleasant but necessary tool about ownership of our work?

Based on this, how much feedback is healthy and how much can it be a distraction? I wonder if I was to put work on a gallery wall and ask for audience feedback and based upon that feedback, tear down my work and change it, how would that relationship between artist and audience work. it feels to me like a very destructive relationship. It the very personal nature of my work an even bigger reason why I might be wary of feedback?