a thought

Agent Shipley: Unfortunately I had to leave the symposium early last week, but one thing that I have been thinking about since is something Gary said, he mentioned that he was nervous because he would be assumed to be an 'expert' about Action Research by being paid £500 to talk about it. I would have naturally assumed the same, he obviously has more experience than me in that I have only been graduated from my BA since 2006 and he was chosen to speak at a symposium when I never have. Somehow I feel that this qualifies him to have more time dedicated to talking about his opinions.

Similarly I went down to Cell Projects in London this weekend to see Lisa Le Feuvre in conversation with Ian Brown, Johanna Hallsten and Marcus Coates about their current exhibition 'Trying to cope with things that aren't human (part one)'. There was a moment that triggered a similar thought when Marcus Coates declared he believed himself to be a stoat as he made his new video piece, Lisa Le Fauvre said she simply didn't believe that he believed himself to be a stoat. Coates immediatly responded with'Well I did' and later on, over a pint in the pub, Coates said that he had quite liked the opportunity to confront what he described as, Le Fauvre's assumtion that an artist doesn't really believe anything.

All this has got me thinking about my own opinons and nerves, in both situations mentioned above I was too nervous to pipe up with my own comments or discussion points. It wasn't that I didn't have anything to say I just wasn't confident enough in my opinions to think that they would be relevant; I fear that I am to be perceived as one of Le Fauvre's non believing artists.

So the question is do I need more faith in my opinions in order to be paid £500 to speak them, or do I need to be paid £500 to speak them in order to have faith in them?