My first photo Exhibition, Ostermundigen, Switzerland
I have been visiting Switzerland for over 10 years now. It is always a jointed trip to work and visit my sister. But it hasn’t always been this way.
I can recall the first time I have travelled to Switzerland – I was as a 9 year old boy. We had some acquaintances there, family friends from my fathers side. I remember the times he used to spend on the phone speaking French to our friends, but it wouldn’t be until later on when we’d actually meet them in person.
My father is a great driver and always been obsessed with cars, obviously there wouldn’t be another way to get there, but by car 🙂 These sort of family trips were scarce and this is one of very first one, from what I can remember.
I don’t remember that much from the actual trip, I did find Switzerland very organised, clean and fresh. The country looked wealthy, that little I could see even then. But even when I visited Bern and threw carrots to the city Bears (no pun intended), or when I was eating a cake in Victoria Jungrau hotel, dressed in horrible colorful sports set, I had no idea that one day, when I grow up, I will be hosting a photo exhibition there 🙂
I have met Stefanie, the owner of Stef’s Kultur Bistro few years ago, as she is a friend of my sister. She owns this nice restaurant which gives local (and international) artists the opportunity to demonstrate (and sell) their art. So we put a date in the diary and discussed to display my images there as well…
I didn’t have a clear idea (at first) on what to exhibit. I wanted to give this exhibition a theme, and display the images which for a long time only slept on my hard drive, with a minimal exposure to the outside world. In the recent years I have taken some great shots in Malta & Gozo and wanted to display those, as well as my black and white London work and few photos from my trips abroad, so we named the exhibition “Wanderlust”
Wanderlust mainly featured photos from London, Gozo, Malta & smaller selection from Switzerland, Florida & Spain.
I had some great ideas for the exhibition and big hopes too, the hopes of exposure and hopes of selling some pieces to lovely homes.
As a self-learner photographer, I learn as I go. There is a room for error, as in with everything you do and sometimes the only way to achieve anything is by “trial and error”. This is probably how I would describe Wanderlust. When you’re a sole trader, with the minimal help from the outside world, you do things your own way and sometimes don’t always count with the possibility the things may go wrong, OR not exactly according to your expectations.
The shipments of photographs arrived damaged as well as some breakages when I was framing my mounted prints in Switzerland, larger format photographs weren’t ordered enough in advance, so they basically arrived to Switzerland one day before the event. The turnaround on the event wasn’t according to my expectations, neither did the sales. But I was still happy, because putting Wanderlust together, was a bit of an achievement. It was my first larger project and regardless, I was very proud of it.
There is so much to think about that, looking back now I would have probably spent bit longer on the exhibition and the event itself. Sometimes you just hope the things will work out for the best, but it is not always be the case. But it is okay. It is okay to try and not succeed, because if you do it next time, you would have learned from your own mistakes. There will always be times, when you simply don’t get back, what you have put into the event but this is also okay. Because, it enables you to learn and grow.
Would it be amazing if my exhibition was a great success, I would have hundreds of visitors and literally would be sending them away due to the lack of space? Would it be amazing if I sold all the pieces on the night, and had to print more due to the high demand? YES it would ! But in every failure there is a hope and a lesson that the next one will be totally different.
So as I’m looking back at the event, and the photographs below, I am proud of what have I achieved. I will be looking forward to hosting another exhibition, and learning from my own mistakes in the past 🙂
