[BACKGROUND CONTEXT]

My first introduction to an art market outside London was in Manchester, circa 2013 when, as memory serves, both The Manchester Contemporary (TMC) art fair and the Contemporary Art Society (CAS) Collector Development Programme were in their first years. 

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The Manchester Contemporary directed by Thom Hetherington & Sophie Helm was curated by 'International 3' gallery. Laurence Lane & Paulette Terry Brien, the directors of 'International 3', saw the importance of a regional art market in creating an healthy arts ecology, encouraging artists to live and work in the region and championing other regional towns and cities. 

The Collector Development Programme was an invaluable economic initiative focused on developing collectors from the North to add to the long established London membership that CAS enjoys.

As a curator and academic, my research interests have always been in art and artists outside traditional art centres like New York, London or Paris. 

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These initiatives, together with Arts Council England, (who were in the process of commissioning the report entitled Taste Buds : How to cultivate the art market 2014)  set the scene for a new collecting / buying audience for a growing critical mass of artists, studios and galleries outsie of London. Employed by Paul Hobson, the then director of CAS, Mark Doyle and Rebecca Morrell took up salaried positions as Regional Managers of new collectors in the North West and East respectively. Their tenure was a success and welcomed in the region; I havent spoken to anyone involved in those heady days of learning, experimentation and discovery who has a bad word to say about the programme or Mark and Rebecca's enthusiasm and professionalism throughout. Their work supported galleries such as my own, Division of Labour, to become established in the North and strengthened the art ecology in the North. We miss them very much.

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A Modest Show began as a exhibition and commissioning vehicle for artists hailing from Greater Manchester to participate in a festival of art during The British Art Show (9) in 2022. We focused on hospitality and came to an understanding of the importance and the need for someone to organise and facilitate looking at, talking about and sharing art. We realised how Art Lovers find meeting Artists difficult and visa-versa. How the recent history presented above is so fondly remembered and sorely lost. How much of our work as arts professionals, artists, curators, gallerists and critics has become about administration, funding, surviving and logistics and not doing what we 'do it' for: sharing our work and meeting art lovers!

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Nostalgically I want this time back, so we need the support of Art Lovers everywhere! 

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-  JOIN US : producer@amodestshow.com

Nat Pitt · Curator of A Modest Show.

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CURATORIAL STATEMENT for The Collector Programme