My Generation

Writing by Władysław Mirecki

There are many reasons why the gallery thrives, one being the artists who show with us. I was born on the 1st October 1956 and have asked artists born 6 years either side of that date who have had a solo show with us to contribute to “My Generation”. This celebrates my 70th during the gallery’s’ 40th year.

My wife Edna began the gallery on 16th May 1986 on the proceeds of earnings made in Holland and Belgium. That year the River Amstel froze while I was freezing up a signal pole in time for the first steam day of the season at the East Anglian Railway Museum. Edna and I met when I became a lodger and immediately got involved with the business, (and her).

Not all our artists were that young. Our very first Solo artist was Vasant Chinchwadkar (b.1934) who unknown to us, invited a friend, Shanti Panchal (b.1951) who is in this show.

Our next Solo exhibition was by Angela Thwaites (b.1960). We did not meet up again with Angela until last year 2025, when we immediately offered her another Solo show. Some of these exhibitors have only had one solo show with us and some have become part of our stable of artists showing frequently. Some of these artists were given their first exhibition in a commercial gallery. Some have gone onto greater things with sole agency in Cork Street. Others have retreated into quiet solitude to do their own thing. What really pleases me is not one artist refused to contribute despite what might seem like shoddy negligence. In our defence it would not have been possible to offer each and every one of them a repeat showing. There were also artists from older (and younger) age groups, mixed and themed shows such as Walberswick artists or our ‘Continuing the Tradition series of distinguished artists from this region including Peter Coker and Maggie Hambling.

We only rarely showed deceased artists work as we did not want to become dealers and preferred to be a living, breathing venue with walking, taking artists. And not having gone to art school myself, talking to fellow practitioners and handling their work became my Art education.

For the first 10 years our bank did not allow us a penny overdraft. This meant we were sometimes very slow paying our artists for which we apologise. This did instil in us a kind of financial discipline. Not so disciplined that we only put on commercially viable exhibitions. It would have been so easy for us to choose our artists from the many professional members of the Colchester Art Society. Instead, we went to London and showed people like Edward Bishop, David Gluck, Charlotte Ardizeone and Fred Dubery the last two who happened to live in Suffolk.

In all this time, we lived through many a recession. Each time we upped our game. Our rural location meant although we had great space more than we could afford in a town setting, we would never have the throughput. So every sale had to count.

I had a painting block until about 1996 which was forcibly overcome in order to celebrate the gallery’s 10th Anniversary. It was agony. But the success of the show meant the bank relented giving loans which allowed us to expend the property, so we were no long living in rooms above the shop. (We were, but oh, what rooms!). These paintings were brought to the attention of a delegation from China. I was invited to exhibit in Nanjing in 1999 where on my birthday I celebrated 50 years since the forming of the People Republic of China. One of our hosts, Mme Yu Ruirong (b.1958) was given a reciprocal exhibition in 2001 and is included in the show.

The financial crisis of 2008 resulted in our temporary closure in 2010. I resented lost studio time putting on shows nobody came to see. My arrogance made me feel my sales were subsidising the gallery. So, for a while it became just my space. Guilt and fear as the sole earner drove me to sit in my studio getting no exercise, eating and drinking too much culminating in a stroke in 2015. We had re-opened by then as it became clear our artists subsidised me. Besides, we missed the hugger-mugger of it all.

The gallery’s new incarnation did not resort to the old mode of each show lasting 3 weeks with a week to re-hang giving us 13 shows a year which we’d done for about 25 years. We managed to acquire 2 new artists for ‘My Generation’ Peter Rodulfo (b.1958) and Hilary Hoyland (b.1958), daughter in law to Francis (b.1930) and Philippa (b.1924 – d. 2019) Hoyland. How many more might we acquire for ‘My Generation’ in the future?