January 2013 Presidents Report

Dear Members,

Happy New Year! Welcome to our new members, we hope you enjoy being part of our diverse and dynamic group. We have a lot happening in 2013, with the move to our new home at Kedron projected for the first half of the year, embarking on a new path for Impress in this our ‘own’ space. It is an exciting time for us after all the frustration of the last couple of years.

Kedron update:

Since late September last year, Kedron has been at a standstill, even though the balustrade and stairs were supposed to be fitted under the last scope of works, they are still not fitted. Our workshop program has been crippled since July because we have three presses there that are unusable and our gallery program has been on hold for two years; yet despite numerous emails to the BCC we seem to get the same response, “We are trying to get the extra funding together”. Well after all this time, it appears the light is beginning to be visible at the end of the tunnel, as I was informed last Thursday that BCC now have full funding to complete the job and will be starting soon.

Progress so far:

The Mezzanine level (gallery) floor is up, the lift well is installed, the acid room, bathrooms and troughs are fitted and plumbing is operational. The air conditioning ducting is now onsite and the fitters are able to start in about 2 weeks. The final scope of works will start within the next few weeks, and all going smoothly we will be in the building before the middle of the year.

How you can help:

Members can help by volunteering to participate in working bees to:

·      help us pack up Warilda Street and move those items to Kedron

·      clean Warilda street after everything is moved out

·      clean Kedron before equipment is moved in

·      help unpack equipment and set up Kedron

·      donating materials for benches

·      painting and making moveable benches

·      finding sponsors for paint, bench making materials and other incidentals

·      general helping hand

Vie De Pacifique:

The first VDP exhibition opened in Auckland in December and was very well received and over the last few weeks I have collated all the prints for the other boxes, making sure they are in catalogue order and mailed them off. I am now working on collating all the information for the catalogue so that I can hand it all to Amanda Page who is going to do the catalogue design. We did not get the grant for printing the catalogue so I will have to raise around $5000 to fund this, is there anyone who can help with this please? I am also currently working on my final DVA exhibition coming up at the end of February to mid March, so I don’t have time to fundraise. I have put in countless hours on this exhibition, making folio boxes, printing the Vanuatu artists prints, creating invitations, posters and the didactics that are included inside each box as well as funding my trip to New Zealand to open it there. Paula kindly transported the Chile boxes to Taller 99 studio in Chile.

As yet some participants have not paid the $40 entry fee, could you please check your records and send this money if you haven’t paid as this money is to cover postage and the boxes. If you are able to donate some money towards the catalogue, please remember we are a tax deductible organisation, whatever you donate is tax deductible, but please specify if it is for the VDP catalogue by adding VDP to your donation details. Any donation will be welcome

As it appears that Impress new gallery won’t be open by April, I have several venues that I’m looking at, one a private gallery at Redcliffe (which we will have to pay for), another is the Redlands Museum, and a possibility of Redlands Gallery or a BCC space; we are awaiting replies from the people in charge. I am also looking at the possibility of touring it through the Regional Gallery system with an educational package after the ASSI 150 years.

Kind regards,

Jenny Sanzaro-Nishimura

President