TRANSMISSION GALLERY ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING MINUTES 22.01.2009

TRANSMISSION GALLERY
ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
MINUTES 22.01.2009

These minutes are available to all Transmission members. Please contact the gallery if you wish any amendments to be noted.

PRESENT
Bob Carey-Grieve (Chair), Helen Tubridy, Conal Mc Stavick, Victoria Skogsberg, Tim Facey, Jens Strandberg, Nick Evans, Michael Hill Johnston, Sierra Stinson, Michael Kent, Toby Patterson, Lola Edwards, Paul MacInnes, Kathryn Elkin, Lynn, Hynd, Laurie Figgis, Roddy Buchanan, Sally Chapman, Stephanie Spindler, Olivia Gurtler, Charlie Hammond, Nika Kupyrova, Louise Montgomery, Sara Barker, Rob Kennedy, Andrew Kerr, Simon Gowing, Jodi Cave, Liam Casey, Kirsteen Macdonald, Chris Dyson, Katherine MacBride, Helena Skulstad, Belinda Scott, Louise Shelley, Laura Aldridge, Luke Neve, Maeve Redmond, Heather Purcell, Craig Mulholland, Katy Dove, Sarah Lowndes, Rallou Panagiotou, Michael Stumpf and Marianne Greated (Scottish Arts Council) as an observer.

Minutes taken by Helen Tubridy.

AGENDA

1. OPENING REMARKS AND NOMINATION OF CHAIR
2. APOLOGIES
3. MINUTES OF THE PREVIOUS MEETING
4. AUDITED FINANCIAL REPORT FOR THE YEAR ENDED MARCH 08
5. GALLERY ACTIVITES
6. DEVELOPMENTS
6.1. MOTION TO AMMEND THE CONSTITUTION BY KASJA DAHLBERG, ASA ELZEN AND MALIN ARNELL.
7. APPROVAL OF THE COMMITTEE
8. ANY OTHER BUSINESS

ITEM 1 – OPENING REMARKS AND NOMINATION OF CHAIR

Tim Facey thanks those attending, introduced the current committee and proposes that Bob Carey-Grieve chairs the meeting. This was seconded by Victoria Skogsberg and the chair was appointed unanimously. Bob Carey-Grieve outlined the rules of the meeting and explained the procedure involved. He also declared the membership requirements in conjunction with the AGM as stated in the Transmission Gallery Constitution.

ITEM 2 – APOLOGIES

The chair introduced Helen Tubridy to read the apologies. Apologies were made in advance by the following members who were unable to attend the meeting:

Helen Tuck, David Allen, Scott Myles, Giles Bailey, Rebecca Gordon-Nesbitt, Jane Topping, Ian Hetherington, Hrafnhildur Halldorsdottir, Ufuk Gueray, Anna Tanner, Christy Cole, Rebecca Wilcox, Anne-Maria Copestake, Lucy Potter, Jenny Soep, Jenny Baynes, Karen Cunningham, Andy Robertson, Tom Owen. Jamie Cooper, Emily Beckmann, Clare Stephenson, Alex Pollard, Ian McIlroy, David Sherry, Mick Welbourn, Robert Johnston, Malcolm Gauldie, Jon Nicholl, Helen Shaddock, Cathy Wilkes, Richard Wright, Laura Yuile.

ITEM 3 – MINUTES OF PREVIOUS AGM

The chair then invites the members to read the minutes of the previous AGM (05.02.08). There were no objections or corrections offered to the minutes of the previous year. The chair then proposed a vote of the minutes which was passed unanimously.

The chair asked if there were any matters arising from the minutes of the previous AGM.

Bob Carey Grieve asked the committee if the membership renewal system whereby there is two points in the year one in summer and one in winter, when members would be able to renew their membership was working effectively. Victoria Skogsberg answered that it was working well and encouraging members to renew their membership as well as allowing the committee to keep on top of the database.

The chair draws the memberships attention to the fact that commissions of artworks have been changed and amended in the constitution from 15% to 30% in comparison to March 2007.

ITEM 4 – AUDITED FINANCIAL REPORT FOR THE YEAR ENDED MARCH 31ST 2008

The chair introduced Victoria Skogsberg who read out the audited financial report ending March 2007. Victoria read through all the items in the income and expenditure columns, explaining what each heading covered. She drew attention to the bigger grand income than year ended March 2007 and explained that this was due to Glasgow International funding and Scottish Arts Council funding for curatorial internship. Also due to the two- point membership renewal system there was an increase on membership fees from the previous year.

Victoria announced that Transmission have been awarded a Capital Grant of £37,000 by the Scottish Arts Council towards fitting out the new space and archive when Transmission relocates back to 28 King Street as part of Trongate 103.

The chair asked the membership if anyone had any questions regarding the figures presented.

Michael Hill Johnston asked for an explanation as to why there was an increase on rent rates and water charges and why the council was not covering these costs. Tim Facey explained that VAT had been applied on all council properties.

The chair due attention to the bank charges which have increased by £100 on the previous year. Toby Patterson said that if there were ever more than £50,000 in the accout there would be a risk to such charges. Conal McStravick said Transmission is working on setting up a paypal account to aid with charges for sending money abroad so money will leave the bank account quicker when making international payments. Laura Aldridge added that according to OSCAR Transmission as a charitable organisation should never have that amount of money sitting in the account.

The chair recommended an action point as to what the implications of this are and that Transmission seek advice.

The chair asked all attending for an approval of the accounts. This approval was passed and carried.

The Committee proposed that the accountants Benham and Conway continue to audit the accounts. The motion was seconded and passed unanimously.

ITEM 5 – GALLERY ACTIVITES

The chair introduced Jens Strandberg to present an overview of the gallery’s activites over the past year. Jens presented this in the form of a projected slide show and talk. The gallery’s activities were as follows:

4 - 8 March
Luke Fowler
Screening and artist talk
45 King Street

18 March - 5 April
Ann Bowman, Luke Collins and Derek Lodge
45 and 48 King Stet

27 March
Luke Collins and Derek Lodge
Two Artist talks
45 King Street

11 April - 10 May
Melanie Gilligan
Prison for Objects
45 and 48 King Street
(Glasgow International)

27 May – 14 June
Jennifer West
Lemon Juice and Lithium
48 King Street

George Ziffo
New Work
45 King Street

10 June
Grier Edmundson and Hrafnhildur Halldorsdottir
Two Artist talks
45 King Street
24 – 28 June
Lois Rowe
Exhibition and screening event
45 King Street

28 June
Donald Urquhart
Plagues
Performance
48 King Street

8 – 26 July
You should be on Holiday!
Annual Members Show
45 King Street

18 July
Transmission Summer Party
Poloc Cricket Club

30 September – 25 October
Michael Kent, Kendall Koppe, Ariki Porteous, Darren Rhymes, Michael Roy
45 King Street

14 October
Salomeh Grace and Becky Sik
Two Artist talks
45 King Street

23 October
Performance by Jamie Grier and Muscles of Joy using ‘you wet my signal’ by Ariki Porteous.
45 King Street

25 October
Anja Kirschner and David Panos
Trail of the Spider
Screening and discussion
45 King Street

3- 30 November
Moot Points
45 King Street
(Curatorial Internship)

9 December - 31 January 2009
José Antonio Hernández-Díez
45 King Street
(International Solo Show)


14 January – 25 March
4x4: Studio Projects
48 King Street

Jens briefly talked about the upcoming Scottish solo Show with Alex Gross, an off site project in Ruchill opening 14 February.

Victoria mentioned this year Transmission has programmed more artist talks and continues to do so as a response to last years AGM.

ITEM 6 – DEVELOPMENTS

The chair then introduced Tim and Conal to talk about the gallery’s developments.

The biggest development continues to be the move to Trongate 103. Tim explained that the move has been put back to September 2009 and rather than move earlier Transmission will keep the existing space and continue with 2009’s programme between 45 and 48 King Street. Tim talked about the capital grant and how it would be used to reequip the gallery, create an archive room and useable office space. Tim outlined the total cost of the project as being £50,000 – with receiving the capital grant of £37,000 and £6,000 plus the fee for a professional archivist from Glasgow City Council there will still be a shortfall of £4,000. Tim explained it is up to Transmission i.e. the committee and membership to raise this money.

Tim mentioned that the Committee had decided to approach the membership with the idea of raising the membership fee to contribute to the shortfall; £8 for student/unwaged or £20 for waged. Conal added that in recent times similar artist run spaces such as Generator and Catalyst have also raised their membership fee. The chair asked the membership if they could consider this. Michael Hill Johnston made the point that the postage costs for mail outs are still not covered by the increased fee. Toby Patterson added that the fee has not gone up in at least 15 years.

The chair proposed a vote on this motion and the membership agreed unanimously.

Kathryn Elkin said this should be mentioned in a mail out to the membership.

A member asked what the other ideas for fundraising might be.

Tim suggested an art auction as part of an exhibition that could be presented online to encourage buyers from outside Glasgow and welcomed suggestions. Sarah Lowndes suggested a jumble sale.

Conal introduced the developments of the new website and anticipated it would be ready over the course of the next few months. He went through a demonstration of how the website would look showing past committee members, a members directory and an online archive. Toby Patterson asked how it would be possible to view past shows online. Conal explained that this is being worked on systematically with each committee member working on a different time period.

Michael Stumpf questioned how the members slide archive would work with international members as it could be exploited by becoming a host for artist’s works who don’t necessarily have a vested interest in the gallery.

It was suggested that inline with raising the prices for UK members that international membership should be set at a higher cost, not only to cover the mail out costs which are considerably higher but also to discourage people joining just to have their work on Transmission’s website. The price was agreed at £35.

It was also discussed that the definition between full or associate member should be made clearer and that anyone living outside Glasgow should be advised to become an associate member as it is unlikely they will attend the AGM.

Kathryn Elkin questioned the five-year lease assurance for Trongate 103. Conal explained that we are still pursuing this issue and Victoria added we are waiting on papers to arrive.

ITEM 6.1 - MOTION TO AMEND THE CONTITUTION BY KASJA DAHLBERG, ASA ELZEN AND MALIN ARNELL

The chair asked the membership if we could move on to item 6.1 and introduced the motion put forward by the YES! Association represented by Kathryn Elkin. The chair, Bob Carey-Grieve asked the membership to consider allowing him to step down from the chair in order to give his opinion as a member and proposed Tim Facey to take over the duties of chair. This was passed unanimously. Tim asked Kathryn Elkin to present the motion.

Kathryn explained her relationship to Kasja Dahlberg and the YES! Association and presented the membership the Transmission constitution and the YES! Association’s amended constitution explaining that the YES! Association felt the Transmission constitution was outmoded and did not do enough to fully represent equality in terms of artists shown at Transmission.

Tim asked if there was anyone in opposition to the motion who could present an argument. Bob Carey-Grieve asked to be considered and the membership voted unanimously.

Bob spoke of how the YES! Association’s amendment was unrealistic and by accepting the amended constitution the committee would have to practice positive discrimination in order to programme in accordance with the agreement, as a result of this shows would not necessarily be awarded on artistic merit. Bob said that positive discrimination is illegal and as Transmission is funded by the Scottish Arts Council signing the agreement could jeopardise Transmission’s funding. Bob presented an amendment to the constitution to allude specifically to equal rights as part of the constitution.

Kathryn explained she had spoken to a solicitor and the Equalities Officer from the Arts Council but was unsure if this question of a specified percentage of female artists would be deemed to be positive discrimination in the UK. Kathryn made use of the definition of Positive Action as provided by the YES! Association. Kathryn also mentioned she had an informal conversation with the Equalities Officer who had reacted positively, but this was not the official sentiment offered by the SAC.

Kathryn said the solicitor she had spoken to had advised that in order to adopt the line regarding quantifying gender representation in terms of artists selected by the gallery, there would have to be statistical substantiation that women were under-represented, and those statistics would need to apply to Glasgow generally.

A discussion followed in which the following points were raised

Transmission has an equal rights agreement, is it necessary for this to be part of the constitution also.
How could the statistics be monitored?
It is not a good idea to change a constitution as it is a legal document – a lawyer must oversee any changes and changing it may be costly.
The length of time for this amendment being presented was ill considered
The document doesn’t represent Transmission
The argument about Transmission already showing enough female artists was raised again as was the question of the legality of specifying a percentage of artists represented be female.
Are the YES! Association members?

Kathryn then spoke and said the YES! Association – Malin Arnell, Asa Elzen and Kasja Dahlberg had joined as members yesterday.

Tim asked if there were any other amendments to be considered a member put forward another amendment. Tim asked for a vote on the amendments from the membership, it was voted unanimously the constitution should remain as it is.

Bob then stepped back up to the position of chair for the remainder of the meeting.

ITEM 7 – APPROVAL OF THE COMMITTEE

The chair explained the proceedings of the vote to approve the current committee. This vote in favour of the current committee was passed unanimously.

ITEM 8 – ANY OTHER BUSINESS

The chair suggested a time limit for all motions to be submitted one month before the AGM to allow papers to circulate and a time limit for any amendments should be no later than one week. This was approved unanimously.

The meeting was adjourned.