The Work of Being
A catalogue essay I wrote for a publication created on the occasion of the duo-show I curated at Wild Trumpets, London, 30 January - 18 February 2025
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Gianna T.
Vincent Matuschka
Excuse me, miss. May I ask you a question?
What?
What is art?
Art is art.
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‘What is art?’ It’s a question that has preoccupied artists and philosophers alike for centuries. Attempts to tackle the subject have resulted in countless artist manifestos, philosophical treatises and, quite frankly, existential crises for those compelled to make art. Yet, pose this question to a six-year-old and the answer is simple: ‘Art is art.’
The Work of Being catalogue, inside spread, 2025.
Those who regularly interact with children are all too aware of their shrewd ability to both ask and answer questions that might intimidate even the most qualified of adults. Typically delivered with conviction, they prove that sometimes what might appear to be a highly conceptual line of inquiry might be met with concision and confidence: qualities we might aspire to carry through into adulthood. Yet, when it comes to the act of artmaking, this straightforwardness is often countered by an expansive and imaginative creativity – crucially, one that demands focus and attention as much as experimentation and play.
This catalogue presents a selection of work made by individuals between the ages of four and ten. Much of the work was created in 2024 at artist-led workshops run at the London gallery Wild Trumpets – a space in which young people’s artistic activities are recognised, celebrated and fostered. Here and in this publication, the output of young artists is taken seriously and asks those who encounter the works reproduced in these pages to do the same.
The Work of Being catalogue, inside spread, 2025.
For artists of any age, their work is deeply informed by their perception of their environments. Whether expressed in an abstract or figurative visual register, it is often the lived experiences of daily life that are at the fore. This enduring connection between observation, personal impression and representation has often led to children’s art being considered primarily through the prism of psychological and developmental analysis. In these contexts, art is understood as a tool of (un)conscious communication through which we might decipher a child’s progress on the steps to adulthood. This catalogue asks what it means to take children’s art out of these developmental frameworks. To instead treat it as the work of young artists and address it using the same guiding principles with which we approach artworks made by their adult counterparts, encountered in museums, galleries and publications.
Throughout the catalogue, we find evidence of young artists’ varied approaches to a wide range of themes, materials and modes of expression. Landscapes, domestic scenes, depictions of animals and family portraits sit alongside abstract works, all evidencing the dynamic potential of colour, line and form. Collage becomes a tool through which found images are appropriated and their meanings reformulated in new contexts. Other works lay out series of pictorial icons loaded with symbolic potential, asking viewers to bring their interpretative powers to derive meaning from these personal vocabularies.​
The Work of Being catalogue, inside spread, 2025.
Also striking is the prevalence of written language that sits alongside imagery in these works. While words might identify the drawn and painted forms as rainbows, family members or plants, on occasion they also indicate mood, tone or feeling – be it love or existential assertions of ‘NOTHING…’ as is written by one young artist within a densely rendered, abstract black form. Sincerity and humour alternate, reflecting the breadth of human emotion.
Evidently, this is art that stands up to robust design critique. Compositional experimentation lies in the considered placement of the artists’ mark-making, their grouping of subjects and employment of perspective. A variety of stylistic approaches, personal to each artist, also emerges: from forceful, expressionistic gestures to the carefully sketched lines of delicate pencil drawings. Bold, minimalist offerings are offset by maximalist, full-throttle compositions carrying powerful instances of tonality, (a)symmetry, light and shadow, colour, motion and dynamic gesture.
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The Work of Being catalogue, inside spread, 2025.
​If, as this catalogue contends, young artists’ work might be approached through aesthetic analysis then why is it so often diminished in comparison to art made by adults? An awareness of preconceived hierarchies of intent seems key here; the reductive assumption that there is a conceptual and formal rigour absent from the work of young artists due to their age and lack of formal training. Yet, we are in a moment when the wider artworld is working to challenge and deconstruct the hierarchical categories that have led to many artists being overlooked and marginalised due to factors including gender, race, sexuality, disability, socio-economic background and nationality. Why not add age to this list? The result can only be a more inclusive and thus richer landscape for the making and reception of art – one that demands we leave our preconceptions at the door and embrace a process of close-looking rooted in the very artworks themselves.
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The Work of Being catalogue, inside spread, 2025.
This publication takes its title from a 2025 duo-exhibition of new work by the 31-year-old artists Vincent Matuschka and Gianna T. (The Work of Being, Wild Trumpets, London, 2025). For them, ‘the work of being’ describes the shifting nature of our relationship to artmaking throughout our lives. When considered in the context of childhood, the act of artmaking is typically cast as one of freedom and creativity. Yet with the passing of years and passage into adulthood, artists often find this previously liberated mode of expression stifled by the intrusion of work and notions of labour. These obstacles may come from external pressures – the structures of the artworld, a lack of time, energy, resources and economic viability – or internal pressures – crises of confidence, internalised judgement and self-censorship. Being, and its translation into artistic expression, becomes work.
However, considered in a different light, ‘the work of being’ might take on new, revitalised resonance. The idea of ‘work’ is shifted away from capitalist contexts of economic productivity. Instead, it is understood as an act of dedication, the labour of honing a skill set, of self-reflection and the development of a muscle memory that allows artists to wield a brush, hold a pencil or sculpt form. Recontextualised in these terms, work becomes a necessary process through which art is created at any age.
Gathered under the titular 'Work of Being', the drawings, paintings and collages collected in these pages evidence the variety of ways in which young artists might contribute to and expand the experiences we encounter in artmaking today, building a fuller picture of the subjectivities that comprise contemporary society.
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Kit Gurnos
January 2025
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