I was given some background information about the 60 students I was to give my talk to at the University of Granada, that they only value Baroque painting as a form of art and that they thought that all artists were financially poor and that being an artist is not a good life choice. So my job was to inspire them to see things differently.

Preparation

I have read a few books on public speaking and previously I have only done a few nerve wracking short introductions for various performers in the past. Apart from that I have successfully avoided all forms of public speaking my entire life because I get stage fright. It all starting off with my first tongue tied class assembly performance at school, at the age of 5, where I totally forgot how to read and the whole school laughed at me and I cried. I nearly cried again this time as well. I began by showing my first film Work Wise, after which the head of art, Manuel, introduced me. My words did not come and instead my eyes welled up. Manuel seemed to understand my hesitation and he kept talking, as I swallowed my emotions down. I took a deep breathe and took over from him when I was ready. I had written an essay about my career as preparation and I had bullet points to hand. I was determined to do this.

A Review of My Career

I began by speaking about how my art film career had developed, from my early college days with no computers, through to taking heavy old fashioned television sets to gigs in the 90’s and then talking about how popular I was when I got my first video projector. I showed a film to illustrate the type of visuals I make, Cheeky Hearts. Then I showed them the film of my sculptures, where I tell the story about the making of Bacchus’ Amphora (the cock pot), which threw me as well as them. It is blatantly erotic but hey, everyone was over 18 and I didn’t swear once during my talk, so that makes up for it, I think? OK I said, “Sod” once but that’s all. I allowed myself to get animated and passionate as I spoke and I rode those nerves all the way through to the very end. The audience seemed attentive and keen to listen the entire hour, as no one threw anything at me and I even got some lovely feedback on my website from two of the students.