Voluntary Work at the Brian Eno Exhibition, Brighton Festival

Posted by David, studying Engineering Foundation at Bellerbys Brighton

Selamat pagi/tengah hari/petang/malam, readers! That means good morning/afternoon/evening/night in my national language, the Malay language, since I probably do not know when exactly you readers will be reading my blog.

I sat down one day, idly wondering what I could do during my leisure times instead of repetitive revisions or drawings.  We cannot possibly study 24/7.  In fact, we should not.  We should have a balance in everything we do.

Well, the A-level exams are drawing nigh, which means it would be unlikely to sight A-level students free enough to entertain me and my incessant energy.  Foundation students seemed occupied enough with their own work, which left me thinking about volunteer working. 

What with my extremely pathetic web surfing skills, I magically stumbled upon a volunteer opportunity in the upcoming Brighton Festival.  It read “Art Exhibition at Malborough House by Brian Eno.”

Brian Eno?  I have to be honest.  I was oblivious as regards to who he was; absolutely clueless.  I just thought to myself how cool it would be to meet an actual artist.  Having been totally new in voluntary working, I was excited yet dubious of what I might have gotten myself into.  You see, I have trust issues with the Internet, earlier being convinced that all offers made on the Internet are somewhat scams and plans devised to kidnap you.  I am a paranoid child! 

Nevertheless, I sought advice from Mrs Chris and was approved by her that it was safe for me to proceed.  Gleefully, I leapt onto my laptop, typing out an email to apply for my first volunteer job.

Briefings during the induction gave me a clear view of what I needed to do.  We work in two different exhibition places: Fabrica Art Gallery and Malborough House.  Fabrica contained the ’77 Million Paintings’  where Brian played with sets of 4 different sized screens comprising of various motives overlapping in time.  Along the entrance walkway, activities like colour tone-based Sudoku and naming colours kept some visitors occupied.

Malborough House, on the other hand, was a slightly different environment, housing 5 rooms distinctively defined with Rick Holland’s poem.  Based on the different poems, Brian cleverly brought out the ambience of the room by manipulating his installation of his self-designed speaker flowers, prompting the visitors to imagine to the fullest. 

The most interesting room for me had to be the one where he used disco balls as reflectors shone through a white light between his ‘flowers’, exuding a biological imprint on the walls of the dark room; resembling haemoglobin in our body cells as mentioned in Rick’s poem.

Working for Brian Eno for the past few weeks had been amazing.  Seeing that Bellerbys is a college only meant for foreign students (besides the local teachers of course), it is gratifying to actually have the opportunity to interact with the locals in Brighton.  

I have met so many different kinds of people from all walks of life.  There were kids who were completely engrossed with the Sudoku and questioned the artwork in a surprisingly innocent yet innovative manner. The funniest encounter had to be in Malborough’s house when a man asked us volunteers if we were real people. (How random is that?) 

There was also a sentimental moment when a lady creatively named a colour after the date of her son’s birth.  She elaborated how she felt during his birth and sent her prayers that all will be well with him in the future. 

Speaking with the British people has dramatically spurred my confidence in speaking, which I am certain, would be of a paramount asset when I enter my university.  It was certainly the icing on the cake that this experience could potentially be the ‘sugar and spice’ in my college reference, giving my reference an extra punch of something outside of school than plain academic reports.

Not only that, throughout the entire period, I have met similar art enthusiasts working for the event as well. They were not all students, but experienced art pursuers too.  Having met them enabled me to learn a bit more about the perception of art.  Some volunteered to improve their grasp of the English language or simply to show their mettle in dealing with public speaking.  Did I just hear a way to improve one’s IELTS speaking test? 

Anyways, with Malborough House coincidentally being one of Brighton’s architectural masterpiece in Brighton, I was lucky enough to be able to first-handedly witness the structurally rich building.  By the way, previously mentioning that I did not know much about Brian Eno, I was completely infatuated with his work.  Getting to meet him really was like meeting the artsy version of Sara Bareilles.  (I am a die hard fan of Sara Bareilles.)

A big shoutout to Tila and Tasha (the volunteer managers): Thank you so much for the warm hospitality with all the frequent provision of snacks and drinks.  Not to mention, treating us volunteers with such consideration, allowing us to switch places so that we could also experience different aspects of Brian’s work while working. 

I was also amazed by how you both could effortlessly remember all of our names.  There were so many of us and yet it seemed like you have known us for ages.  It certainly made us feel appreciated.  It has been such an experience under your leadership skills.  Not to forget, being meticulous enough to brief us on different ways to handle certain scenarios.  Now, I certainly know how to get myself out from someone who has been talking to me for ages, hindering my work. One thing though, can we keep the volunteer shirt? *laughs*  Most importantly, a gigantic TERIMA KASIH (thank you in my national language) for instilling good work ethics in me.

Dear readers, voluntary working has initially started as something merely to fill up my days.  Instead, I ended my experience, with a profusion of accomplishments from vocational experience, communication skills, social networking, discipline, more architecture, and town exploration!  It was definitely a worthwhile experience, which I reckon that everyone should give it a go.  I am definitely grabbing the next opportunity that comes, anticipating for more exposure in this second home country of mine.

Thank you once again for reading.
Au revoir!