Page 4 - Art First: Kate McCrickard: New Romantics

introduction

Everyone loves a story, and they often begin with a date–
a more grown-up version of ‘once upon a time’. This exhibi -
tion is a multifaceted celebration for many reasons, and it
gives me enormous pleasure to share a few of them here,
starting with a date, which as it happens, marks an anniversary.

Twenty years ago, Kate and I met one another in New York,
thanks to David Krut, who knew we would get on rather well.
How right he was. The occasion was the presentation of
Eileen Cooper at 50: a Celebration, which was an extension
of her London exhibition with Art First in Cork Street in 2003.
Kate had just been appointed Gallery Director of David Krut
Projects, his new space in Chelsea, New York, and this was
to be the first show. It began a three-way friendship between
Kate and the two Coopers, all Geminis, and all British, though
Kate and I both had African childhoods.

A decade later Kate had married her French husband,
Antoine, and moved to Paris, where they had three wonderful
children, one of them, Sarah-Frances, being my goddaughter.
Kate had emerged as the practising artist she is, working
mostly as a printmaker, with drawings and gouaches. David
Krut Projects hosted her first exhibition, Kid, in 2013, and the
next year she had her first show with Art First in London,
Open the Box. Very memorably, the opening party was filled
with as many tiny people as adults, for all the young children
attended, with their cousins and friends, and baby Ben lay
on his back on a bed of bubble wrap. Another guest was
Eileen Cooper, whom Kate considered a mentor, and the
2 two of them went through the work, deep in discussion.