Story of Simon Birch
People often ask about my inspirations and how I developed @the14thfactory. This is my story...
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In NYC things were going downhill rapidly. The money to fund the show was running out and cost kept rising, and my attempts to raise, fancy dinners, networking, brand sponsors, the rich, art patrons, all failing. No one in NYC would help fund. The money I had was not enough and even when a superhero from Hong Kong, Jack, tried to save us at the last minute, we ran into timeline issues and the cash was still short. Our grant applications rejected, crowdfunding failed and zero sponsorship arrived after hundreds of meetings.
The production house lost faith and canceled us. No refund on the hundreds of thousands we had paid in advance. The landlord wouldn't give us an extension on the lease (the building is still empty today) to give us time to raise more money. The show was built offsite, we had announced, dozens employed, amazing relationships, community, education, and then, almost overnight, the show was off.'
Just like that.
Career ending. Disaster.
This brief recollection represents two years of work, drama, stress, exhaustion, and persistence, which is a whole book in itself. Dinners with important people, kicking my way into the offices of gatekeepers, players in the art world, government, financial worlds, etc. It was an awful revelation, how the world works, and your place in it.
When this disaster happened, all was ready, believing it would all come together. Just a little extra money or influence and we could've realized the project...Believe in yourself, commit, work, persist.....it's just not that simple. Where's the motivational insta post, the inspirational guru, that says; believe in yourself, follow your dreams, never give up...but also don't? because even with all that you may still be totally fxxked.
Belief, with skills, talent, network, money, experts, amazing idea? Still maybe not enough. Your dreams may well stay as dreams, however well prepared. My dream, to build this wonderful collaborative art project, over 70,000sqft of historic NY real estate, rapidly turned into the worst nightmare of my life.
But desperate as we were, dreams shattered, huge disruptive art exhibition now doomed...?
A ray of hope presented itself....
