The Holy Art Gallery — Attraction in London

Where to begin? This was a total scam. I felt £100 is ridiculous to charge artists, but thought to myself (considering their social media influence) that sometimes we need to invest to get ahead in life, which I now know regarding my experience was foolish of me. They clearly did not look at my sculpture properly or read the concept of what my piece was about, which is ironic really. I travelled from the South West to London with my sculpture in a suitcase, after being stressed about it for over a week in regards to how to get there with it. (I am currently on Universal Credit and used a food-bank recently, so even this journey alone I couldn't really afford.)

I arrived and was a little disappointed that the gallery was nothing more than what looked like a shipping container inside a warehouse on a road that will have barely any footfall. I was emailed the day after that my piece would be unable to be displayed because there's some slight mould on the fabric. Something I feel they could have worked out if they looked at the photos or even by reading my statement. I was then told that I could replace it with another piece or have it digitally displayed. I was expecting about 25 people at the exhibition opening, some friends of friends who I had no contact with, and thought how am I going to warn everyone that I potentially am unable to exhibit? I was also annoyed that my concerns in the email got totally ignored and were very London centric, as if other artists don't live there and that I could just go and get another piece. I suggested for my piece to be covered in cellophane so that it wouldn't even spread potential spores (I recently had an exhibition with this piece where over 200 people came with no health issues), but my email was ignored. So, even if I wanted to accept their other suggestions and offers, I would just be left in the dark anyway. Considering they were meant to advertise each artist's work (which they didn't) and keep in touch, I found the gallery very unprofessional. Even from the get go of them asking me if I had paid yet, when I had written in the previous email that I had done so.

When it came to the opening night, you could tell that this was not a carefully curated exhibition and that it was just 81 other people also stupid enough to pay £100 each that were selected. The space had literally no room for the pieces or people to breathe or view, it was designed like a rat run. I have no idea how my piece (which is a single mattress) would have fit in this space. Also, considering that's over 8000 pounds worth of money which they receive at least twice a month, you would think they could buy some better wine!

I decided to have my piece as a guerrilla exhibition next to the entrance. I was eventually told that this area was private property and was told to leave. What was hilarious was that the gallery tried using a photographer as some sort of back-up bouncer. He was hot and not at all threatening. Was more likely to stay because of him. There was no remorse or anything. No apology. I was told in our confrontation outside that they were "too busy" to reply to my email, to which I stated that they weren't too busy to take poor artists' money. What was ironic, is that my piece is about refugees and asylum seekers struggling to find a permanent home indoors, so the fact that my piece wasn't allowed to be part of their bougie exhibition was ironic really and added to the concept of the piece even further. My friends had to laugh because they all said haven't they ever been or lived inside a typical London or English home? (Very well known for...

Best SCAMMERS, five stars for that! Exhibited in 2021, but never did my review. Now I've seen they have arrived in so many cities besides London and Athens that I think people should be aware! GET AWAY ARTISTS! When I had recently moved to London and saw a sponsored advert on Instagram, I thought I was losing my opportunity to exhibit in a gallery in London for the first time if I didn't apply; the deadline was the next day. So I applied and got in, of course, as did EVERYONE who applied. After I applied and started following them, I realised they held exhibitions every single week. There is no selection criteria, and the curation was extremely poor. All they want is YOUR ARTIST fee in their bank accounts. There was no networking with curators, collectors, or any other people from the arts, just friends and family of the people who were also exhibiting. The worst part is that you pay them, and they still do things wrong. They wrote my name incorrectly and, even worse, attributed my work to another person's Instagram account. Everything was just TERRIBLE. I complained, and they corrected my name but not the Instagram account until the last day of the exhibition. Of course, I had to go almost every day to chase them to the gallery. I did the art on loop, which is the worst. I don't remember how many "art" pieces they had on one screen, so it took a really long time for mine to appear again. They make so much money from this by displaying photos on a screen, and of course, art on loops allows them to include more pieces, which means more artists paying to participate. Also they work extremely well on their webpage and socials, that is how they get to scam more people. They also invite artists that have many followers to participate for them for free (this is obviously not public), to make them more liable and promoting the Holy Art Gallery on their instagrams to arrive to more people of course. And they promote this artists on their webs rather than the ones that pay. The only good thing about this whole experience is that I became aware of types of businesses, which make money out of young artists. If you just want a line on your CV that says you exhibited in London or any big city, fine! But in my case, it is such an embarrassing gallery that it is not even worth it; quite the opposite. By now, I have exhibited in many great venues in London. Do thorough research beforehand and never, never, NEVER work with galleries that charge an artist fee. They really don't care about your art. This was good advice a recognised curator gave me after I told her about...

The holy art are as much of a ‘scam’ than every other pay-to-play vanity galleries messaging anyone and everyone on instagram about an ‘opportunity’. They accept anyone who sends an application. After my show with them, a friend of mine applied using terrible children’s painting as his work, and he was accepted, and invited to pay the £180 fee. There is no 'selection process’, the whole thing is a generic amateur art show aimed at anyone willing to pay their fee. Their entire sales pitch is a lie, they don’t provide anything past the point of receiving their fee.

What is suppose to be part of the agreement: 'promotion and marketing', 'pricing and advise support'; Not only was I not promoted in any way, my name was even left out of the list of artist participating in the event, when I pointed that out on IG, they simply deleted the comment. They claim the ‘documentation’ part that is featured on their website counts as promotion, but there are no names featured, or social media links, so who could actually benefits from that. Ultimately the only thing they promote is themselves and the applications you can send, so they can automatically accept it.

In terms of 'pricing and advise support', there was someone at the event selling a framed photograph for £3000, and someone else selling 2 painting for a total of £160, so they either don’t provide the support they claim to give or they actually told an unknown photographer taking part in an amateur art show that 3 grand for a picture is appropriate, and to someone else that making less than the actual fee he’s paid is somehow ok.

Their response to me after telling them yet again that they didn’t respect the agreement, was that they are ‘not a PR agency’ and that I don’t have anything to complain about because ‘the show welcomed over 500 people’, looking back at the 40 something people that showed up to the opening, the size and location of their place, the idea of another 50 people showing up everyday for 10 days is such an obvious lie, its...