The advantage of distance: An external curator perspective

There is a moment many artists recognise, even if they rarely articulate it.

You are working, producing, refining. You are not inactive.

Yet something does not move. Decisions circle. The work feels close. Too close. Every choice makes sense, and yet none of them shift the larger picture.

This often happens when an artist has been inside their own practice for too long.

Not emotionally, but structurally.

Why this matters

When you are immersed in your own context, your own market, your own expectations, perspective compresses. What feels logical begins to feel inevitable. You adjust rather than rethink. You add rather than reframe.

For artists working internationally, or hoping to, this can be especially limiting. The question is no longer whether the work is strong, but whether it is positioned clearly enough to travel.

And clarity rarely appears from the inside.

Australian artist Karen Osborn

The deeper layer: an external curator perspective

A large part of my curatorial work happens at a distance.

Different countries. Different time zones. Different cultural references. Many of the artists I work with are not based where I am, and that distance is not something to be overcome. It is central to how I work.

Distance removes noise.

From an external curator perspective, I am not embedded in local conversations, trends, or assumptions. I am not part of the internal logic that has slowly built up around a body of work. This allows me to see patterns very quickly: repetitions, hesitations, inconsistencies, and possibilities that have gone unnoticed simply because they were too familiar.

What artists often describe as a fresh pair of eyes is, in reality, a structural position. I am close enough to understand the work deeply, but far enough away to remain precise.

Reframing the question

Artists sometimes ask whether it is a disadvantage not to work with someone locally.

A more useful question might be whether proximity is really what creates understanding.

Curation is not about standing next to the work. It is about knowing where it sits, what it communicates, and how it functions beyond its place of origin.

That kind of clarity does not depend on geography.

A final thought

An external perspective does not dilute an artistic voice. It sharpens it.

Sometimes the most valuable person in your process is the one who is not standing in the room with you, but who sees the whole room at once.

At a certain point, the work asks for a curator.

You can find other reflections in Inside Equine Art.