Chrysalis Mode
It’s been a while since our last blog post. Over three months in fact. We hadn’t intended to let time pass to quite that extent before writing again but that’s time for you. Always moving on and often catching you out.
In the intervening period we’ve been pretty busy, as I’m sure anyone who knows us has come to expect. We’ll try to make time to blog over the summer months about some of the stuff we’ve been up to but for now I just wanted to use this platform to mark a particular moment.
There was quite a bit of reaction to the last post. A lot of understanding and empathy, some excitement, a smidgen of resentment and a fair amount of confusion.
Confusion in particular about whether as an organisation we were leaving the building entirely. So just to be clear, we’re not. HQ will go back to being our offices for a little and will no longer operate as a venue.
I’d usually apologise for posting something that lacks clarity but I don’t want to, and luckily in this case, I don’t think it’s necessary.
Complexity can be hard to communicate.
At Empty Shop we thrive on complexity. We love grey areas. Not because they offer flexibility but because they afford you an opportunity to really dig into something, then amplify the nuances to the point where we you can see the black and white areas that make up the grey.
For us, sharing the reasons behind a decision are just as important as sharing the actual outcome.
We appreciate however that life is busy and people come to HQ to have a good time. Who has time for nuance when you’re worried about booking your next gig or finding somewhere friendly you can go to for a drink on a Friday night?
So it’s worth having another bash and sharing the words of an artist who, as artists do, found a way to communicate the situation in a concise and beautiful fashion.
Tim Crabtree is a Canadian singer songwriter whom many of you will know by the moniker Paper Beat Scissors. He came to play his fourth show at HQ in May having become a true friend of the organisation since his first show as one of our first ever Seagull & Circle gigs in 2014.
Tim has only visited Durham - and HQ - those four times but he’s bonded with the venue (and the venue with him) in a way that’s quite rare. At his most recent show he was reflecting on this being his last visit before things shut down and change up. He used a classic metaphor to acknowledge the past whilst simultaneously expressing his excitement about our decision.
His words were: “I understand Empty Shop is about to go from being a caterpillar to being a butterfly. I just hope the butterfly will be as beautiful as the caterpillar has been.”
Perhaps it’s an obvious metaphor. Caterpillars, chrysalises and butterflies are a pretty common analogy when discussing transition. Something we had probably identified and rejected as being something of a cliche. But here’s the thing about cliches: they only become cliches by being true.
It was for us, a real moment of clarity and reflected the mix of anxiety and excitement about the unknown that people had been trying to communicate with us since we’d first made the announcement.
A big thank you to Tim for being amazing and hinting at so much whilst saying so little. We can but dream of being so articulate. For now, these blogs will do.
So, to clarify once again, for anyone who wasn’t sure about quite where Empty Shop is in this moment - we’re about to disappear into a sort of chrysalis mode for a little while.
Butterflies tend to emerge from theirs after 7–10 days. Ours will be a bit longer. Expected gestation period, very much tbc. In the meantime while we will continue to lease and use both Empty Shop HQ and TESTT Space, there won’t be very much in the way of visible signs of activity.
As mentioned above, we’ll hopefully be blogging a bit and you’ll no doubt see Alice, Carlo and myself around town but Empty Shop as you know it will be dormant.
As for what will sort of butterfly will emerge, we genuinely don’t know. A caterpillar doesn’t know either, it just operates on instinct and lets nature take its course. We’re very much looking forward to doing the same.
