Caroline Coon’s Rejection Letter: “The very word makes me nauseous”

Few icons seem more unrejectable than Caroline Coon. Her 60-year career has been filled with rebellion, creative variety and tireless activism. She authored one of the first-ever books on punk, managed The Clash, and through photography and writing, documented the sociocultural shifts that turned Britain inside out. Coon has campaigned for women’s rights, social equality and even founded a charity that provides legal support for those impacted by drugs. And it’s through her painting – crisp-edged figurative works that quash taboos around sex work, gender and drug use – that these themes are so potently captured. But like any counter-culture pioneer, there were detractors, and as she outlines here in this Rejection Letter, it was often those she least expected. It’s been a long path, but the world is finally catching up with Caroline Coon.

Talking about rejection is difficult for me – the very word makes me nauseous. But, I guess, the only way for a human to avoid rejection is to not be born! Rejection is a condition of life, whatever kind of life we lead. When we choose to work in a creative profession and offer our work to the public – which is a kind of arrogance – learning to accept rejection is essential. Every big success is due to a thousand little rejections.

I was lucky to be trained by great artists to both face rejection and to work hard, the better to avoid it. At ballet school when I was a child, I remember rehearsing before the great retired ballerina Lydia Kyasht. She would whack her walking stick on the floor and shout at us to repeat a step again and again until she judged us good enough to proceed. It was by learning the importance of persistence that I was able to withstand the first rejection that cut so deeply I will never forget it. I was talking to my mother about art, and she dismissed me saying: “Caroline, you’ll never be a great artist – great artists have had one-man shows by the time they are your age!”

I was 14. I was vulnerable – with no experience of the world – and I believed my mother. But already there was a strong part of my brain that told me my mother was wrong. If I persisted and worked hard… maybe?

Rejection is particularly nauseating, humiliating and shaming when it is done in public. When I was a first-year fine art student at Central School of Art, Germaine Greer – the feminist writer and critic – would visit me in my studio. We would have engaging conversations long into the night about life, love and sex. I looked up to her (she is six years older than me) as an intellectual and friend. It was the late 1960s and she was writing what would become her international best-seller, The Female Eunuch. When the book was published and I read her dedication to me: “Caroline, who danced, but badly, painted but badly…”, I felt devastated. I had to scrape together every ounce of confidence and self-belief to carry on.

Yes, I learned to accept people’s right to reject me and my work. I would absorb the hurt, spit out a few expletives and move on – determined to do better. If we have the courage to present work to the public, we must also accept rejection with good grace.

Rejection takes an emotional form within me instantaneously, like a knife stabbing into my heart. The question for me has always been how to keep on going – how to repair my damaged and hurt ego. Whilst I struggled for many years to sell my paintings, I still hoped that if I persisted long enough there would eventually be someone who said “yes”. Possibly? And, as time passed, I learned to deal with rejection more rationally. There is no acceptance without rejection. Repeated rejections mean acceptance is sweeter when it occurs: a nice paradox.

What helped fortify my creative outlook has been reading about the lives of everyone who has carried on regardless – no matter what anyone thought of their work. I cannot think of one artist, writer or musician whose work I love who did not face rejection, strife and struggle in their lifetime. The list is long of the people who have shaped my often faltering creative psyche – artists, writers and photographers like Angelica Kauffman, Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, (Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette) Colette, Jean Rhys, Camille Claudel, Henry Scott Tuke, Dora Carrington, Georgia O’Keeffe, Glyn Philpot, Faith Ringgold, Carolee Schneemann, Shirin Neshat, Charlotte Salomon… These are exemplary people for me – not necessarily for the style of their art but for how they managed to live in the face of bigotry and exclusion, often not receiving recognition until long after death or very late in life.

Looking back – although it didn’t feel like it at the time – being overlooked for projects or commissions and having my paintings rejected over many years has had an altogether positive effect on my art. Rejection was damn inconvenient financially! But working outside the art world enabled me to paint exactly as I wanted – which was right for me. I had no pressure to conform to any art world fashion: there was no need for me to compromise my style or subject matter. I could be passionate and free.

Failure is intrinsic to the creative process. If we do the work to the very best of our ability, then there is no failure – only success on our own terms. Just do the work and Keep Going!

Also, it is a good idea for artists to have a sense of perspective – most of us are critical of other artists’ work all the time. I am anyway! I make a judgement but then I remember to keep an open mind because in another mood, on another day, at another time, I will change my mind – what yesterday I rejected, today I adore.

This article was published in Catalogue Issue No. 7.0, guest-edited by Plaster. For more information about Cork Street Galleries, and where to get hold of a physical issue, visit corkstgalleries.com