Gesso Open Gesso

For painters and fine artists

Your career, hung in order.

Gesso keeps every exhibition, residency, award, commission and publication on one timeline, each linked to the works that were in it. When a gallery asks for your CV, it is already written.

Open Gesso See the CV it prints

Free, in your browser. No account, and nothing leaves your device.

A CV is always due the week you are hanging a show.

So it gets patched from memory at midnight. The group show in Leeds goes missing, the residency lands in the wrong year, and nobody can say which paintings went to Margate.

Gesso is where you write it down once, on the day it happens.

  • CV_2019.docx
  • CV 2021 FINAL.docx
  • CV_final_v3_gallery.pdf
  • cv-new (2).docx
  • One record, kept as you go

How it works

Three small habits, one finished CV.

  1. 1

    Log it when it happens.

    A show opens, an award letter arrives, a catalogue goes to print. Pick the kind, give it a title, a place and its dates. It takes half a minute.

  2. 2

    Hang the works on it.

    Tick the works that were in it, or add a new one on the spot. Each work gets a painted stand-in until you link a photo.

  3. 3

    Print when they ask.

    The CV sorts itself: solo shows apart from group shows, newest first, titles in italics. Print it, save it as a PDF, or copy it as plain text.

The timeline

Fifteen years at a glance.

Every year gets a column and every entry a mark, coloured by its kind. Turn a kind on and the timeline shows only that. Try it: this is the sample career the app opens on.

All 24 entries

  1. 2026The Weight of WaterFennick & Rowe, LondonSolo exhibition
  2. 2026The Weight of WaterExhibition catalogue, essay by Jonah Reeve. Fennick & Rowe Editions, LondonPublication
  3. 2026Harland Trust Painting FellowshipThe Harland Trust, EdinburghAward
  4. 2025Edge ConditionsLarchfield Contemporary, LeedsGroup exhibition
  5. 2025Tide Table, a painting in four panels for the ferry terminalStromness Pier Trust, OrkneyCommission
  6. 2025Sealight ResidencySealight Studios, OrkneyResidency
  7. 2024Marram Painting Prize ExhibitionThe Saltings, MargateGroup exhibition
  8. 2024Marram Painting Prize, shortlistedMarram FoundationAward
  9. 2024Painting the IntertidalInterview, Northern Art Quarterly, issue 41Publication
  10. 2024Slack WaterTolbooth Lane Gallery, GlasgowSolo exhibition
  11. 2023New Ground: Painting NowKiln Street Projects, ManchesterGroup exhibition
  12. 2023Winter Studio ProgrammeKelp House Arts, TobermoryResidency
  13. 2022Low WaterHarbour Row Gallery, FalmouthGroup exhibition
  14. 2022Painting for the reading roomAshgrove Library Trust, GlasgowCommission
  15. 2021The Long FetchKiln Street Projects, ManchesterSolo exhibition
  16. 2021Harland Trust Artist BursaryThe Harland Trust, EdinburghAward
  17. 2020Salt LedgerArtist's book, edition of 150. Outlier Press, GlasgowPublication
  18. 2019Lighthouse Keeper's ResidencyRubha Point Arts, Isle of LewisResidency
  19. 2019WrackLarchfield Contemporary, LeedsGroup exhibition
  20. 2018ForeshoreHarbour Row Gallery, FalmouthSolo exhibition
  21. 2016Open Studio AnnualWellpark Studios, GlasgowGroup exhibition
  22. 2016Emerging Painter AwardClyde Arts Guild, GlasgowAward
  23. 2014Small Works on PaperTolbooth Lane Gallery, GlasgowGroup exhibition
  24. 2012MFA Degree ShowNorthfield School of Art, GlasgowGroup exhibition

and 18 more in the app

Linked both ways

Every work knows where it has been.

A link is kept once and read from both ends. Open a show to see what hung in it. Open a painting to see its whole history: the residency where it was made, the shows it travelled to, the catalogue it was printed in.

Solo exhibition

Slack Water

Tolbooth Lane Gallery, Glasgow

12 Apr – 1 Jun 2024

Works shown

  • Slack Water
  • Tidewrack
  • Neap
  • The Long Fetch
Tidewrack, 2023 Oil on linen 120 × 150 cm

Exhibition history

  1. 2025Edge ConditionsLarchfield Contemporary, Leeds
  2. 2024Slack WaterTolbooth Lane Gallery, Glasgow
  3. 2023New Ground: Painting NowKiln Street Projects, Manchester
  4. 2023Winter Studio ProgrammeKelp House Arts, Tobermory

The CV

The page a gallery expects.

There is no template to fight. The format is the one curators and grant panels already read, set in a book face and built from whatever is on the timeline.

Solo and group, apart
Exhibitions are split the way every gallery CV splits them.
Newest first, the year said once
Each section runs backwards from this year, with no repeated dates down the margin.
Titles in italics
Exhibitions and publications are set the way a catalogue sets them.
Works under each show, or not
One tick lists the works that hung in every exhibition.
Paper, in any theme
It prints black on white with real margins, on A4 or Letter, even from dark mode.
Plain text for portals
Copy the whole CV as aligned text and paste it into an application form.

Stand-in pictures

No photographs yet? It paints a stand-in.

Documentation always lags behind the work. Until you link a photo, each work gets a small painted placeholder in the shape of its real dimensions. Six compositions, six palettes, and a repaint button for when it does not feel close.

  • HorizonTidewrack, 120 × 150 cm
  • Colour fieldSpring Tide, Low Light, 200 × 160 cm
  • StrataLittoral Drift, 120 × 90 cm
  • ArcsForeshore II, 100 × 100 cm
  • GridSalt Ledger, 40 × 30 cm
  • MarksWrack Line, 60 × 180 cm

The rest of it

Small, private, and finished.

  1. 01

    It stays in your browser.

    No account, no server, no upload. Your career is stored on your own device and goes nowhere else.

  2. 02

    One backup file.

    Download everything as a single file and restore it on another computer. That is the whole of moving house.

  3. 03

    Checked on the way in.

    A date that does not exist or a show that closes before it opens is refused, in the form and in a restored backup alike.

  4. 04

    Phone, tablet, laptop.

    A tab bar under your thumb on a phone, generous tap targets, and the same timeline at every width.

  5. 05

    Keyboard and screen reader.

    Every action works without a mouse, saves are announced, and focus always lands somewhere sensible.

  6. 06

    Light and dark.

    The app follows your device. The CV stays paper white in both.

Try it

Try it on Tamsin Averell.

This is the real app, open on an invented painter with fifteen years of shows. Filter the timeline, open a painting, look at her CV. Then clear the sample and start your own.

Open Gesso full size

Anything you change here is saved in this browser, and is there when you open the app full size.

Good to know.

One artist, one browser.
There is no sync between devices. To move, download a backup and restore it.
Photos are links, not uploads.
Gesso shows an image that is already online. It does not store image files.
It writes the CV, not the statement.
No biography generator and no templates to choose between. One format, the standard one.

The next time someone asks for your CV, press print.

Open Gesso

Free. No account. Nothing leaves your browser.