Hosted at the Twelve Twelve art gallery, this event was a chance for WIL members, art world professionals, and other guests to meet and network over drinks and a stunning art exhibit. Twelve Twelve gallery, which opened in September 2016, is owned and managed by Silvia Bakker, the youngest female gallery owner in The Hague. In this gallery, new exhibitions take place every month each year, with this month Sam Lock's abstract work being exhibited.
Asta Rossi, owner of three art galleries in The Netherlands and the author of several leadership books, was the special guest speaker of this week's WIL event. She spoke of her journey and lessons she learnt from being a young entrepreneur in Finland, such as experiencing getting fired and working in a cross-cultural environment. Listening and really hearing were the two most important skills she learnt when working with people, especially in the cross-cultural environments she described. She also shared the story of her severe burnout which left her in hospital, and how she came back and re-centred herself through means including yoga and Buddhist philosophy. Throughout her speech, she focused on how her professional milestones impacted her personal life, sometimes in enriching ways and sometimes in significantly harmful ways.
Throughout the event, ego and ambition were often addressed and discussed. The guest speaker reminded WIL members that even if you work yourself tirelessly to make sure all the right elements are in place, things may still not work out if the conditions are not right at the time. She embodied this concept through the metaphor of windsurfing, expressing that you cannot windsurf if there is no wind, a lesson which strongly echoed the words spoken at last week's WIL Talk on Balancing Ambitions.
Asta also described that you cannot be driven only by ambitions, as you also must consider your contributions and what you want to contribute in both your professional and personal life. Echoing these thoughts, she also expressed that there are many thing you could do - but that does not mean you should do all of them.
For the rest of the evening, WIL members and other guests were free to meet and network, enabling many connections between students and professionals to be made. How far WIL has come since its beginning was often a subject of conversation, with Sylvia complimenting WIL members on our ability to work together as a team, and to use each other's complementary strengths to make incredible things happen.
During her speech, Asta also reminded the audience that if you enrich yourself through different ingredients, you also enrich your professional life, a thought which resonated with attending WIL members after they left the beautiful setting of the gallery. Special thanks to WIL member Jayne Fitzgerald for organising this wonderful event!
If you wish to know more about Twelve Twelve gallery, visit their website here.