Art as a business.

I have been worrying over the financial aspect of my art for some time. A friend of mine made an ever so small comment that hit me like a ton of bricks. "Why don't you treat your art as a business and grow that?" I had never thought of my art as a business just as a way to make money on the side. After all I don't want to be the starving artist I want to make money and lots of it! But as I said before in a previous post it is all about Marketing. Why couldn't I grow an art business? I went to a local event for women on Friday and there was a woman's bureau representative there and their whole focus is on mentoring, guiding and directing women to grow successful businesses. I talked with the representative and she said of course art could be treated as a successful business. I have after all had so many professionals in the art field tell me that my artwork has a lot of retail value. So I need to learn how to tap into that retail value. Grow the business if you will. So....as soon as finals are over this week I am going to make an appointment and get it done!
I also have a good friend who is very left brained...NOT the strong well developed side of my brain. This friend is interested in promoting my work, an agent if you will, and the two of us would grow this together! I like the idea! I could be free to do what I do best, take photos, create, and socialize! And she could take care of all the paper work and taxes and all that stuff that I find so overwhelming and tedious!

I am standing on the edge of a precipice with my arms stretched out wide, the wind is blowing in my face, and I am one small movement from flying and feeling like I have been set free.

My First Solo show!

I am stunned! I was forwarded an email that a local art gallery was looking for artists to put some pieces in a new restaurant opening up. I answered the call and assumed that I would be one artist of several that would put pieces up in this restaurant. It turns out that I am the ONLY artist for the show for a whole month! My first solo show! So it is not a big gallery but it is a start! And I have heard from one artist that he would much rather do the coffee shop shows than gallery shows. I don't know the difference to prefer one over the other. So this show is exciting to me!

I was concerned because I have no money, how am I going to be able to get my prints made and framed for display? I have a financial backer! His wife and him are going to partner with me to get my career off the ground! Isn't that exciting? Now if I will just sell them all....that will be a huge blessing!! It still amazes me that they believe in me and my skills and talents enough to invest in me. I have grown up all my life with people being skeptical that I would be successful in anything, and these people believe in me enough to step out on a limb for me. WOW! It makes you want to succeed even more, strive harder, and market to the max.

Exciting Week and Patty Duke

It has been an exciting week. I was invited to a small get together to meet Anna Patty Duke Pearce. I have been a fan for a long time and to meet her in person was wonderful. She really is just a tiny thing and so warm and gracious and encouraging. What does this have to do with my artwork you might ask? I wanted to give her something special for all the work she is doing in the field of mental illness. She is such a positive beacon that people with Mental Illness can be achievers, over comers and be successful in life. I really admire her for being involved and taking the initiative to be herself. And I wanted to bless her for all her hard work. One thing I love most about my artwork is it allows me to give a gift to someone, with very little cost other than my time and a few minor expenses. I gave Anna Patty Duke Pearce one of my pieces, the most metaphoric for her and for me actually. The butterfly piece, coming from an ugly caterpillar to a beautiful butterfly, spreading her wings and flying. She was very gracious and loved the piece, I viewed her from a distance looking down at it again a while after my time with her had come to an end. Her husband and her both said that it fit in their dining room perfectly, it matched the colors in that room. I am thrilled that I was able to give her a piece of my artwork.

Gallery Show!

Well sort of. There is a chiche beer and pizza place that has art on the walls for sale. They want my artwork from June until July! Whoooo hooooo! They contacted me through a local art gallery. I am so thrilled but.....how on earth do I find the money to get pieces framed and printed? I am scared to death. I have no money, and I live at poverty level, what do I sacrifice? There is nothing to sacrifrice, I am at rock bottom now. I am going to believe that somehow the money will come in!
What a thrill!

Thoughts...

My art history professor has more of an impact on my life than he realizes. First off are the stories and inspiration I glean from the artists of years past. To hear that Picasso, and Matisse and others lives were just as tragic as my life has been and yet became successful artists, is an encouragment to me. I will over come this dark time in my life, I WILL! He posted on his blog:

"I look at is like this...if you have a talent, a gift, use it. If all you're going to do is complain about how cheated you are by life, God and everyone, because you aren't the success you thought you were going to be..."

Yesterday I had time to myself as I trekked around downtown taking pictures for new works of art, and plenty of time to think. How was I going to become successful with my art? I have been belly aching about the lack of money, if only I had $1000 to get work printed and framed so as to go around and sell it. I set a goal yesterday to sell one print a week, I was complaining because I don't have the money to get the print made or framed, but as I read this post it dawned on my that I don't have the money to get my 20x20 pieces printed or framed but I do have several of my 16x20 prints stored in a safe place and a whole stack of frames just waiting to be filled -I bought them on sale to stock up. So I can't sell the really gorgeous prints, but I can sell the gallery prints and that will provide the moneys for the big prints! Work with what I have! It reminds me of the movie "In Pursuit of Happyness" he had those darn xray machines to sell, and he didn't enjoy it but it was fullfilling the need and getting him to where he wanted to go, same here! And maybe the gallery prints will be more successful than I know! So I am going to make some phone calls and make some appointments and get busy!

Thank you Proffessor Etter for your inspiration!

New images

Here are a couple of new images that I have created lately.

Face to Face

I had a business leader in my church tell me this week that business performed face to face or with a phone call is a better way to do business than emails. Emails are too easy to ignore. And that is what I have been doing. I email people let them know about my artwork but I never follow up with a phone call. I have been hiding behind the anonymity of email. This fact was shown to me this week. I went to a networking event put on by our chamber of commerce to pick up some graphic design work (those bills must be paid somehow!). As a result of that I picked up a job from it. Networking, meeting people, and getting your face and personality out in front of people is going to be the key to my success I believe.

This and the fact that my art history professor was telling us about Matisse and Picasso and several of the others artists and their life histories. Many of them were successful because they were charismatic and had good marketing skills. I have often been told that I am charismatic and that I could sell ice cubes to an eskimo. Those qualities should be just the ticket. I think it is the next level of self confidence that you must infuse yourself with in order to go talk to people and ask them to buy your work or at least display it! It is one thing to feel like your artwork is good and that people would want to buy it, it is another to believe in your ability to be able to sell it!

I have a new goal to be able to sell one print a week! A contract to a local restaurant would be good. All of my artwork of the Local Buildings would be great hanging in a restaurant. I must get a small portfolio of images that I can take around to shop owners to show them what they could buy.

Media Attention

Every Artists dream is to be discovered. I don't know that I have been discovered but the local newspaper has done a full page article about my work and me. My images are big and bold on the front of the local human interest page as well as a bio photo of myself. The power of the press is a mighty thing. The journalist makes me sound like a backwards hick. I don't think I talk like that. There are several instances in the article that I am directly quoted with things that I did not directly say. The writer put words in my mouth interpreting what I said. "The Courthouse is one of the only ones of my images that has......" Ouch! That sounds so bad grammatically, and I KNOW I do not talk that way. Or.."I had one professor saying, "do more metaphorically" but this is one of the only pieces that has any more depth than 'here's a pretty picture'. I didn't say that! I said that most of my images are no more than a blend of images to make beautiful designs! Not to mention that she puts my age down as 48...I am NOT that old.

I guess I need to relish the fact that I am in the paper and those who know me will know that I do not talk as the journalist protrayed me.

Words aside and looking at the article as a picture, WOW! How fantastic is that! A whole article about my artwork and myself! It will be interesting to see how this changes my life if at all! I can't wait to go to the web site statistics to see if I had a lot of hits.

So the next lesson I have learned is choose your words carefully when talking to the press, don't just talk from the heart and let the words tumble out. Or ask to read the article before it comes out, so you can approve it. (Is that possible?)