xquisitlife

Many artists speak of their anger, frustration and pain about being an artist. Their sense of self worth can diminish, and that can affect work, life, and relationships with others. Many times artists question whether or not to continue as an artist, but the reality is that if you give up after all that you have learned in creating the pieces that you have, you will never be more than where you are right now. You will never truly know the possibilities of what could have been if you had only known the right avenues to proceed with your art!Maybe you have tried to do exhibits with little to no success. Doing things only this way can produce a number of realizations that could potentially change your whole life.

When you are dealing with a work of art that you have created, you open yourself up to either facing acceptance or rejection. You become completely vulnerable because you are dealing with someone’s choice and their personal taste and opinion regarding the piece of art that you have created and poured all of your passionate heart into.

There are certain things that you must do as an artist if you want to be a success, and let me remind you that what you consider to be success will always be different from what another person declares success to be. Success must first begin with a decision that we are going to be successful!

Remember that success is not an accident when it comes, but it is the result of specific, measurable actions that you have taken to propel yourself forward! Never let ANYONE tell you that you can’t do something.

Just relax and remind yourself that inability has more to do with attitude. Keep your head up, believe in yourself, and don’t move away from your plan. Attitude determines your approach and your approach determines your successes or failures! Remember that the right attitude will usually supersede your level of ability and take you beyond your present level and into a realm where dreams come true. Attitude is everything!

Always remember that there has to be an audience for your work and realize that you just haven’t found it yet. The best way to find that audience is by the process of elimination. Begin to research the galleries in the area that you live within. Once you find galleries that you think would be interested in your work, you can begin to send them copies of your portfolio on cd-rom’s. Sending out your portfolio is a much more effective way to getting your work seen. Don’t be fearful of the rejection letters that may follow! Use them as motivation to propel you forward into discovering more creative ways of getting your work seen in the local market!

While attempting to get your work seen locally, expand your promotion throughout the state that you live in, and then nationally. The beauty of this is that  there may not be many people or galleries that value your work locally, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder! Many larger cities have a wider variety of people to market to. Thus giving you a greater chance to be seen!

Do the same thing with other cities that you have spent time working on locally. Never stop researching! Research is very time consuming and can take a long time to complete but continue to send out your cd’s while doing your research. Send out as many as you can afford.

You will learn that by submitting your work to galleries, shows, group shows, flea markets, traveling art shows etc. that your chances of getting seen are greater and you could essentially be able to make a living as an artist from these various efforts.

The reality of this is that it’s a lot of hard work. You will encounter such things as self-doubt, face the anxiety of an inconsistent income over and over again, possibly deal with depression, but you have to decide if you would have it any other way because you are actually doing what you are passionate about and want to do in your life with the gifts that God gave you to create with. This is the first thing that you have to do. Decide what you want to do, make a plan, and then do it no matter how you feel, or who says it can’t be done the way you see it!

The first thing to do is to realize that the way our lives are right now are a result of the choices that we made yesterday. It is our choice to be an artist, to be angry, or to get frustrated. Ultimately, we choose to let that rejection letter discourage us. You can prove everybody wrong and live from your work, but you have to believe in yourself and you have to believe that it can be done. If you can’t see it before it ever comes to fruition the chances of stumbling or falling when it gets really tough is great! But if you believe in yourself, there is absolutely nothing can stop you but you!

Figure out what you want. Do you really want to be rich and famous or do you just want to make a living as an artist? Do you want both? Are you good enough to be both? Do you want to make great masterpieces that everybody wants when they see them, or do you just want to be the best you can be and learn who you are in the process?

Once you have figured out what you want, you have to make a plan on how to get there. Set goals, and then draw up your business plan. Once you step outside your art studio it is all business! But you are creative and so this is where you will develop your “edge” above the rest!

If you find yourself in the position of a full-time artist, you will see that 50-75% of your time will be spent managing your business of being an artist. Take responsibility for your life, develop a business plan, and follow through with it no matter how discouraged you may become. Take all of the things that are negative in your life and try to find the positive in them. Negative situations will keep you from achieving what you want to do. Rejection letters show that you successful so why are afraid? Statistically, the more rejection you get, the closer you actually are to getting your acceptance letter! It statistically takes 7 No’s to get 1 Yes! So you have to find in yourself the will to move forward no matter what. As artists, it’s no secret that we are creative people. Use that concept always to your advantage in everything you do, think, say, and create!

Find your own way. Be a leader in your market and not a follower. You might love Monet or Van Gogh, but let your passion lead the way with your heart. Don’t try to copy someone else, or that takes all originality and “You” out of what you are creating!

If you have set goals for yourself you need to ask if they are they the right goals? Do not set unrealistic goals that you do not have control over. If you would like to have 10 shows this year, send out 100 portfolio packets, and this will increase the probability that those shows will happen for you within that year!

So here you are. You are an artist. Do what needs to be done! First and foremost, you have to be honest with yourself! Are you an artist? No one else can decide this for you. Is the work that you do come from the depths of who you are? If it does not then you need to give yourself some time to work that out. You don’t want your work to be more about your desire to make a living from art than it is about the integrity of who you are.

Always remember, that you will need to make many compromises to be a full-time artist, but never compromise your work. Since artwork is the kind of product that is valued subjectively, a limited-edition print from someone nobody’s ever heard of is worth very little. The problem artist’s face is a problem of supply and demand. Because their dreams are so common, they are competing against many thousands of capable and creative people whose mission is the same. And mind you that they are not just inexperienced amateurs, but people who may have many more years of experience than you do.

Unfortunately, the people who can truly appreciate passionate art are few. To accomplish your goals, you will have to find the most inexpensive, and effective way to sell your work to the public. So simply begin in the community of which you live.

The typical art buyer buys pretty things to hang on the wall. Many are people who make purchases when on vacation. They are out looking for something neat or unusual that they couldn’t find near the area in which they live. Most of the time, they don’t know anything about signed limited editions,  and they wouldn’t care even if they knew what they were.

The bottom line is however good your art may be, it has little or no commercial value without a value being established which usually comes through an art broker. Commercial value for commodity art is created almost entirely by an art broker because they can create that value, and recreate it over and over again. Thus, developing your art into a “brand.”

If you are an artist and are thinking of having other people sell your art, you must be willing to pay what they, not you, think is a reasonable commission. If they are doing all of the work, it would be entirely reasonable to pay them an 80% commission and you the artist would only be getting a 20 % commission on a piece you poured all of your heart and soul into.

After all, they are responsible for getting your work seen and brokered out to the public. They should be paid a higher commission for that work, resources, and their connections. The question you must ask yourself is whether or not you can live with that?

You can visit every retail vendor of whatever kind of art it is that you are creating and try to make a 20 % deal, but this is a very expensive and very unlikely method. You can become your own broker and market your art locally and/or through the Internet. Ebay is a fabulous tool, but don’t allow it to be your only way of doing things because then it can become your crutch, and if that “crutch” is removed at some point, you can fail and fall flat on your face because you didn’t have other venues in which to get your work seen!

Locally, you can sell your work at flea markets and traveling art shows. You won’t make a lot of money doing that at first, but you will make some, and it will be easy to develop a mailing list of customers who should be happy to buy from you on an ongoing basis. If you keep at it for a few years and procure a few thousand first-time buyers, you could easily be making $50,000 or more a year by intelligently and persistently marketing to them.

Selling someone at a flea market or art show is a considerable accomplishment. It takes personal interaction and a high level of interest on the customer’s part. Turning that kind of a buyer into a long-term customer would be relatively easy.

Besides direct selling, you could get into direct-response marketing by setting up an Internet business to sell your art. Here are some simple steps to begin to make that happen right now for you!

1. You should set up a website, but keep it simple and not spend too much time and money on it. There are many places to set up free web hosting. Google it or go to www.000webhost.com
2. Invest the majority of marketing time in going out to other websites and e-mail lists and promoting your name and artwork.
3. Promote your name first by teaching people about art and how to appreciate it, what separates good art from undesirable art and exactly how to interpret what you are looking at. Each person will interpret each piece differently because beauty is in the eye of the beholder concerning art.
4. There are plenty of places where you can write articles and give advice for free. You should encourage people to respond to your articles, and then add their names to your mailing list.
5. Create two e-mail services: one that teaches people how to appreciate art, using your own artwork, and another that goes directly to people who have purchased or expressed interest in your own personal work. In this second service, you would talk about your art, the projects you are working on, and your next limited editions.

You might think this kind of work is boring, arduous, or too commercial. A lot of artists feel that way. They would rather be creating than marketing. They are willing to place great value on the work they do in creating the art, but they place very little value on the work brokers do, which is where commercial value is created for their work.

In reality, the broker is an artist as much as is the producer of the artwork. Your art is just as much about transformation, and imagination. The only real difference between the two is the end result. The artists goal is to create a material object. Unfortunately, that creation has no commercial value until it becomes a brand. The broker seeks to take something that has no commercial value and transform it into a work of art that does!

You actually have the unprecedented opportunity to become twice the artist you already are. First, by creating and making your art, and secondly, by selling it and creating your name into a brand! It is time to begin spreading the word about your art. What are the best ways to do this if you don’t have a direction to go? You have fabulous pieces of art, but right now you, and family or friends are the only one admiring them at a close distance. So what to do?

Step One: Business Cards

Before you say having business cards is a given, there are some things you should know.

First, you should have cards that stand out and attract attention. Use an image of your art on the card. A good place to get affordable, professional business cards is vistaprint.com. You can get all kinds of nice promotional items for your art at this website. Highly creative professionals use Vista Print.com

Secondly, don’t forget to put your online portfolio address and email addresses on the cards. This way people not only have that nice image of your painting on the card, they also have a way to view your portfolio, recent creations, and a way to contact you.

Thirdly and most simply, once you have your cards, use them!

1. Whenever you mention being an artist, slip that person a card.
2. Whenever you sell a piece, give the buyer a card.
3. Leave a card with your tip.
4. Put a card in the frame of all your works so that others will know who created it.
5. Give many cards to family and friends so they can give them out to people they know. Branch out and use your immediate resources to get other people spreading the word for you!

Step Two: Internet Networking

Networking is easy when you do it on the internet. The easiest ways that I have found are:

1. Make your email signature your name and link to your portfolio

2.        Join business forums and groups on the web. Meet others, ask questions, and make friends. Remember to make your post signature like your email’s, and leave a copy of your website there too!

1. Join artist’s groups. Learn where you can advertise your art, and find artist job boards.
2. Write! Write articles about how you create your art, or just art in general. If you are not a good writer, then seek one on the Internet possibly under Craigslist or any other popular websites. Call colleges to see if they have any students willing to “intern” and write for you for free basically for the practice! Then post your articles on a blog or free article service along with your biography and a link to your amazing portfolio.

Step Three: Shows and Contests

The easiest way to get your art seen by the most people locally is by entering an art show or competition. Your town, no matter how small, should have some kind of art show, craft show, or art contest for local artists. Contact your chamber of commerce to find out more information. Find out about all the nearby towns’ events as well. By entering local shows, or group shows, in nearby towns or cities, you will create a name for yourself and begin to create your own “presence” within the local community!

If you are an artist, you know very well that creating your art is only the first step. Once you have completed a piece, the next step is to put it up for sale. You have worked very hard to create your piece, and put your heart and soul into it. Now you have to go from artist to salesperson, and ultimately become a businessperson. For who knows every inch and detail of your artwork more than you do? Who could describe passionately everything that was poured into that particular piece than you can? The answer is easy! Nobody but you can do what you can~ Not the way you can do it!

Artists are usually not trained in selling, so we end up learning to sell our work on our own and from others. Selling art is not easy, because of the extreme competition, but there are many ways to sell that I have listed for you within this article. Galleries, shows, and online are just a few ways to get your work out there.

Most shows are free to enter or require a nominal entry fee. Aside from winning money, most events allow browsers to buy the art they like. The show or contest usually will take a small cut of the profits you make by selling a piece, but you don’t have to sell your piece at that time if you don’t so choose. Take the interested buyers name, address, and the piece they are interested in and then send them more about it after the show along with similar pieces within the same color schemes as the one they were interested in. Kind of like the concept of knock off colognes, if you love eternity you’ll love this one too!

There are plenty of ways to get your work seen by those who want fabulous art. It takes passion, and persistence, but if you want something badly enough, you can succeed! Remember that you are the only one who can make something happen for yourself, and it will be up to your determination, attitude, and perseverance if and when you will get where you want to go. Now my only question is this~ What are you waiting for?

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