Depending on somebody else to provide you exposure…unless they have some formalized interest in your work is rather like wishing on stars.
All over the Web, we have artists whining and moaning about their placement on a website’s members list, their exposure, how they come up in search results, and whether or not they are being treated fairly or given their just due. And all this whining and moaning is for what? For pennies? That’s a lot of time wasted whining for very little reward, isn’t it?
I’ve said it before and I’m going to say it again. Do your own marketing. Everything else you get will be icing on the cake, reinforcing the work you do for yourself.
Want some ideas on promoting yourself as an artist and a specific piece of artwork? A few places to start:
- Do have your own website devoted to your artwork.
- Do keep a blog.
- Do become an active member of online communities and real world organizations whose members are the kind of potential customers and clients who would be interested in your artwork. (NOTICE I DID NOT SAY ARTIST COMMUNITIES. YOUR CUSTOMERS ARE NOT OTHER ARTISTS.)
- Submit your artwork to magazines, book publishers, and organizations when you see “a call for art,” but only submit artwork to them which you really think suits their needs. Do your research, in other words.
- If you want to try for national and international recognition, but don’t have a “name” to promote your interests yet, enter recognized contests and art shows. (See my post on that on this blog or on the main website under Commentary.)
- Get an agent…which means build a portfolio, add to it all the time, and get some contest wins and awards as well as some substantial sales as proof of your art’s value as a commercial commodity.
Remember on point #5: If you have already undersold your work, an agent is going to be skeptical of signing you. Do NOT sell your artwork on places like EBay if you want to be taken seriously.
2 Responses to “Depending on Somebody Else Isn’t Wise.”
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Some very good and pertinent advice Dawn. I would just add, don’t hide your light under a bushel. Done something note worthy, like added a new gallery to your web site, secured an exhibition, received an award, tell the world - write a press release and get it out there.
Gawd, Henry. I hate writing press releases. Abjectly object to the tedium…especially since anything “arty,” “music,” or “written,” isn’t picked up. The only “hot spots” are sex, religion, and politics. Press releases are the most comprehensive pain in the behinder I know of to write, especially online. “I’m sorry, you’ve gone over your character limit.” Better to let it hit the search engines for those interested, although, more and more, Google is turning into Scampoo in its results.
I was looking for a tutorial for a beginning landscape painter today so to avoid a long discertation on how to paint water and further avoid having to make one myself. Upon typing the appropriate key phrase boolean into Google, what came up in the first 100? Yuck, muck, and cluck.