The Art Biz ep. 14: Quantifying Quality in Art: Elaine Kehew
Everyone says that there’s no such thing as a negative review. That any media attention is good media attention.
That’s easy to say until someone slams your work.
In this episode of the Art Biz Podcast, I’m at the big table with Elaine Kehew, who shares the story of a negative review she received last year and the resulting journey to improve the quality of her art.
The critic who rankled her was someone she knew and trusted, so she took his comments to heart. And they hurt.
This isn’t a story about perfectionism. Perfectionism is crippling, Elaine says. It’s not about aesthetics or beauty. It’s about Elaine’s quest to quantify the quality of her work – to ensure that it is getting better.
Elaine is a repeat student of the Art Biz Accelerator, a class in which my students set goals. When I read that Elaine’s #1 goal for the year is to improve the quality of her painting, I asked her how she would measure that. After all, goals are supposed to be measurable so you know when you achieve them.
This led Elaine to explore quality – particularly the research being done around quality management in the 1990s and early 2000s. (In her previous life, Elaine was a researcher for a law firm.)
Listen as Elaine opens up about what happened after her negative review and shares 8 targets she has identified to improve the quality of her paintings.
The Art Biz ep. 14: Quantifying Quality in Art: Elaine Kehew Read