There are all kinds of places where you could show your work.
Coffee shops would love to have your art!
Salons would fawn over it!
Professional offices would think they’d died and gone to heaven!
This is great news for you, especially when you are just starting out. It’s a stamp of approval when public spaces want to show your work.
Almost every artist does the “free” circuit. It’s where you get your toes wet.
These seemingly low-risk venues offer a venue for you to learn how to:
- Properly prepare and price your art for installation
- Curate a body of work because not everything you have made is fabulous and looks great together (Sorry)
- Install your art correctly
- Promote your art in a brick-and-mortar space
In addition, live venues test your conversational and and negotiating skills. There’s rarely a formal agreement in these venues, but you’d be wise to add that to your list of learning opportunities.
Because these non-art venues are considered less serious than galleries, many artists put very little effort into the process. After all, you’re looking for (here comes the e-word) “exposure.”
You deliver the work, install it yourself, add labels, and then, when the time comes, deinstall it and take it home.
Or perhaps the date for deinstallation is left open.
Six months fly by and your work is still there. The owners and patrons have gotten used to it. They quite enjoy having the nice backdrop. The owners don’t want to see it go, so they aren’t responsive to your attempts to communicate with them.
Your art show has turned into free décor.
Let me be clear that