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Notes from the DAC Workshop: Survivor, an artist's opportunity workshop |
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I attended the Survivor workshop this weekend (May 30-June 1 2008) offered through the Dumbo Arts Center. Below are my notes and brief summaries of what was discussed. I attended all of the workshops, except for the website workshop and the GYST workshop (I do have synopsis for those two presentations.)
The panel discussion started with Kanishka Raja stressing the importance of building connections within your art community and among your peers, and offering as an example his experience of going to Skowhegan and meeting fellow artists there who later recommended him to New York galleries. The moderator pointed out how competitive Skowhegan is, to which Kanishka responded: “it took me 3 times to get accepted... and rejection is awful”. I can't tell you how refreshing it was to hear established artists admitting that rejection is never easy, no matter where you are in your career. It seemed more honest than the usual advise I have gotten over the years which has basically boiled down to “Get over it!”. The artists on the panel had different ways to deal with rejection: applying to as many opportunities as possible to dilute the pain of rejections; getting angry instead of depressed and using that energy in a positive way; allowing themselves to feel bad for a day, and moving on to the next application. Rejection is an unfortunate part of an artist life, and I applaud the panel for being honest and human about the sting of having work rejected. Moving on in the discussion, the general consensus among the 3 artists is that an art career is non-linear, meaning you can have great success one year, and sell nothing the next. In order to sustain those ups and downs, artists should concentrate on making art consistently, and making art that is honest: don't try and second-guess what the market wants because chances are that the market will change its mind! Be true to yourself and your art. These artists also stressed the importance of networking: networking as creating friendship among your peers, helping your fellow artists, and creating a larger sense of an art community. So don't forget to venture out of the studio and meet other artists, and don't hesitate to help your colleagues who might one day help your career as well.
Artists should ideally have ready a basic information packet that can be used and built upon to apply to different types of opportunities: grants, gallery opportunities, residencies, etc. The packet should contain at minimum: an artist statement, a resume, a CV, and visual materials. Artist statement Resume and CV Visual materials Be aware of the fact that different monitors display images differently and it is therefore very important for you to check your images on multiple computers. The speaker also pointed out that digital projectors which are used by nyfa for example, will not show the image the same way as your monitor. The projected images will tend to be more washed out: if you know of anyone who use such a projector, try and use it before you send your images to maximize quality. Here, I want to dispel an urban legend that came up during the presentation. Some folks are under the impression that jpg images will lose quality as they are opened and closed. This is simply NOT the case. You can open and close a jpg a million times, and it will appear the same way. The confusion comes from the fact that SOME image editors will re-compress the jpg file after you edit the image AND either save it or “save it as” a different filename. Additional materials General advise
Nyfa source is a searchable database of grants, opportunities and services for individual artists. Though I have found their new login protocol to be quite annoying, NYFA is not only free but it is the best and most comprehensive websites for artists. NYFA source lets you do basic searches (such as awards based on
geographical location and types of awards) to more advanced searches
such as searches by keyword, or types of discipline. NYFA source
will launch its new site at the end of June with more filters and
capabilities. I highly recommend you spend some time looking for
opportunities there.
I did not attend this seminar but the synopsis seemed to follow design advise I have given in my article “20 tips for a good website design” and “Make your site work for you”. GYST I did not attend this seminar because I use Indie Band Manager as a database tool. GYST is a software that was specifically designed for visual artists and is more complete than IBM (it's also more expensive). It is a database program to help artists keep track of their artwork, proposals, mailing list, etc. I have put their link online under Resources, and I highly recommend you check it out.
Sarah has different opinions on the role of an art statement than Melissa Potter, which made the presentation both interesting and confusing for me! For Sarah, the main goal of an art statement is to be a point of entry leading to the work. As such, it should be direct, honest, simple and clear, and mainly be descriptive as opposed to offering a critique of the work: let the viewer interpret the work themselves, don't necessarily do that for them before they see the art. The speaker's advise was to establish a writing process similar to an art making process: generate ideas first, and let the writing flow completely uncensored, then go back and edit the statement, clarifying and organizing your ideas. Her suggestions were to keep the statement short (100 words to 300 words maximum) and to let your own voice come through. She felt there was no need to contextualize the work, but instead to aim at giving a mental picture of the work. She suggested artists read art listing blurbs in the newspaper, looking for descriptive language as opposed to critical language or opinions. Use formal art elements to describe your work (color, composition, line, form, etc..), but do not use too many elements in the description: don't give the reader too many choices. The statement needs to be a narrative that grabs the reader's attention. As such, ask friends and colleagues to read your statement and give you feedback.
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© 2006 by Isabelle Garbani/Websiteforartists.com |