Building Your Art Career Pt.4

Set your goals

Whenever you set out to do anything it's ideal to have a list of goals in place. This holds true for your art career and it doesn't matter if you are a painters, writer, sculptor, actor, filmmaker, producer or a singer...you all should have short and long-term goals to strive for.

With the help of curator and artist Rhonda Schaller's post from her blog archives, I've pulled together this week's Art Tip Tuesday.

Schaller suggests that you should really hunker down and think about what your career goals are as an artist. Here are some things to think about.

• What is your potential market?
   
• Where do you think your artwork belongs in the art market? 

These are very important questions, so take your time coming up with the answers. No one knows but you.

To an extent Schaller is right but I think it's just as important to utilize your supportive network to help you figure out where your artwork belongs. (see: Build a supportive network )

One of my emerging artist friends envisioned his sensual paintings gracing the walls of high-end gentleman's clubs throughout the Miami Beach area. I told him absolutely not. Yes, I think it was raunchy to have his work in strip clubs because his work is much more sophisticated than that. "Your sensual paintings should be marketed to lovers, mature adults, and art collectors who appreciate sensuality," I advised. He still ended up pursuing getting his paintings into the strip club, but I am not sure if anything came of it.

At the end of the day it's important to really think about where your work may end up in the long run and how you want to be portrayed as an artist. The magic word here is 'tasteful.'

Self Produce/Commercial

The next step Schaller suggests is to decide how you will self-produce and/or go after commercial galleries. 

In order to figure out what is best for you, start to write down a few long-term goals and a series of short-term goals to help you match your art work to a prospective market. Here's how the thought process should go.

• Do your homework – Where would your style of work fit? Who are the artists who shares your aspirations and where do they show their work? What are your dreams on how you'd like to show your work?
  
• Who is your audience or the potential audience you want to reach? Middle-class art collectors, affluent art collectors, fine art collectors, etc?
  
• Find out where those collectors hang out and who they collect?
  
• What is the best way to reach your ideal audience? Social media, curators?
  
• Find out which galleries cater to your preferred audience? This is where your networking talent comes in. (I'll share more on what to do and what not to say in a future posts)

For those of you who already have a list, kudos to you. For those of you who don't have a list of goals, go out and get a journal and start sketching out your ideal plan...and try your very best to stay on track. And if you need some help you know who to reach out to.

Have you set your goals for your art career? Go ahead and comment below or tweet me @tcsviews

Tips You Missed:

Tips to Building Your Art Career

• Pt. 1 – Build a supportive network
• Pt. 2 – Get your work online and in artist registries 

• Pt. 3 – Get back to class 

TC's Tips

• Artists, Where Are Your Websites?
• Do You Have a Card?