Question 2: "How long have you been selling your work professionally?"

When you're training to be an artist, whether that's informal training (on your own or as part of a group) or more formal training (i.e. art school), there are things you need to find out in order to best plan your route from Point A (art as a hobby) to Point B (art as a career). I've come up with twelve questions to start with. There are probably many more questions but these are a few I thought of that are meant to at least get you going in the right direction. 

If you've been reading these posts, you know I've answered the first of twelve questions in my last post. Here, we tackle question 2: "How long have you been selling your work professionally?"

The answer to this question can be stuck in the same mental box as the answer to the first question. The answer to the first question I proposed will give you an idea of how long this person has been doing art. The answer to this second question will tell you how long they've been SELLING art. Both questions are background questions. They are meant to orient you as the interviewer to the artist you're speaking to so you know how to weigh what they will share as they answer the rest of the questions. I don't mean this as a rude or "judgemental" exercise. I just mean that if someone has been marketing and selling their work for years, they will probably know more about how to market and sell artwork than someone doing it for eight months. Again, this is just to give you a way to know which answers (when you get conflicting answers from different artists) should be given more weight. That's all. 

“…if I was depending entirely on the income from selling my paintings in galleries, I’d be a starving artist”

Personally, I've been selling my artwork for about 25 years now. I started selling in a gallery in Orlando, Florida (where I was living at the time) and it was a heady thing realizing people would actually part with their money in order to purchase one of my paintings. It was awesome. In the beginning, my questions were all about how to get into another gallery. I'll talk more about that later, but I've learned that if I was depending entirely on the income I get from selling my paintings in galleries, I'd be a starving artist. Galleries are helpful because they give you "vacation money" (extra funds you can just look at as fun money) but there are other outlets to tap into for more of a steady income stream. Again, more on that in answer to a later question. For now, just know that getting into a gallery was where I started, and the day I was told they wanted to represent me at the gallery was truly an amazing and exciting day. That's a good start but...it was not the end. More on that to come.

Question 1..."How long have you been an artist?"

When an emerging artist thinks through the question “How do I get from where I am (a novice) to where I want to be (a professional), I have suggested interviewing artists and asking pointed questions. Most artists I know would be very happy (and even honored) to be asked for their assistance. If you’re an emerging artist, please take advantage of the willingness of the artists around you to advise and encourage you. With this in mind, I have suggested that an easy place to do all this is Asheville, North Carolina simply because we have over 200 artists all working within a square mile of each other, and they have open studios, so they’re totally used to people coming into their studios and observing them work. Believe me, we answer a LOT of questions. So come to Asheville and meet as many artists as you want to meet! Pick your favorites and then…ask if you can make an appointment to ask them some questions. This is key. This is telling the artist that you respect them. That is always a good idea. So once you have that appointment, I am suggesting twelve questions that should help you gain the basic information you need to move forward. For each of the questions, I’ll explain why I’m suggesting it, and then also answer each question myself (in case that might help anyone out there).

Question #1: How long have you been an artist?

The answer to this question sort of informs the weight you should give to all the other answers. I say that just because you probably will get more pertinent information from someone who has some years behind them. This doesn’t mean that someone who has just made the transition from art as a hobby to art as a profession won’t have helpful information. That person may well have the most helpful information for you, but asking how long they’ve seen themselves as an artist just gives you a good basic idea of who you’re talking to.

Personally, I’ve been an artist since I could hold a crayon. I’ve always drawn and painted as long as I remember. I made the transition from art as a hobby to art as a career about sixteen years ago now. I inched into the career as a part time artist (painting about half the day) and working at my “real job” half time, and then when I was earning the same with my artwork as I was earning at my “real job” when I did that full time, then I quit entirely and painted full time. That felt like the smartest way to do it because…what if I quit my job and painted full time and no one bought my paintings? I had to know this would work (as best I could) so I took advantage of the fact that I could cut down to half time at my previous job. That significantly decreased the nail biting when I quit and went to painting full time.

If you have any questions related to this, please feel free to ask here. I’ll do my best to answer all the questions you might have. Thanks!

So, you're thinking about art as a career?

A client of mine recently told me his high school aged daughter was interested in pursuing art as a career and asked me if they could visit Asheville and have me offer her some words of wisdom and encouragement. I love that. So yes, that meeting is set up for the family to come up the hill to Asheville and I'll try to be as sage-like as possible. 

In thinking about what I would suggest a young artist (ANY young artist) should do as they explore career possibilities, my first suggestion has to be to visit the River Arts District in Asheville. This is a really unique place, in that there are now well over 200 artists all within a square mile, with studios open to the public. I would suggest they spend the day exploring, and make a list of their favorite studios. Then maybe the next day, go back around and ask their favorite artists if they could set up an appointment to ask some questions. I don't know ANY artists here who would have a problem with that. In fact, everyone I know would be more than happy to help and more than honored to be asked. The artists in Asheville are actually selling their art to the public, and since that's the goal (I assume), their input and suggestions would be really invaluable. 

…everyone I know would be more than happy to help and more than honored to be asked.

So, if appointments are made to basically interview the artists, the questions asked are important, so I decided to come up with a suggested list of questions to ask if someone is just beginning to think about creating art as a career. Here is that list:

1) How long have you been an artist?

2) How long have you been selling your work professionally?

3) Did you go to art school? If so, where?

4) For a high schooler interested in pursuing art as a career, would you recommend art school?, if so, how would you find the right one? 

5) Would you mind critiquing my work at some point? (But don't ask that question unless you're really open to hearing criticism.)

6) What are the positive points and negative points about having an "open studio"?

7) How do you price your work?

8) Do you advertise? If so, what seems to have worked well for you and what hasn't? What percent of your budget goes to advertising?

9) How do you manage the business side? 

• Where do you have your art supplies?

• How do you keep track of inventory so you always have what you need?

• How do you keep track of sales tax?

• Do you accept credit cards? What’s involved with that?

10) Do you have your work in galleries? How do you find the right galleries?

11) Where do you get inspiration for your work?

12) What do you do if you get a mental block? 

I'll be forwarding these questions to my clients and their daughter in a couple weeks, but I thought it might be helpful to anyone else who is considering art as a career to spend a blog entry for each question. So, stay tuned. Soon to come...my own answers to all these questions, hoping to help anyone who is interested to make the jump from being an amateur artist to being a full time professional artist.