I’m sneaking in an extra message to you.
Because, wow! Our recent conversation around galleries and what artists need and want was on fire! And I want to follow-up and say thank you to everyone who participated in Chat or Notes, you’ve given me heaps to think about → I heard your frustrations loud and clear.
As a recap, and for those who didn’t drop in on the Chat convo, I asked the Private View community for their thoughts on an online ‘gallery’ space (I hesitate to use the word ‘gallery’ because I rail against the contemporary gallery model all the time but I think it’s time artists reclaimed the word.)
FYI, anything you write in Chat is private: it stays within the Private View subscriber group and cannot be seen publically—that’s why I love Chat so much. So I won’t copy and paste anybody’s Chat comments directly into this post since it’s visible to everyone on the internet as a 'free' post.
I asked:
What do you need from an online gallery?
You answered:
A way of telling the story of the making of the art.
Extra information on labels such as the actual cost of making the artwork, how many hours it took etc. (This is partly the story of the making I think, so links to point #1).
Transparency and simplicity of applications, systems and policies.
Ways of connecting with art collectors, not just other artists.
Improved methods of matching art collectors to artworks they might enjoy.
Upfront payment to cover the costs of making art for a planned exhibition.
Inclusivity and community—a sense of belonging to a movement.
Collective artmaking. (This links with point #7.)
Options to trade or gift artworks.
Recognition that artists are often art collectors too.
On Notes, I asked a second, broader question:
What, as artists, do we long for and what have we not yet experienced?
(A question lifted and adapted from adrienne maree brown’s book Holding Change.)
These are the ideas and thoughts I received in response:
Upfront payment for exhibition costs. (This comment came up several times).
Art patronage/artist universal wage such as being trialled in Ireland.
Marketing/admin support so artists can focus on artmaking without spending too much time on social media.
Ownership of own career trajectory. (Do not have to rely on galleries to build a resume.)
Reversing the power structure and putting artists first.
I also want to share some fantastic public Notes made by
and and thank them for their insightful comments.
My Private View
Wow. You gave me lots to think about. I need some time to process and decide on my next steps.
My initial thoughts are,
I agree with everything that has been said and I can’t meet all these needs, there are some systemic issues at play here that will take years of advocacy to change, BUT I think there is something we can do together and I’m willing to spend some time and energy figuring it out.
Bear with me.
I want to touch on a couple of points that came out of the Chat conversation that aren’t included above. One is that artists’ ‘payment’ can come from the satisfaction and warm fuzzy feeling experienced by an artist when someone enjoys their work. Hmmm…
My hair stylist feels all glowy and proud when I tell her she transformed my look and took ten years off me, but she still gets paid. My doctor is an angel and probably would work for free but she has a mortgage to pay, so I pay her. The guy who came to fix my gas fireplace and geeks out on fireplaces so much he had to snap a photo of mine to send to his friends LOVES his job, but yes, he gets paid.
Artists are not the only people who feel warm and fuzzy when their work positively affects others. But because we’ve been framed as folks who live outside ‘normal’ life (thanks to the Renaissance) there’s an assumption we don’t need all the boring, regular stuff, like money; we can somehow survive on good feelings.
This leads to the second point: a universal wage for artists; being paid to be an artist. I personally don’t expect to be paid to create art all day in my studio. I would love for EVERYONE to receive a universal salary but that’s not going to happen any day soon and is a different conversation, but what I DO expect is that when I’m engaged to ‘work’—when a venue asks to show my art, when I’m invited to be a featured artist at a festival, when I’m asked to do a workshop at a community event, when my work is selected for exhibition—I’m paid for that work. I don’t work for ‘exposure’. I don’t HOPE the gallery does its job and sells my art, I want a guaranteed payment. Some organisations do this—mostly nonprofits—but I want to see this become the norm across all art venues. That’s what I advocate for.
Phew! That was a lot.
This discussion is becoming a research project into what artists need and want—watch out for more invitations to Chat in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, if you didn’t get a chance to participate in the Chat and want to add your Private View, feel free to pop your responses to the question below in the comments:
What, as artists, do we long for and what have we not yet experienced?
Until next time.
JC
“Transformative change happens when we are willing to build the things that we know must exist.”
—Mariame Kaba, from the book ‘Let This Radicalize You’
Wow! So good! Great work spurring this dialogue with the community.
So many good responses here, and better articulated than I could ever do. This one is food for thought for me - "Ownership of own career trajectory. (Do not have to rely on galleries to build a resume.)" I agree we should have ownership of our own career. But so much of current validation sits on the resume in the form of gallery exhibitions and museum collections. How do we create an equivalent validation in other ways? And how do we educate collectors about it?