Time for gift giving!

happy holidays & wishing you a very healthy new year!

I have an on-line store that prints and frames my work, your choice of frame!  Go to www.CallieArt.com  and click on store link, start shopping today to adorn your walls with CallieArt.

If the artwork you like is not there, drop me a line and let me know which one you would like me to upload:  callie@callieart.com

Getting into a Gallery

Persistance, just keep sending your work to galleries that you are familiar with and that have work similar to yours. Being a good fit is important, otherwise you are wasting their time and yours.

I would not know how to do this, since I am not in one. Not true, my work is in Pierogi 2000, a well-known (in certain circles) gallery in hip Williamsburg, Brooklyn. I have a page on my website, under "shows" with the work included in the Pierogi 2000 flat files. Anyone can go and ask to see them, and they are for sale.

http://callieart.com/pierogi.html I have six works with them, the seventh was sold.

I am also showing in a gallery (the Dragonfly gallery) on Martha's Vineyard for their Flower Show. Check out the http://www.mvdragonfly.com/ They will have three of my larger works on canvas up for Mother's Day. A two week show. The gallery is in the art district, in Oak Bluffs. I got into this gallery by simply talking to the owner as I browsed, then I brow beater her with visuals of my work until she agreed that I would be a perfect addition to her annual flower show.

I was able to show at ABC Home, part of the infamous ABC Carpet family, by writing to the owner and convincing her that I was so Earth Day that if she did not hang my work for the month, well then she might as well give up her PC attitude of love and the earth. As an artist, I need a lot of love and attention.

For those starting out as a emerging artist...

Some advice:

Create a buzz about your work.
Get a website and update it frequently.
Send out postcards to any show you are in - vistaprint.com is a good source for inexpensive cards of good quality
Go to artist residencies, experience what it feels like to be an artist full-time.
Find galleries that show work like yours, send them postcards to your shows, keep in their radar, send them an introduction packet about your work.

Get involved in neighborhood art clubs, get some shows on your resume and some experience in dealing with the entry requirements, costs involved, and packing your artwork up correctly. Enter juried shows in your area.

Show that you care about your work. Artists are said to be the greatest cause of harm to their work, be it because they are more into the creation and less into the finished piece, or that they know they need to let go of it after creating it for sale purposes and are trying to detach.

Speak passionately about your work
Learn how to describe it
Be the best, most unique in your field
Be different, be daring.
Stand out of the crowd
Sell for the same prices in and out of the gallery
Discounts are ok
Be reliable, keep your word, be trustworthy
Network well
Know the gallery you are approaching
Always plan bigger!
Have different sized work, collectable by all
Generate excitement about work
Be more money aware!
Visit galleries you want to approach
Sell on ebay, don't worry about being famous
Go to auctions, see the hype...feel it, demystify what it is about.
Learn to frame work. Learn about spacers and how to use hinges.

www.CallieArt.com

My First Artist Residency

In 2000 my life was going through some major changes and I thought it was time to experience an artist residency. Asking for a month off from your full-time job is not an easy thing. My day job was great about it, if I had the vacation time, they would let me take it all at once.

I got accepted into the Vermont Artist Residency, in Johnson, Vermont. It was about six hours from the city. My dad had just left me his car so that helped out tremendously. I set off alone on a cold winter day on this adventure of living with about thirty other artists from around the world. I was given a small room for sleep and a studio to spend all my waking time in. I was thrilled with the studio space, having done my Masters on the six year, working full-time plan, I was never given my own studio to work in. Having this space to work in was amazingly freeing for me. I started painting larger right away.

One of the wonderful things that the VSC offers is a weekly critique from working artists that they bring in. Believe it or not, I was not really experienced in getting critiques, always afraid that they would turn me off from creating art and I needed art in my life too much to lose it that way. The advice was sound, the insight incredible. I also made a friend right away, just after I arrived and while sitting in the waiting room I met my first Karen from Seattle. Eight years later, and we are still good friends.

I made lots of friends that month, had a ton of fun, created wild paintings, and felt free of my day job after working there for twelve years. This year it will be twenty years at my day job and I have been to residencies in Hungary and Costa Rica as well. I find that you push yourself further when you think others are looking, you try harder and are a lot more serious about your work. It is a amazing feeling to be taken seriously as an artist, and not as my day time work persona of "telecommunications analyst". I suggest residencies to anyone who wants to grow as an artist.

www.CallieArt.com

The work at ABC Home is up!

At first the process was slow, I sent my tree series to the owner, months later I heard from the art director that they were indeed interested in showing my work, a little while later she came to my studio to pick out possible pieces for the show, then quiet....and yet April, as talked about as a Earth Day celebration, was the planned time for hanging. I had framing to do, five pieces and it turned out I had two weeks to do it. I got it done in a week in a half in Brooklyn, at Frame It on 3rd Ave and 25th Street, I highly recommend them, and then arranged with ABC to pick up the five framed pieces along with two large oils and found out that they would not be insured until they reach the store. So I wrapped all the work up as best I could and begged the van drivers to use as much care as they could muster up for the journey. The truck was enormous and only had one couch in it. But would the couch move during the drive and crash into my work? One would think that might occur under the circumstances and Murphy's law...but no, all arrived safely and then even survived being hung several different times. Now they sit quietly in beautiful display on the second floor of ABC Home, at B'way and 19th Street.

They are up until May 20th and the store is worth the visit.

www.CallieArt.com