For every new independent artist, self-promotion is necessary to getting your work out there and helping you find an audience. To many, it can feel uncomfortable and unnatural. Nevertheless, marketing your work is an essential part of being a successful artist. And honestly, it can end up being quite fun and painless.
The first step to successfully promoting your art is deciding what you want to achieve.
If you are an emerging artist, you may want to focus on building your reputation in your local area. If people in your field know you and your work, you are ready to move to a national scale. Perhaps you want to make a mark within the community related to your profession or identify people interested in your topic or specialized focus.
Take stock of your current situation and connections, then define goals you would like to achieve in the future.
For Brazilian dancer and educator Quenia Ribeiro, the pandemic lockdown provided for such an opportunity. Quenia teaches children and adults the history and culture of Brazilian dance and music in New York City. Hired by renowned Alvin Ailey School, she was the only faculty member teaching Brazilian samba and folk dance from 2005 until 2019. A dancer from the age of five, she has developed and released instructional DVDs focused on samba.
“I have always had a vision for my ideas and have been thinking about teaching online for a long time. I was in Rio de Janeiro recovering from an injury when the pandemic hit. Soon after, I was invited to teach two live classes online. After the experience, I decided to continue and haven’t stopped since. Some of my students moved away from N.Y. It has been wonderful to keep teaching them online.
According to Quenia, investment in social networks takes minimal effort, and it is gratifying when classes shared online lead new students to her.
“I believe in personal contact despite the distance of remote learning. I use Facebook and Instagram. The application Inshot is simple to edit videos. My advice is to believe in your business. The tools exist to start transmitting your art to the world today.
Her teaching career began in Brazil at 16 to children younger than 10. In 1997, she moved to New York City and began taking capoeira lessons with her brother.
“I can say that capoeira changed my life. Through it, I started to do folkloric shows. I was always involved with samba, but I started to do dance shows about the orixas, samba, and capoeira through capoeira classes. I decided to open my studio in a Penthouse on Broadway and Houston in Manhattan. At the time, there were no social media, but my class was so popular by word of mouth that I started to be invited to teach classes at other gyms,” says Quenia, who concludes by advising the people to believe in their business. Use all the tools that exist out there being free to transmit your art to the world.
The Colombian musician Oscar Fernano started playing the guitar when he was 16 years old. He went to college and graduated as an Engineer, and started working an office job. During all those years, he started to write songs for fun. One day when he was about 28, he started playing in his hometown, Medellín. Around that time, his girlfriend wanted to move to the U.S., so they decided to go to NYC and try music. He left all the office jobs behind and started putting together bands in NYC, and just kept writing songs.
“The pandemic was awesome for me but not so much for the band. The band I had before the pandemic imploded, but I wrote many songs during that time and got signed by a small record label. We are a new band now called Public Nature, and if everything goes well, we will be touring with one of the Ramones in October 2021.”
When he searches to do a promotion, he finds out there seem to be thousands of bad companies offering marketing packages. So he realized it is better to focus on making good songs and most important good connections and friendships.
“The first step is to have good songs or any art and only then find a company that knows what they are doing. I guess you have to know they did a good job for somebody else. For example, buying fake followers and paying for Spotify plays is not going to do any good,” he said.
According to R.J. Supa, the gallerist, curator, visual artist, and co-owner, and director of ‘Yours Mine & Ours’ gallery in New York, these days, the most obvious way to let people know that you make art is by promoting your practice on social media. It’s free to use, easy enough to figure out, and can immediately get your work on people’s radar.
“I know lots of artists who had never shown in a gallery before but who were able to generate business solely through their Instagram account. I prefer to follow social media accounts that reflect an artist’s unique personality. Taking a more casual approach to your social media posts will also free you up to just be yourself and will alleviate the fear that you need to craft an image on social media that isn’t true to who you really are.”
Also, he said beyond simply posting about your artwork, there are lots of ways to bring your social media audiences into the fold of your practice. “I strongly believe that anything art-related can (and should) be posted, whether it’s a formal review of your work, an event flier about an upcoming group show, or a candid snap from your senior crit.”
Overall, selling artwork is about developing good communication skills, and being patient and putting yourself out there as an artist is the first step. Spending time at galleries, open studios, and other related events will help establish you as a member of the community and lead to introductions, studio visits, and eventually, sales.
As advice R.J. Supa says, keep in mind that even if no one is buying your art now, there is no reason they will not be in a year, or even in a month or two. Keep making connections and keep your community informed about all that’s going on with you and your practice. Let people know that your work is for sale and where/how they can collect it. Moreover, as you develop your deal-sealing skills, ask questions, don’t be afraid, and be flexible. Every collector, artist, friend, art gallery, independent curator, or art advisor will work differently based on their needs. The best way to work with them is to be upfront and transparent about your own needs.
Now get back to the studio and start networking!
