Artist & Mentor, Ann Rea and Jen Colombo, Stamford, Connecticut
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What were your top two challenges?
Oh right. Top two challenges where I really had no idea how to market my art. I had no idea how to find. I had been selling, but it was two people that I knew and it was more something I was doing on the side and when I decided that I’m going to attempt to do this full time now I, I needed, I needed guidance. I had no strategy. I had completely clueless about what I was doing.
What did other artists tell you to do?
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Artist’s statement. Yeah, and ready exposure. Go ahead and kill your prospects of selling your art, right? A boring ass self involved cringeworthy artist’s statement. And then look for exposure everywhere.
No matter what. Don’t ever stop. Don’t ever give up, even though it’s complete shit exposure.
What advice did you receive?
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The advice was more about making sure you’re talking about like your color palettes and you should only ever be sticking to like certain color palettes. And My, that was hard for me, especially because I’m, I have a degree in theatrical scenery design so I’m like super varied sometimes. Yeah. And I couldn’t wrap my head around how to fit the skill set that I had. What did experts say? Tell told you you need to stick this specific color Palettes, how ridiculous!
What did your artist statement say?
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What did your artist statement say?
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I’m a watercolor artist and I worked in acrylic paints and what I was trying to capture the essence of moments in my work and then I kind of talked a little bit about my background and it was really horrible. It was ugh.
What was it like writing your artist statement?
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And it was, it was painful to write and it was really a struggle and typically I know they’re longer. I got as far as the paragraph and he just said quit. I don’t know. I was like, you’re supposed to like react and feel my art. Yeah.
What did people think of your artist’s statement?
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Oh Wow. What is this girl talking about? And um, it honestly, it was so on authentic, like it felt very. There was, there was no emotional connection to that statement. And when I read it, because I read it a couple of hours ago before we got on this call, I can, I can feel that, that it just forced and fake.
What’s it like sharing your mission?
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Oh my goodness, like so much better from here. And it has so much more meaning.
How are people responding to your mission?
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People were like, well, you’re opening up a conversation because I’m curious. I want to hear more what that means and why you feel connected to that and that’s been really awesome because it’s so. It’s so natural. Nothing. Nothing is forced.
What advice would you give your younger self?
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I would tell her that it’s possible to make money doing at it, to make money doing it if you have the right strategy and to be authentic and that’s who people really see your authenticity.
What else would you tell her?
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It’s possible to do if you have a plan. I mean I made, you know, there are some things I had thought about before I joined this course that are coming up in this course. I’m like, okay, great, but the thing is I probably would have stumbled around for quite some time, maybe even years trying to figure out how to find my market, how to actually talk about my work and it being more of a mission instead of about the work and just all of the strategies that comes along with it. It’s a, it’s a nice plan I have. I don’t, I don’t have a business background, so it’s nice to have everything. It’s nice to have the roadmap laid out for you.
What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned?
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Oh, well the biggest lesson by far is it’s not about your art or whatever form it is. I know there’s more disciplines on here. It speaking about it from your purpose is so much better. I mean like, it feels better when I’ve like just talk to people in general. Um, it just leads to more conversation and I’m not, I’m not forcing anything. I’m just being me and that’s amazing.
What have you gained?
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as somebody again who has no clue about marketing or anything to have an actual structure that I can follow that I don’t have to try to go and figure out myself is truly amazing.
What advice do you have for artists?
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I would say you have to invest in yourself. I mean that’s, you can, you’re going to spend the money anyway struggling to do it on your own, so really truly invest in yourself. I mean I’m, I’m not even to the end of the course yet and I’ve already, I’ve just had so much clarity on so many things on how to proceed, which is great. And one of the best parts of this program is this study partners or study partners. I have sir. I have a lot of study partners and I love meeting with them like it’s so great to talk to other like minded people, but also just if you’re. If you’re not sure on something. The biggest thing I’ve found with study partners is just actually talking like this with a study partner. You’re both just brainstorm together in like figuring stuff out and it’s. It’s amazing to have a, you know, somebody to talk to about that and bounce things off of.
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Thank you so much for sharing this. For years I thought it was just me. I always felt artists statements were artificial and stuffy. Then every show I entered(I know and I’m sorry now) insisted on you having one. So I just thought maybe you (meaning myself) are not creative enough to write this amazing representative statement of your art. I was feeling inside each person who saw my art would feel something different. I didn’t feel I should write all this fluff. Thank you again.
It’s not you. It’s the scarcity and permission based art establishment.