Artists: Nadine, Brady, and Abby
QUESTION: Is the Making Art Making Money program just another online course?
Abby: It’s self paced. It is an online global course. I have friends that are in London, I have friends that are on each coast. I have friends in Australia it’s really, really cool.
QUESTION: How do you make friends with other artists in the program?
Abby: You don’t know each other at first right, and we meet for study partner sessions where we go over lessons together and we have lots of things in common ’cause we’re all trying to figure out how to make a living as an artist, which nobody teaches you how to do. I would say I went to college where they taught me how to make art but they didn’t teach me why I wanted to make art or how make a living at it, not that any of them did it themselves. Ann Rea knows how to do this. She puts her Schedule C statement up, there is a picture of it- of her first year of sales, she made over $100,000 her first year. I don’t think I’m going to do that my first year. I have different goals for myself, but she puts this up as a piece of evidence that she has made money as an artist. So that’s one of the main reasons I signed up for the course, we just get on and go through the lessons and it’s really exciting to have instructions on how to do this because I’d never seen them before. And then it’s just so unexpected that it goes into who you are as a person. You learn these things about yourself that people are usually too uncomfortable to dig down and do. So you come up with this understanding of yourself, which is just such an unexpected value in the course that I didn’t know I was going to get and it really cemented why I want to do art and it makes me excited to move forward. So there’s friends in the course, it’s all self paced, just go. Sign up.
QUESTION: How would you describe the program to other artists?
Brady: Well I describe you Ann, as a doer and a done-er (you have to put the dash in there so it’s in reference to doing and having done something). I think to me that’s my biggest selling point. She’s basically done what I’m trying to do and she’s describing to us in great detail how to do it. She’s even doing it to us because she’s turned her course, or turned her own course on herself, if that makes sense. To me that’s where the most value lies because it’s not like you show up with a book and you’d read and you have quizzes and blah, blah, blah. You basically show up because we are your paint on canvas technically. And the emotional part is what we’re developing as we go through the course and as we figure everything out in order to help get us closer to our SMARTER goals, acquiring our milestone map accomplishments. It’s hard, it’s very hard to describe it, but feeling it is kind of guaranteed. Sending them, like Nadine mentioned, sending them to the Saturday webinars, I think that’s definitely a place to start because then it’s something that they can do on their own that isn’t really pressure or me trying to show them something or hey look at this video of her or read this blog post she wrote. It’s look at her in her home environment and listen to what either the students or the non-students, the participants, are saying and asking and just to figure out that there is another way to sell your art then the conventional wisdom way. I think for me the sustainable part is what got my attention and that it’s not just learn how to sell this widget. It’s learn how to make your artistic/entrepreneuristic endeavor sustainable and growable as you are doing with your offerings to us. So I do kind of get tongue tied trying to describe, it. No, it’s not a scam. No, she’s not taking you for a ride. But yes, she is taking her own course by herself and teaching it to us in a way. So it’s almost like a never before seen doer and done-er.
Ann Rea: I don’t teach you anything that I haven’t done and that hasn’t worked for me. I don’t just repurpose other people’s stuff.
Brady: Yeah, and that’s what I try and stress to people.
Ann Rea: Yeah. I don’t read other people’s lessons. A lot of what’s out there, just so you guys know is repurposed, recycled lessons. This is all stuff I’ve done or I do- for sure. Okay. So sounds like it’s more than an online course then.
Brady: It’s about as interactive as life can get.
QUESTION: What is the Making Art Making Money Program?
Nadine: Okay. So this program called Making Art Making Money is this interactive online course where you learn from an artist mentor who has actually made, not just made but sold, over six figures of her own art for over a decade. And she’s been training other artists to set up their own art enterprises and learn how to make money from their art as well. She does this by teaching us how to create value above and beyond our art and actually sell that.
Ann Rea: So I get this a lot, “what does that even mean?”
Nadine: So that means what you do is because as artists you’re product is emotion, you actually learn how to understand what you stand for and what you stand against. You actually learn how to understand what your creative mission is and you learn from that mission, you realize what one problem in the world that you can help solve and you can actually use your art and all of your skills and your life lessons to accomplish that and actually really help people so that they understand the value in handing over their credit card for that piece of art and for that experience that you offer them.
Ann Rea: Is that something, Nadine, that you feel like you can deliver now? Can you do that now, offer value above and beyond your art?
Nadine: I already have. This is hilarious because instead of showing a creepy artist statement at my booths and art art fairs, I actually have written a mission statement and I’ve actually had people come into my booth, read it, their jaws dropped, they look at me with goosebumps and sometimes tears in their eyes and say; “oh my God, this is so spot on”, and then they stay and have conversations with me. Them just reading what I would I had to say and what I’ve learned in my own life experience gives them value. Whether they buy anything from me or not, they’ve gotten value just from that conversation, just from that reassurance, that they’re not crazy and that they’re dealing with all of these distractions and that they feel a little bit sad or disempowered. This is a way to help them to feel their own inner guidance again and that they’re not alone and that they can connect to, first themselves and then literally to all of life around them in a way that works for them. What’s really cool about this program is that you get to claim all of who you are, not just as an artist, but as a person because my life lessons and my life experiences are very different than all the other artists that are there. Even if we have similar purposes, all of our skills and abilities help us to come up with very unique ways of serving our collectors. What’s amazing is because of that, we understand that we’re such unique individuals that there’s no point in trying to compete and there’s no jealousy. It’s just supportive. Nobody’s going after the same piece of the pie. We’re all creating. What we’ve learned about is the blue ocean strategy and it creates a lot of positive momentum ’cause you get access to all these minds from all over the world with different perspectives, but they’re all very helpful to you. You can connect with various study partners and they’re all people of your own choosing, you don’t get assigned. You basically gravitate to the people that you enjoy and that can help you and that you can help. Because what’s really interesting too is sometimes you teach something that you’ve learned and that actually just helps to cement it even more.
Ann Rea: Definitely. Wow. Where can I sign up? (laughs)
Abby: Nadine you could be like a radio host. Wow.
Nadine: I’ve been practicing this stuff in real life. That’s what I love about it. My way of doing the course is a little different than everyone else’s. I enjoy being a student, but I really find the power of this course is I’ll learn something and then I go out there and actually do it for real. I learn how to make it better every single time I practice.
Ann Rea: Yeah you don’t need to wait until the end, you can start right away. You start off in the beginning using Code to Joy right away. As you’re coming to your Why, use that right away, and it’s designed intentionally like that. So you don’t have to wait until the end. Implemented, start iterating and benefiting. You sure you don’t want to use an artist statement, Nadine.
Nadine: Those things were always so creepy to try to write when I thought I needed one. It’s so funny because I can’t do that because also I worked in advertising for a really long time where my whole life training as an employed person was ‘how do you make something relevant? How do you make it about them and not about you?’ and I always thought artists statements were really creepy and full of BS and I used to just secretly laugh at them. I actually had some ad concepts about horrible obtuse artist statements as the idea for ads where he would just laugh at them and they’re appalling.
Ann Rea: Have you seen ArtyBollocks.com where you can generate your own artist statements?
Nadine: That’s hilarious. I haven’t seen that, but yeah, I have actually now had people asking me to mail it to them or can they take a picture of it or,
Ann Rea: Sell it! Hold on a second, Nadine, letterpress that stuff and sell it.
Nadine: That’s what someone told me to do just the other day and I’m like, damn, definitely that’s on the list for sure.
Abby: Your mission statement?
Nadine: Pretty much people love it. Like they fall in love with it, Abby.
Abby: You think they want to read it at home, like it’s a thing of beauty on its own or you think it’s a good idea to like monetize the
Ann Rea: The mission statement itself, absolutely. That’s your intellectual property Nadine, go make some money.
Nadine: Yeah. And this is amazing because, actually I think it might’ve been RuthAnne that said, you need to make a poster of that and sell it.
Making Art Making Money
