PROBLEM-SOLVING FOR CREATIVES #6: A New Social Media Opportunity!

Our in-person studio visits are a powerful way to connect with our audience and potential collectors. And now there’s a new platform to make that even easier!

 An artist has solved a huge dilemma around our quirky art studio hours…

 (4 minute read)

 In last week’s column about recognizing our “team”, I shared how we can connect and benefit from our contacts who have skills we lack—and need!

This week, I’m delighted to share a new website that resolves one of my greatest problems as a professional artist: It provides our audience and people who don’t know us yet with the means to visit our studio.

A long-time reader reached out to me a couple weeks ago. Bill Snider is an artist who’s created StudioDoorz, a website featuring a listing of participating artists’ studios across the country, and around the world.  His project was featured in the 12/03/2020 issue of Boulder, CO’s newspaper, Daily Camera.

It’s pretty small right now, with just under a couple hundred participants right now. But it’s a major accomplishment, with the potential for huge growth.

Because one of my biggest pet peeves with Yelp, Google Business listings, Google Maps, and most of the open studio events I’ve been in, is that their listings don’t accommodate “open by appointment” for our business hours.

That may not seem like a big deal, but it is. (When I was in a more public studio, I used, “Open by chance or by appointment”, but in my current situation, I have to know you’re coming in order to even let you into the building.)

And yet artist studios deserve this option.

We’re a small business, with just as much of a presence as a burger joint or a swanky restaurant.

But very few of us keep “regular business hours”.

I’ve asked orgs that publish catalogs for their open studio events to add something, a brief comment or a symbol, that lets people know if an artist can offer an appointment for a studio visit. (Maybe next year? I hope!)

Bill and I are on the same page with this. When people visit our studio, it can be the most powerful way for new visitors to experience, and connect with, our art.

They not only get to see so much of our artwork, they get to meet us. They get to see who we are. We get to have deep conversations about the why and the how of our work. They get to see our sacred creative space.

My work rarely sells at a one-off event. It’s different, it’s not cheap, and it can take people awhile to understand what they’re looking at. Literally! At my very first small art show in Keene NH, visitors who were intrigued would stare deeply at my work. After a bit, I would ask, “What do you think?” They always answered, “It’s beautiful, I’ve never seen anything like it, and I don’t know what I’m looking at.”

From the very beginning, that taught me something important:

Yes, there are plenty of people who couldn’t care less about my work. But there are also plenty of people who do, and even some who love it enough to buy it.

But it takes time. And as a friend told me last year, “Art events aren’t about making money TODAY.”

Galleries help, of course, and social media marketing is an increasingly good way to get our work out into the world.

But a studio visit is the icing on the cake. It creates the most personal, intimate way to engage a potential collector (or passionate admirer) with our work.

Bill has created a website that works like Yelp/Google for artists. Visitors who are traveling, tourists, etc. can use the site to find artists in a specific area or city, or even country.

They can read the artists’ statement/bio/resume. They can view the work.

And they can contact the artist through the website to make a studio appointment, either ahead of time or in the moment.

Now, this isn’t like using Facebook, where anyone and everyone can see our posts. It’s not like an open studio event, which can attract dozens, or even hundreds of visitors, but only take place once or twice a year. It’s not like “First Friday” or whatever, when all galleries and studios in a city are open, (which can quickly wear down the novelty of such events.)

Instead, if someone is traveling to “wine country” in Sonoma County, and they are also interested in art, they can search for that area on StudioDoorz, explore the artists that are compelling to them, and arrange for a studio visit.

I’m so excited about this new website, I joined in a heartbeat. The cost is a mere $5/month, or $50 for a year’s subscription.

It’s not a website host, like FASO. It’s not for buying artwork, though we can upload around two dozen images of our studio and our work.

It’s simply a way for someone to explore the area, find the artists there, reach our website, if they want to learn more, and to discover us in a way that would otherwise be almost impossible to do.

Remember that delightful quote from the animated movie Hercules, when Hades (the villain) visits the three Fates (who can see the future)? “Indoor plumbing. It’s gonna be BIG!!”

StudioDoorz.com. It’s gonna be BIG!

Your shares and comments are always appreciated, and often give me great ideas for future articles! If you know someone who would find this article useful, send it on. If someone sent this to you, and you liked it, either subscribe to my blog or my email newsletter at my website, LuannUdell.com!

 

Problem-Solving for Creatives #5: Call in the Experts!

PROBLEM-SOLVING FOR CREATIVES #5: Call in the Experts!

Making jewelry with my artifacts is a LOT easier than mounting them in a shrine!

 

We don’t have to know everything. We just have to know who knows what we need.

(5 minute read)

This series is dedicated to opening our perception of what a “team” is, and how our team support us in our art journey. We’ve covered the skills that got us here, the beliefs that keep us going, and the people who value us, and our art. Even the ones who are toxic have value, when I realized the only person who can stop me from making my art is ME.

Today, let’s talk about the experts.

First, of course, there are the artists and teachers (and people who are both!) who shared their art-maiking skills and education with us.

Then there are the people who help us get the word out about our art. In FASO’s (Fine Art Studios Online) unique AMP (Art Marketing Playbook), we not only get to hear Dave Geada share his insights and expertise about online marketing (websites, Instagram, etc.), we get to hear from experts he’s brought in for their take on things, too. (You can enjoy a 30-day free trial of this program by signing up here. Trust me, it’s worth your time. I’d say it’s well-worth the money, but…it’s free!) For the record, I don’t share just because it’s a feature of FASO where my own website is hosted. I’m sharing it because, even though I’ve used social media for years, I learn something new every single time. (Ask me about my pages and pages of notes I’ve taken on every AMP zoom meeting I’ve attended!)

There are other experts available, online, too. Other views on art marketing, instructional videos for art-making, etc. It seems like I search the internet almost every day looking for the expertise of others to help me move forward with my work.

But what has helped me move forward in leaps and bounds have been friends and acquaintances who have unusual skills I need.

I’ve written before about my New Hampshire friend Gary Spykman, whose creative work is hard to put in a box. (Literally! Woodworker/furniture-maker only begins to cover it.) Gary helped me move forward on some big projects, and what he taught me is reflected in my latest shrine project.

And now here I am in Northern California, far from old friends and fellow New England artists, still working on that big project, still getting stuck regularly on my journey.

This next step is hot. Literally. I need to make my own museum mounts for displaying some of the artifacts in the stacked boxes I’ve put together. I took an online class about this, just before we moved to California. But it involved welding/brazing with much bigger torches than my mini-torches, and I never felt safe trying this on my own. I found a maker space here in Sonoma County with classes, but the pandemic shut that down. I tried to purchase mounts that might have worked, but they are expensive. I’ve tried other methods of display the artifacts, with not much luck.

But I think I’ve found my expert!

And in a beautiful twist of fate, it came from me sharing MY expertise with THEM!

Our local art organization that hosts two open studio events a year is on a strict budget this year. We’re actually using older road signs from previous events, borrowing some from people who aren’t participating this year, and cleaning/restoring damaged signs.

One of the people in charge of the sign committee shared the difficulties of removing decals (arrows, studio numbers, etc.) during our steering committee meeting (Zoom!). Aha! I can help with that! I volunteered to bring my bottle of Undo and some other glue debonders to restore these signs. We met up in his outdoor workshop, fully masked and distanced, and tried them out. They worked! This reminded him of other, similar, chemicals he has on hand that removed every trace of Sharpies, too.

It wasn’t until later that I realized, this is a guy who’s been into welding and metalwork since forever. And he might be the perfect guy to help me figure out this mount-making issue.

And in another twist of fate, once I had some hope for learning how to make my own mounts, I gained more insights into other aspects and issues, like how to drill a hole inside a tiny box where a drill (even a small hand drill) won’t fit. I won’t bore you with the details on that, except that JB Weld glue will be involved. So even though that wouldn’t work for connecting the boxes, because of how I put them together, it has huge potential for artifact display. (No, I’m not gonna glue the artifacts!) So here’s another shout-out to Chris Fox, customer service rep at JB Weld.

Just like the glass artist I mentioned in last week’s article, whose partner can build a shipping crate for them, these experts are often right under our nose, in plain sight.

So what holds us back from asking for help?

For me, I’m afraid they’ll say no.

Yup, a grown woman afraid to ask for help. Yikes!

But for some reason, because I’d already done them a favor, it felt okay to ask for a favor in return. And he said yes!

I’m calling Rick Butler, metal sculptor, as soon as I finish this article.

Turns out that many, many people are happy to help others in their creative work. We may fear giving away our “trade secrets” (though very few of us are actually using processes that only belong to us.) We may fear of giving too much away, or having our work being copied in the process. (That copy fear again!)

And yet, if we open our eyes and look around, we may find the exact expert we need to move forward with the project dear to our hearts. Or at least gain a step forward on our journey.

Your shares and comments are encouraged! You can post in the comments (at Fine Art Views or at my blog) if someone has helped YOU move forward in your skills and projects. And also if YOU have helped others in theirs! What goes ‘round, comes ‘round. When it comes to creativity, that is so true.

And if this article helped you, you can read more of my articles, and the expertise of others, at Fine Art Views. Search for “Luann Udell” in the “Topics” drop-down menu, or your favorite FAV writer!