April Rimpo is a full time artist who has spent the last several years learning about marketing art. Previously she had discovered that trying to build her art business without having a set of goals she wanted to achieve led her down some paths that turned out to be a waste of time. In this interactive program April will try to help you focus on your art business goals (e.g., accepted in exhibits, more sales, gallery representation, greater national exposure, being published in an art magazine or book), and find a short cut to success. April will provide examples of activities you can do that might get you to your goal faster. Did you ever find yourself losing track of where your art is on exhibit and when you need to pick it up or deliver it? April will also provide examples of record keeping options.
In addition to discussing your art goals, we’ll talk about the amount of time you have to work on them. Balancing life, art production, and these goals is important. April will provide ideas to help you set priorities so your art business tasks don’t always get lost.
Since more exposure of your art and selling more art are often popular goals we’ll explore different types of art exposure and which might be right for you. April will share her bio, artists statement, and portfolio as examples of the materials you will want when approaching galleries. In addition we’ll discuss the importance of understanding your buyers and what is selling. Once you understand this it will help you target the right venues for you.
Although marketing is a scary word for most of us, the benefits of online marketing, including newsletters, blogs, and social media to help you achieve your goals is important to understand. April will provide examples to demystify what to write about. We’ll talk again about the amount of time you want to spend on marketing to help you decide what, if any, of the options are right for you.
Participation by all will make this program better and allow April to tailor the course to best fit your needs. April will ask everyone to offer ideas, during a “group brain storming exercise”, on possible art goals, which she will capture in a list. This list will become a core to our discussion. You’ll be asked to identify your top one or two goals from the list and then April will share methods to tailor your goals and develop a list of tasks you might do to achieve these goals.
April will provide several hand-outs with examples including: tracking sheets for painting inventory, business records, gallery research, bio, artist statement, and her portfolio.
You can learn more about April at her website, blog, Facebook Art page, and Online Store
Please pack a lunch and beverage.
