I think I understand what success is, and it's money.
If you want money as an artist, then you have to deal with money as a business person. That's actually the underlying meaning of any and every post I've ever made here along these lines.
Young or new people who focus on art think that there's a rich culture of enamored viewers waiting to give then a ticket to reknown. I try to debunk this in no uncertain terms.
The business of art is business. ......... is money. You've got to make money to spend it, or spend time fundraising it. Buyers of art do not support all of this activity that goes on. Buyers of art support only a small investment by most artists.
Ask yourself this:
Who makes money off the Florence Biennale? Mostly artists? Mostly support people? Mostly producers? Does anybody make any money off of it? (I don't know).
So what does the money support? That's another question I would ask.
Also, look at the bare figures:
* $ 3,000 (right?)
* 4 works to show
* 600 artists
Who's gonna come? Whose gonna see you amongst over 2000 works? Whose gonna follow up?
I just don't see the investment's paying off, from a business standpoint.
I think it would be better to take that $ 3000, target a local audience with your own work, EXCLUSIVELY,....... put on your own one-man show, and look for success on a local level. "Success", of course, meaning "the possibility of financial return".
Yeah, it feels good to be in a big show, to play the game (and I mean this practically, since I play my own sorts of games), to see fellow artists, to help fund an art-focused event (are you wanting to play philanthropist?-- that's okay too), to have a sense of being caught up in the fanfare. It's a big party, right? It has a big entrance fee to party.
If you've got $ 3,000 that you absolutely are okay throwing into the wind, with no hopes of monetary return, and participating is all the return you hope for, then such an event as this is, indeed, "worth it".
If you are expecting sales, contacts for future sales, agents finding and engaging you, then I just don't think one appearance in one event is enough to even begin to scrape the surface on this hope. Again, I'd think it makes more sense to take that $ 3,000 and do a targeted ad in a merchants' magazine or several smaller adds in other sorts of publications, specifically targeted for art buyers (if such things exist).
To get any results from advertising and self promotion, it takes many repetitions or appearances or runs. In effect, the event is one and only one $3,000 ad, ......IF you are looking at it from a business standpoint.
And one ad does not find very many customers. Now if you showed up every year, and maybe followed up and saught out certain people you know might be there, then after a few hundred grand's worth of appearances, the event might begin to pay off, but how long would it take you to recoup that hundred grand that it took to jump start your contacts at that venue??
I simply hate seeing artists have innocent idealist expectations without ever having the hard issues confronted honestly. Somebody has to step up to the plate and (forgive the pun) draw the more accurate picture of what all these artist-supported events/publications really are. Once you know what they really are, then you are the most informed to decide whether they are right for you.
I don't think that the promoters feel this way, however. Their success and the illusion of their cultural activism is SUPPORTED BY THE PARTICIPATING ARTISTS. Artists are the entrepreneurs of their own exposure, at their own expense, usually for the profit of others besides themselves.
Really, I wish a savy business person would respond to this thread and prove me wrong.
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