Chapter Nine Blog

Having your work on line is essential to being a success as an artist as it is the principal means of communication in society today.

Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art. _Andy Warhol

Joining an Online Gallery/Group
Advantages:
• Technical aspect is already done for you
• Possibility of more traffic visiting a site with more artists
Disadvantages:
• The pages are preformatted, little room to be creative or individualize

Research galleries and look for ones with familiar artist who you respect, is the site easy to navigate? Does it have a presence you would be proud of?

Everything you can imagine is real. _Pablo Picasso

Fee based virtual Galleries provide you with all the tools to create and maintain a Web site. The gallery should be bringing traffic to your site but remember traffic doesn’t equal sales.

Juried virtual Galleries. Presumably you are then with more sought-after artists. Which will hopefully give your work more serious attention. They often take a percentage of sales and are more likely to have sales. Be sure to read the fine print and what you are getting into.

Community based virtual galleries. An advantage is to have the credibility of the organization and increased exposure to art people.

Creating your own web site gives you the pleasure of having complete control over how your art is presented. But you do have to create your own traffic. Building a web site takes focus; decide where you want your focus to be.

The perfect web site should include everything you would have in your artist packet.
• Images of your art
• Current bio
• Statements for each body of work
• Upcoming exhibition lists
• Contact information
• Mailing list/guest book
• Press page
• Links
• Site map
Do not personalize including pictures of family; interests or hobbies make it professional.

Research web sites and make notes of what you like about them.

Research web host’s, they are like landlords.

Get a domain name, like your real name you want it to be the same throughout your career.

Your goal is to be easily accessible to those searching for you.

He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator. _Francis Bacon


Tracy Rocca’s dos and do not's of web design
• Keep it simple
• Be consistent
• Make connections
• Plan for growth
• Make text legible
• Help visitors get around
• Don’t get too flashy
• Don’t keep visitors waiting
• Don’t reinvent the wheel
• Skip the intro
• Wait until you can do it right

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. _Alan Kay

Always check to be sure everything is working correctly.

Be courageous. It’s one of the only places left uncrowned. Anita Roddick