Business: a changed landscape

We must also examine the purpose and value of social media platforms to emerging artists (i.e. converting audience members into customers, building sound business models, and easing administrative burden). From my interviews I learned that, if the main purpose of a social media platform is to do business, it is not enough for creators to simply engage in an organic conversation with fans and potential customers. The conversation has to be

persuasive and action-oriented to sell art and other items. Business plans should, therefore, include tailored communications that engage audience members, encourage them to share pieces with others to help the artists’ grow their reach and brand, as well as responding to audience’s preferences and perspectives.

Many of the artists I spoke with told me that they often experienced an internal dilemma over whether to pursue creative acts for the sake of the art or for money. Related to this, they questioned whether you remain a true artist if you can successfully straddle these worlds. These issues are deep-seated. So much so, in fact, that artists are often seen, by the public, as the kind of professionals who want to keep away from commercial enterprises, and are commonly regarded as satisfied with lower-income art jobs (Steiner and Schneider, 2012). As voiced during my in-depth interviews, this view tends to be internalised by artists – forming a part of their professional identities.

The emergence of crowdfunding and social media has left many artists and creators confronted with business issues as they attempt to develop their careers independently of galleries. Morris’ observation (2013) is illustrative: ‘While new technologies are celebrated

for making cultural production more accessible, there is also more pressure on artists, as cultural entrepreneurs, to produce and distribute their own work’ (p. 274).

The following ‘business’ circle shows how the successful artists I interviewed tackled business issues in developing their art careers. Compared to the art world’s

traditional business environment, artists who rely on social media must adjust their working paradigm. Sparrow explained that the most obvious difference is that

[galleries] held a lot of power and it is like they held the future of artists… I think it is unfair. The main point is that you can make anything that you want. You don’t need to depend on anybody. The Internet Age is quite unforgiving of artists or to anyone really because it’s all about giving the best service all the time, instantly… You are your own boss. It’s good in a way, but also bad, because, again, you come back to the whole pressure of things. So it can be the best, and it can also be the worst.

I think part of the reason why The Corner Shop has been so successful is the repetition of it… I see it as more of a challenge, with having to make so many things. It echoes what consumerism is. It’s the mass-produced thing. It is artists, instead of making one of something, they have to make 100 of something, so I think [The Corner Shop is] helping switch those roles around.

It was clear from our conversation that Sparrow appreciated the power of the internet, the new art market, and how Kickstarter accelerated her career. She also recognised that it requires a different approach from traditional business transactions. In her own words,

You have to provide rewards that people actually want, because, ultimately, people are selfish. You need to offer them something that they want in return [for their financial support]. I mean people aren’t stupid. They know what can work. I think there are quite a few people out there who use Kickstarter projects and they haven’t raised money because they do not think about what customers can get from them… There are so few people who are unselfish and giving [patrons].

Practically speaking, Sparrow viewed social media sites as offering artists more opportunities to be successful. She explained,

I think: “How can I make the most money for work that I enjoy doing? How can I capture people’s imaginations? What works and what doesn’t?” I’ll sort of test the water with that. If it doesn’t get a response, then I’ll know it is not what people like. That is to say, through social media you get a much wider audience to test your facts on.

Giblin’s business circles revealed that she is not relying on social media to develop her art career. She is straddling the two worlds – i.e. the traditional and the social business side – in an effort to harness the benefits of each. During our interview, she shared ‘I want to have my own studio and invite the press over… I want to be recognised… I want to share my stories and I want to teach… I really want to be represented by galleries worldwide… It is my dream’.

Of course, Giblin recognised that these spheres are different. Her choice to divide her time and attention between them was financially motivated. ‘These two are quite difficult… It is totally financial… This is also why I don’t have the confidence and also don’t have time to really do it because I still have to look after the gallery’. Above and beyond the business side, Giblin expressed that she wanted the approval and validation that traditional galleries offer ‘despite knowing full well that it is very difficult to be accepted by them’. (She mentioned this above in the ‘network’ circle, wherein she compared the advantages and disadvantages of traditional galleries with social media platforms).

Bowell spoke about the same theme, but drew focus on the pressure of having to acquire a broad variety of skills. ‘As artists, it’s really hard to do that stuff. You have to become your own social media team, web developer, advertiser, publicist, and still make the art’. Alternatively, some of the artists I spoke with drew clear lines between their art and business sides. Driver said,

I don’t think of my art practice as a business. I’m not about making business contacts and gallery contacts and all that stuff. I don’t feel comfortable with that idea – my art as a business – which is probably why I don’t make enough money. I just do a little better than break even.

Sweeney also expressed discomfort with the connection between her art and business. During our interview she explained:

When I did my Kickstarter campaign, I felt uncomfortable about it, because I was asking for funding to support something personal, rather than a business venture. I was kind of aware that I was asking for funding for something that was really, essentially, self-indulgent.

As Sweeney put it, even though developing an art career through social media can be a pathway to sustainability and profit, she preferred working with galleries. She claimed,

it’s not about the money. It would be great to show with a gallery or space that is about integrity, rather than money. Most galleries have to make money because they are a business, and I think to see them as this big bad wolf who takes half of your money is quite a naïve view, because it’s actually their premise. It costs an awful lot of money to run a gallery.

Taking a different tack, Sparrow viewed the art market ecosystem through the lens of a power relationship. Based on her experience,

galleries decide what light your work is cast in, absolutely… But social media has changed the way the whole art world works… The people dictate what is popular now… I think the way galleries are related to artwork has completely changed because of social media.

Sweeney also highlighted the positive aspects of growing a career through social media platforms, claiming

[crowdfunding platforms] completely facilitate the process of having money to continue making art. People can support you in a way that doesn’t feel weird… I got

kind of offers from friends before, who said, “I’ll buy you some canvas, let me pay

for some stretchers or whatever”. And as a person I have to say, “No, I’m not comfortable with that. I will never take money from you. That’s just not going to happen”. And what was great about Kickstarter is that it just created that platform, where it felt okay for people that I knew to pledge money.

As she conceived of the art world, it is full of rules; ‘to be too commercial is something you don’t do… You know people judge you on it’. Albrecht also informed me

that she is making a conscious effort to overturn this view for the sake of artists’ establishing their careers through non-traditional platforms:

if artists do not change the stereotype, they cannot see or have the opportunities and, in the end, galleries are the only place they can go. But it is not very easy to reach them [galleries]. It is another hierarchy; you don’t go there. If they want you, they will come to see you. The whole system is set up to make artists be in a very passive position. That is why social media and Kickstarter is liberating, supporting artists in being proactive and doing things for ourselves.

Even though Albrecht, by her own admission, has not come up with a good business strategy or model for her art, she has tried to grow her business skills – including using crowdfunding platforms and social media – to gain support. I was struck by her insight that social media can be liberating and ‘flatten out the hierarchy’ of galleries.

Even still, for most of the artists I spoke with, galleries remain the primary source for establishing their careers and making them known. Artists, like Giblin, have managed to straddle the two worlds to the benefit of their careers and have positioned themselves to attract online and offline audiences. True, Giblin had a successful Kickstarter campaign in

Kollective gallery, yet she told me that the administrative social media ‘chores’ she had to

manage reinforced her commitment to set her sights on exhibiting in galleries.

6.8 Opportunities

With ever-growing numbers of social media platforms focused on business needs and transactions, the relationships between the businessperson and his or her followers has fundamentally changed, insofar as artists now have more opportunities to become

empowered and independent. The other side of this coin is that artists also have to consider how to create more opportunities to support themselves and nurture their businesses.

In the ‘business’ circle of this research project, the discussion included artists’ views on business conducted through social media. A common theme that was expressed was that,

because of social media’s near constant evolution and reach, artists are continuously forced to reconsider the opportunities that they can attain elsewhere, not to mention what they are lacking.

During our interview, Sparrow described the opportunities social media and crowdfunding have presented to artists, and suggested that

if you’ve been given this opportunity with social media, there are a lot more people that now have control to advance their careers. But when there are more people, you need to be better at it in order to get to be the best. With galleries and stuff, you wouldn’t need to. You wouldn’t necessarily know where you were going. It’s okay to go into a gallery and say, “I want this, this, and this”. But it’s up to them whether they say “yes” or “no”. There’s a lot of pressure on the internet, and because there are more opportunities, there’s more pressure. Everyone’s like, “Oh, the

opportunities are there”. But the reality is that you need to be the best and create content constantly and please your backers because there’s no excuse.

According to Giblin’s RAINBOW analysis, two of her Kickstarter campaigns brought opportunities not only for herself but also for other emerging artists. With respect to the opportunities this opened for their creative processes, Giblin explained, ‘very often, we share our experience… at the same time, I also educate myself… my performance is about motivation, discipline, and hard work. This can also educate young people to be more enthusiastic’. In terms of her general strategy, Giblin told me that she used her art as a type of reward, which indeed made her art well-known and also opened pathways for discussion in her Kollecktive gallery.

In reflecting on the themes of artists’ work and their expertise based on the combined RAINBOW analyses, it is evident that artists who know their skills as well as their gaps are able to create more business opportunities and build stronger relationships. Taking Giblin’s art as paradigmatic, she uses drawn lines to express emotions on her subjects’ faces and bodies, and told me that she experiences catharsis while doing so. When she is engaged in her artwork she does not rest and will experience a range of feelings, such as being tired,

angry, and sad. From our discussions, it was clear that Giblin knows her artistic style and voice well, and that this comes out in her determination, work ethic, and performance. This also gives her a competitive advantage in the market. Irrespective of this, Giblin told me that she still needs to learn how to connect her art – her adeptness at drawing ‘emotional’ lines – with people’s lives and experiences to grow her business and career. Otherwise, like many other talented artists, her work may continue to be appreciated but not financially supported.

Spence told me that social media’s wider audience gave him new opportunities to establish his career. In more detail,

straight away you can speak to people from around the world. There are no barriers. It’s the internet. People from anywhere can have a look at what you’re doing, and you can talk to them. It makes a giant world the size of your PC. That’s incredible… incredibly powerful. There are so many opportunities there. Then you have to learn to speak to a global audience as well in different ways. You’re not going to appeal to everyone all at once, but if you’re confident in the things that you’re doing and your style, then people that are interested will follow you.

Aligned with this, Bowell suggested ‘in social media, you can start to put things out there straight away and sell things, even if you’ve got a very small amount of work’. By contrast, in the traditional art market, you had to build a body of work, exhibit it, and then sell it.

For Moore, social media created opportunities, insofar as it made her aware of what is trendy and well-received in real-time and from a broad variety of perspectives.

In terms of future opportunities, Sweeney remained steadfast that she wanted to work with galleries.

I mean the opportunities are there if you want them. Definitely. You could sell work. You can upload an image of your work, and you’ve got a good chance of selling it on the right sites. And you package it up and you send it… but… I think the situation is grey. Not black or white. If I could choose what would come in the future for me, at some point, I would want to work with a reputable gallerist who supported the integrity of my practice over having lots of online sales.

preferences. On the one hand, she said ‘I have the gift that I can do things that fascinate people… I have the gift to create things to make people enjoy them’. On the other hand, Albrecht appreciated the fact that her art (fabric bricks) does not connect with many people.

It was not surprising to learn that Albrecht ultimately lost her interest in selling the four hundred bricks that she had used in her Kickstarter campaign. This is a problem that other artists have also had to sort out. In the beginning of their careers, artists are often very confident in their art until they are confronted with challenges in monetising it. After a while, some artists will lose their energy and, in the end, may even give up.

On a broader scale, as more and more artists struggle, it will have an influence on the art environment generally. This is the reason why it is so important for artists to infuse a business model into their career trajectories, and be guided by it throughout.