Getting your story across (Marketing and brand awareness)

10/10/19 • 14 min

Art is obviously emotional and as such its value is determined absolutely subjectively. The big question though is how, because even though ambivalent, subjectivity can still give us a lot of various starting points to think about our target audience.

How people recognise a good story in objects and experiences differs from person to person — that’s why it’s subjective — but usually we can find basic guidelines that can help us define this perception. The main idea behind this exercise is to find what is most important for each person, that we are trying to understand.

What are their needs? What do they wish for? Do these wishes and needs have a certain urgency? Do they provide pain or discomfort for them and can our art elevate or even completely fix their issues?

What are their needs? What do they wish for? Do these wishes and needs have a certain urgency? Do they provide pain or discomfort for them and can our art elevate or even completely fix their issues?

Previous Episode

Polishing your story (The artist statement)

Artist statements, even though they might appear like a load of pretentious art-talk (which many of them sadly are), serve a very important purpose: presenting your passion in a bite-sized package, to be easily consumed and understood by the reader or listener (you can, and should know how to pitch them too).

But what many of us present as an artist statement is usually exactly the opposite of what it should be; we focus on intellectually sounding words and sentences like this: “As wavering phenomena become rediscovered through subversive personal practices, the observer is left with an awareness of the boundaries of our era.”, rather than actually trying to communicate clearly.

Next Episode

Chatting about art school and creativity with Lizzie Reid from Lizzie's Lines

Welcome to a very special series of episodes at Surviving Art. We’re doing market research in London as part of a cultural residency, provided by Slovenia’s Ministry of Culture and will be conducting a series of interviews and talks about the art market in London. In the series, I’ll be chatting with book publishers, both emerging and well-established artists, gallerists and other art world professionals. And to kick it all off, today’s run-and-gun podcast (meaning, please excuse the London traffic in the background, it’s inevitable), is with Lizzie Reid from Lizzie’s Lines. We talked about art school and why going to art school might not be the best option (at least not in places, where education isn’t free (I’m still amazed that people come out of college with debt almost as large as the GDP of a small country). And we also explored her views on the possibilities curatives have in London at this very moment, how a longer hiatus can actually be good for you and much, much more. Enjoy. In her words: “Illustration, design and poetry are the facets that make up Lizzie's Lines. Sourcing her creativity from the subconscious mind, Lizzie uses instinctive mark-making and metaphorical language to reveal her current thoughts, emotions and beliefs of her place in the world. Predominantly using paint and ink, Lizzie draws in moments of creative desire and adopts a patient approach to enable her eye for visual balance to define the poetic relationships between her signature lines, shape, colour and space.” And here’s all the link paraphernalia anyone curious about what Lizzie’s work looks like could want, enjoy: Website: www.lizzieslines.com Instagram: @Lizzies_Lines Portfolio: https://lizziereid.myportfolio.com