Dear Friends:
It’s spring…and as I write this, there are still piles of snow on the streets of New York. I hope it is not snowing wherever you are (unless you’ve come in from a ski slope to read this). By now, I know you’re familiar with CHF’s online Learning Portal and Business Accelerator. Well, we’re about to shift the third vital piece of our educational programming into high gear: our boots-on-the-ground events.
We have already worked with the Salmagundi Club here in New York to record some terrific panel discussions (including Legal Issues for Artists and Patrons, and Fresh Perspectives on Collecting Art), and we’ve made these available to people who couldn’t be in the room for them. It has been a great collaboration, and we hope to do more with Salmagundi in the future, but what we’re up to now is a lot more involved and artist-centric. We have two events on deck that will tip us right into the deep end of the pool, and I am really excited about both of them.
The Santa Fe Arts Business Summit, sponsored by Bridges to Santa Fe and the Arts Business Institute, kicks off tonight with a keynote from yours truly. I don’t know how many people will come to hear me, but I do know that the full weekend of workshops and consultations is completely sold out!
Even as I head to New Mexico for that event, we are deep in planning mode for our next joint venture, this one in Denver with the nonprofit Windows to the Divine. Scheduled for June 20th, Artists Only: Making the Art Market Work for You will be a ground-breaking symposium that we hope to offer as a recurring feature around the country.
Please take a look below to learn about everything else we have going on, and remember, none of it would be happening without you!
Elizabeth Hulings
Director, The Clark Hulings Foundation
P.S. Wishing CHF’s Natalie Baumgartner all the best in her next endeavor! She did tremendous work for us and will be sorely missed.
What’s New on The Thriving Artist Podcast
Over the past month, we’ve produced four new episodes of The Thriving Artist Podcast covering topics from how to care for an art collection, to the current gaps in arts education. Thanks to his 30 years as Glenna Goodacre’s manager, sculptor Dan Anthony has certainly learned what it takes to manage a successful art business, and he shares his expertise with us. Business-strategy coach Betsy Ehrenberg urges artists to formulate clear and targeted messages when marketing their work. And on the subject of collecting, we examined two very different facets: James Kitchen explored the benefits that young people can derive from early exposure to curation and collecting, while Maura Kehoe Collins got down to the nitty gritty, sharing her expertise on such practical matters as documentation, inventory, and reframing.
To learn more about the business of art, check out The Thriving Artist Podcast on our website, Stitcher, or iTunes. And to help us reach a wider audience, please rate and review each episode after listening.
A True Partnership Between Artist and Gallerist
A gallery business is a business. That may sound obvious, but according to art dealer Jack Morris, many artists overlook this basic fact: “[They] are so focused on being recognized and getting ahead in their careers that they don’t ask [business questions].” A member of CHF’s Advisory Board and the official gallerist for the Clark Hulings Estate, Jack has been trading art for almost 55 years, so he’s pretty much seen it all. In a recent interview with CHF, he graciously shared some of his insights—and several amusing anecdotes—about life as a gallerist and auctioneer.
Read Jack’s full Q&A here.
Making the Sale: The Magic of Art
Great art connects people, even across thousands of miles. Should you need further proof that we inhabit a small, small world, look no further than the story of how CHF Personal Project Manager Lucia Fanjul ended up acquiring a piece created by Accelerator Fellow Gonzalo Fuenmayor (image below). It’s no exaggeration to say that she found magic, nostalgia, and a little bit of herself in Gonzalo’s border-defying artwork.
Read more about this fate-riddled encounter here.
How Not to Drive Off a Cliff
Technology has dramatically sped up the way we live and work—and that’s just as true for artists as it is for everyone else. In her March Director’s View, Elizabeth Hulings urges artists to pause from time to time, to reflect on where they’ve been and where they’re headed.
Every entrepreneur needs a strategy, but that strategy must continually evolve if it is to be useful. Artists should not find this process daunting, she argues. Adapting and inventing creative solutions are their stock in trade. “This crowd naturally reaches for and exploits new things,” she writes. “When the time comes to implement new approaches, they have a natural advantage.”
Read Elizabeth’s column here.
Spotlight On… Blake Conroy, Laura Petrovich-Cheney, Bethany Taylor, and Holly Van Hart
CHF Fellow Blake Conroy explores the fragility of our natural environment in his solo show Abstract Nature. His laser-cut works will be on display at the Haas Gallery of Art in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, through May 3rd.
On the west coast, Stanford University is hosting Alive with Possibilities, a solo show by CHF Fellow Holly Van Hart that runs through August 20th. Van Hart’s oil paintings—which speak to the human potential for creativity—resonate strongly in the exhibition’s Silicon Valley setting.
Congratulations to two of our Fellows on their recent awards. Late last year, Bethany Taylor and a few of her friends established Millwood Print Works—a Spokane, Washington–based nonprofit; now comes word that the organization has earned a grant from Spokane Arts to help fund the opening of fully functional production print studio, a valuable resource for area artists and the site of future art classes for the public. Also this month, Laura Petrovich-Cheney received a New Jersey State Council of the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship Award in the amount of $8,600, a prize that was awarded by an independent peer panel in recognition of her work’s artistic qualities.
Figurative Art Fans: Save the Date
Fine Art Connoisseur magazine recently announced that it will host the first Figurative Art Convention & Expo (FACE) at the Biltmore Hotel in Miami, from November 8 – 11, 2017. FACE will offer hands-on demonstrations by master artists, as well as spirited talks by and discussions among artists and experts. Publisher Eric Rhoads and Editor-in-Chief Peter Trippi have already announced the participation of several of America’s leading figurative artists, including Juliette Aristides, Steven Assael, John Coleman, Jacob Collins, Max Ginsburg, Daniel Graves, David Leffel, Jeremy Lipking, Sherrie McGraw, Graydon Parrish, Cesar Santos, and Jordan Sokol. To register or obtain additional information, visit figurativeartconvention.com.
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