Post by Charles E HardwidgeBut Mike's stuff has not gotten any sales. Lots' of favorable comments...
no buyers.
He also has his stuff at another gallery in town (friends of ours)
and maybe once a year he'll actually get one decent sale...
but it's typically someone from out of town.
The people in my city may just plain be too conservative for nudity...
no matter how subtle or tasteful...
but there must be buyers out there somewhere
I'm scratching for something positive to say.
Okay, I can see there's a theme he's trying to develop and people are
obviously willing to help out. That's a good start but I'll suggest both the
photos and marketing can be better executed.
I see a use of geometry and silhouette in his work. I'd want to look at
something more intricate that flows. At the moment it's just to dramatic and
unbalanced which makes the images look damaged and ugly. The other thing is
the girls can look like blobs of dough or they're wilting.
Lacking an easily found and well branded online gallery and accompanying
narrative makes it kinda hard before we get going. Then there's questions
about how images are presented, the target market, and sealing the deal or
generating premium commissioned work.
There's a whole bunch of issues that go with videos. Are you talking about
the work, discussing the work, teaching, or trying to craft some sort of
teaser trailer or standalone experience? How do you grab someone's attention
and hold it? What about the pacing and music? Are you going for something
intellectual or more seductive? Do you want to make an impact or touch
someone's heart?
OK thanks for the reply here.
Well the stuff on the video is Mike's older stuff...
as I mentioned it was all done by his cousin and Mike really did not
have any input...I think his cousin was simply looking for something to
do with his spare time.
Anyway Mike is now doing photo-montages and he's getting a lot of
positive comments.
My fiancé suggested to him that his prices are more than the market will
bear...so on this last go around he's made some smaller images...
his current exhibit consists of approx 11" X 14" with a price of $400
(framed of course)
Since he's at least got a name locally, he has been getting $800 and up
for his larger pieces...but of course at that price...not too many sales.
Recently the Gallery Grand did a fund raiser and we were pleased that 14
pieces of art sold that evening .
After the show we saw that all sales were of artwork framed well and
ready to go....and all the sales were of art $500 or less...
so we told Mike to keep it all under $500.
Mike, as is the case of most artists does not have good marketing
skills... but my fiancé has a sales background...we we are leaving the
talking to her.
Anyway...we figure other art markets such as Chicago, NY and Los Angeles
may very well be worht looking into.