March 2011 South Central Indiana ArtsWORK Meeting Minutes

South Central ArtsWORK Indiana Satellite Group Meeting
McCloskey Conference Room, Bloomington City Hall

Presenter: Kip May, Owner of May Photography in Bloomington

Attending: William P., Allan Y., Eric R., Jim W., Sean C., RJ T., Karen H., Maggie H., & Kathy M. Coordinator: Nadine Pinede; Partner Representative: Jane Harlan-Simmons, Indiana Institute on Disability and Community (recording)

Introductions

Attendees introduced themselves and answered the question "What is your greatest marketing challenge?" New participants included poet Eric R., quilt artist, RJ T., and musician Sean C.

Updates

We have speakers scheduled for our monthly meetings through September. All are on the fourth Tuesday at 5:30 pm. The details can be found on our Web site. Five of our members attended the free arts careers symposium at the Indiana University School of Fine Arts on February 25th. Allan provided a brief summary of the sessions. Nadine mentioned two websites recommended by Alice and Paul Sharp, who could not attend the meeting: behance.net (for online portfolios) and cargocollective.com (for "out of the box" individual artist websites).

Group Member Announcements

William described the work he has entered for the SHIFT competition and his experience with the online application process. This is an annual international juried exhibition by artists with disabilities. It was an extensive undertaking and intimidating at first. However the procedure was made "easy" by the sponsors who take account of the needs of artists with disabilities. He learned a lot about photographing his 3-D work as he prepared the required images.

Allan mentioned that April 9 is the deadline for the Wabash Valley Juried Exhibition sponsored by the Swope Art Museum in Terre Haute.Maggie brought a selection of her matted photographs to share with the group. Jim and Sean have made a short video about Sean’s music project. They will show it to the group at the April meeting.

Jane announced a free workshop sponsored by the Columbus Area Arts Council. >Speaker Ethan Crough is scheduled to talk about his life as an actor with dwarfism on March 24th at the Stillframes Gallery in Columbus.

Presentation

Kip May of Kip May Photography spoke on the topic of Marketing Tips for the Starving Artist. Kip has generously made a digital copy of his handout available to us. It is appended to these minutes. See the handout for more details on the points below. Kip says marketing is not easy but you can do it if you think of it as a table that has several legs:

• You need to have a web presence. BloomingtonOnline.net has free listings and does low cost websites. Luke Russell offers simple web pages at A SinglePage.com. After initial reluctance Kip has found Facebook is a great way to market his workshops.
• Get out and network in person. Bloomington now has a visual artist guild: VAGUE. There is a meeting on March 29th at the Pictura Gallery.
• Display your work in public places. Kip provides his framed photography to doctor’s offices and other locations where he can leave his business cards.
• Keep a database of your clients. Capture contact information. Sometimes it’s effective to repeat a mailing after an interval. Handwritten thank you notes are important. Answer your phone.
• Be ethical. Make sure you deliver the product you promise. He has not found that traditional advertising (print, billboard, etc.) brings results. Being community minded is good business. Kip contributes his work to many silent auctions benefiting charitable causes. Support other artists by attending their openings. The meeting was adjourned at approximately 7:00 pm.

Click here to download additional information:
Allan Yates: Notes from Making Art Work: 2011 Symposium on Careers in the Arts held on 2/25/2011
Kip May: Handout: Marketing Tips for the Starving Artists