You walk through the gallery door, not sure what to expect…

If this is a commercial gallery then the chances are that this is where you now  leave the creations that you have slaved over so lovingly during the preceding months, now to be hung by the Gallery staff. The presentation of your artistic genius is in their hands.

If this is a community or self hosted exhibition then its now all up to you and you have a very short time to get everything up on the walls ready to stun your visitors with your all round clever-clogness. The white cube of  space echoes as you walk around inside. Blank. Empty and possibly a bit intimidating.

Questions race through your mind.

• “Do I  have enough artwork to fill this vast void?”
  • Yes of course you do! You measured the space before you started preparing for the exhibition. (You did, didn’t you? )
• “Will it look any good?”
  • Yes it will. Here’s a gallery secret. Those bright white halogen track lights on the ceiling make just about everything look a million dollars.
• “Is my art a load of rubbish and should I leave now?”
  • It’s too late. You’ve sent out all the invitations and the opening night party is tomorrow. Don’t worry. You are brilliant (*insert addition pep talk phrase of your own choice here).
• “Where is the ladder?”
  • Probably in the store room.

Gallery Hanging Systems

Most galleries that host artist run exhibitions have some kind of hanging system. Ideally it will be the adjustable kind with clear nylon hangers that drop from the ceiling and down the wall, with little metal adjustable hooks. Its best to find out though way before the time of your exhibition and have all your artworks prepared ready for hanging.

Tip!

I like to be prepared for the unexpected, so I carry a little red tool box containing all manner of hanging related bits and bobs. Mine has within it spare wire and string, screws, wall hooks, nails, wire, gaffa tape, removable double sided sticky pads, blu-tak, an assortment of small tools including a hammer, screwdrivers and my trusty bradall tool for making small holes. I’ve had to use it at just about every exhibition I’ve ever hung. I suggest you pack your own ‘survival kit’ similarly.

Bump In

Okay, time to bump in (not literally; this is the show-speak term for setting up your exhibition. Later you will ‘bump out’).

The first thing to do is to unload the car and stack all the artworks around the walls on the floor.  Don’t hang them yet and don’t be too fussy. Just drop them around the room in semi-organised thematic groups so you can see them all, placing any large feature pieces in the rough vicinity of where they might eventually hang.The thematic groups can be whatever you want them to be. Maybe it’s colour, maybe it’s subject matter. Maybe there’s a narrative story which guides the hanging.  It could be just whatever looks good together. Decide early on and your job will be easier.

Stand in the middle of the room and look around. Do all the artworks ‘work’ together? You will have to use some imagination as all the artworks are currently sitting on the floor.

Start sorting and moving the artworks around the walls (on the floor – don’t hang yet). Usually I find that at this stage that the artworks that don’t fit with each other stand out, and ‘call me’ to move them. The really good feature pieces that I want everyone to see get prime position, and I organised the others around them.

Got them sorted into groups? Good. Look at how all the groups work. You might have to swap entire groups around the room if they don’t play well together.

Steady as she goes

At this point it’s easy to get over excited and flustered, and in your mad rush to get everything sorted out, pick up an artwork and accidently bash it against a wall or another artwork. Once the bubble wrap is off, your artworks will suddenly seem to have a magnetic attraction to each other so take it easy. You don’t want be doing last minute restoration of scratches, dings and bumps right now.

Get an assistant to help you

Got all your artworks organised into groups? Good.

Now it’s time to hang your exhibition. It always good to have someone to assist if at all possible, with one person going up the ladder, and another to pass up artworks and then stand back and tell you if the arrangement on the wall is even and pleasing to the eye.

Hunting high and low

I prefer to hang all artworks at eye level (museum style) but that is not always possible. I suggest trying to hang at least one row directly at eye level and then arranging all the others above an below those.

This is the point at which madness can set in

It’s easy at this point to become obsessive about getting everything ‘straight’. Do not fall into this trap. Leave straightening till later as inevitably things will move. Only engage in obsessive straightening once all  the artworks are hanging in their final positions. Use blu-tak, sticky pads or cork pads to make sure artworks stay in place if required.

Lighting

If possible head up your step ladder to adjust the position of the lights for optimum loveliness. There’s generally only a limited number of spotlights available so you might have to make some strategic decisions to highlight key pieces,  with other artworks receiving just a general ambient light. Halogen lights can be hot. Be careful up there.

Price Cards

Okay, so the exhibition is hung, the lights are on and its looking like a million dollars.  Now is the time  to pop the little cards on the wall to indicate the catalogue number, title, medium and price. Don’t skimp. Make classy looking ones and hang them carefully so that they are easy to see and relate directly to their corresponding artwork.

Make yourself a nice cup of tea

You’ve spent all day loading, unloading, arranging, and running up and down ladders. You’re probably pretty tired by now. Put the kettle on, make a cup of tea and sit down quietly in the corner and admire what you’ve created. This exhibition has been months in the planning and execution, and now it’s finally here, in it’s rightful place. Enjoy it all to yourself for a while and don’t forget to get your camera out now and take a few pictures. The next time you see this exhibition it will be filled with people admiring your artworks, with you as the superstar centre of attention!

It’s a jungle out there and now its time to engage in guerrilla warfare and hand-to-hand combat in order to sell your art direct to the public. Don’t like the analogy? Think all this art sales stuff should be all comfortable and snuggely like a warm blanket? Yes of course it should, for your customer at least, but for you this is serious, this is YOUR art business. So camo up, lock and load, we’re going over the top!

These golden rules were honed on the front line, selling my art myself, direct to the public at my own exhibitions. To do it successfully you have to be audacious. Shrinking violets should apply elsewhere.

Like any form of combat training or martial art the golden rules I am about to tell you will take practice, practice and more practice, and you can only practice by actually doing it. Be relentless, eventually you will experience the sweet taste of victory. So here we go…

Golden Rule No. 1: Greet, Retreat and then LOOK BUSY

When anyone walks into your exhibition space and takes more than a passing interest in your art, say “hello”, and maybe even a “how are you today?”, but not in a desperate “look at my art and then buy it pleeeeassee” way. YOU are a successful artist and you are busy, so GREET, RETREAT and LOOK BUSY. You want your prospective customer to feel welcomed and comfortable to stick around a while. They won’t do that if you are oggling their every move. Find something important looking to do like tapping on the computer keyboard fulfilling other sales (pretend or otherwise) or talking quietly on the phone to important sounding clients (again real or fictional…your choice). Look busy even if you are not! People have a herd mentality when buying art. If they get the impression that there is a stampede of people out there buying your art then they will be subconsciously reassured and more likely to move from art looker to art buyer.

Golden Rule No. 2: Display your battle victories

People seem to be absolutely fascinated by any artwork that has one of those red dots on it indicating that the painting is now SOLD. They will stare at these dots even more than the artwork itself for some strange reason. Maybe it’s just the colour attracting the eye. Maybe it’s the special aura around an artwork which someone else has deemed to be worthy by stumping up their hard earned cash. Red dots provide a cosseted reassurance that the ‘herd’ has already approved of your wild gesticulations on canvas or paper and that you and your art are the real deal. Here’s what to do:

• In a very obvious location in your exhibition hang a board on which you will display your sales victories.
• Stick the artwork details card (containing the title, size, medium and price) of artworks already sold on the sales board. Make sure each card has a big fat red dot.
• If you can, do everything in your power to sell at least two or three of the artworks that are intended for your show before the show opens so you can confidently claim victories on your sales board to get things rolling.
• As soon as any sale is made at the show, stick that big enticing red dot and details card on the board.

Adding up the amount of money an exhibition has taken by checking out the dots is a sport for some. I’ve actually witnessed people walk straight up to my art sales board and do the sums even before they looked at my artworks! Maybe I should just create artworks from fat red dots instead.

Golden Rule No. 3: Watch for Circling Sharks

Like a detective on a stake out, undertake discrete surveillance of what your exhibition visitors are doing. Stay busy but just keep a discrete eye on what’s happening. You’re on the lookout for ‘prospective buyer behaviour’. Prospective buyers tend to act differently from other exhibition visitors. Like sharks circling a prospective food source they hover around your artworks for longer than usual, and then quickly move up close for a quick snappy nibble to examine the artworks and take mental note of prices. Rarely will they decide to devour an artwork straight away by proclaiming “I’ll buy it now!”

If you notice this kind of behaviour then it’s time to just casually wander over and engage Mr or Mrs Shark in pleasant conversation. Quietly introduce yourself, ask where they are from or note something interesting about the artwork. Some people will put their defences up straight away, but maintain your pleasant composure and if necessary back off and leave them to their own devices. Many people will respond well, especially if you approach the encounter as genuinely wanting to meet a new shark (Oh dear I’ve now moved from a Guerrilla warfare analogy to a Jacques Cousteau Extreme Shark Encounter…oh well, if it works go with it).

Golden Rule No. 4. LISTEN!

Ego driven, self absorbed artists read the following carefully. When you are selling your art do not go banging on to potential customers about the underlying deep philosophical meanings of your artworks, and how during the creation of your artwork your soul was tortured due to memories resurfacing of the premature and untimely death of your budgie in the claws of a rabid bird of prey which flew off with the aforementioned budgie and then electrocuted itself on power lines. Don’t do that. Save it for interviews with editors of undecipherable art magazines later.

Instead, bring the conversation round to what the prospective buyer likes about the artwork. Get them to tell you about it and LISTEN! Don’t impose your thoughts about the artwork on them. Facilitate their getting to know the artwork for themselves. Let them have a chance to identify with it. Even though it’s your artwork, what it means to you is not important. IT’S ALL ABOUT WHAT IT MEANS TO THEM! By all means answer their questions about any aspect of your work but make sure that you are leading them back to what they like about it. Help them to make the connection between this artwork and their own life.

Golden Rule No. 5: Lead the sale

It’s always amazing to me how many people really don’t know what they want. Most people (not all) will fluff around all day and ultimately make no decision to buy at all after wasting hours of your time if you don’t lead the sale. To lead the sale effectively you need some inside information about your prospective client. Since I’ve been using a war analogy I could start painting a mental picture of a dark interrogation room with a single light bulb swinging as extract the info we need, but since I have no wish to torture my clients I’ll leave that one alone.

Ask questions about where they’d like to hang your artwork; get them to describe the space. Guide them in visualising your artwork in their house by telling you where it will be situated. People LOVE to talk about themselves and their beautiful homes. Take an interest and a mental note of everything they are telling you. This is valuable information and it will help you guide the sale. If you can extract the information about what they like about your artwork and where it might eventually live in their home you have a powerful weapon in your art sales arsenal. Guide your potential client to zeroing in on just a couple of artworks based on what you are hearing, and how your artwork can fulfil THEIR needs. At all times just act as if this is a sale that is going ahead. Don’t fluff around saying ‘if’ and ‘maybe’ to a client. Be direct in your speech. More often than not there will be a point at which the client has a decision to make. To buy or not to buy, this painting or the other, or both.

When the time is right in the ebb and flow of things don’t be afraid to quickly reflect back to the client what they have said and how ‘this’ painting will fulfil their needs. For instance:

Client: “Oh I just can’t decide, both paintings are wonderful, but I’ve only got a small house and room for one”

You: “Well, you mentioned that the painting will be hanging over a blue lounge, so of the paintings that you like here I think this one would be absolutely beautiful in that spot, especially as it would echo that spectacular sea view from the opposite window.”

Client: (nodding and thinking): “Ah yes”

You: (in a matter of fact tone that infers this sale is going ahead): “So, would you like to take this painting home today?”

Important: NOW IT’S TIME TO SHUT UP. Do not say another word. If there is an awkward silence do not fill it. Rattling on any further will give the potential client room to wriggle out of making a decision right now. STAY QUIET. By asking the question and then staying silent they must make a decision.

At this point they will either:

COMMIT and indicate that they are genuinely interested in buying

SAY NO – people very rarely do this as it makes them feel awkward

DEFER and say “I’ll think about it and come back later” (which is a complete and utter lie designed to make them feel less awkward, but refreshingly just sometimes turns out to be true)

Okay, so we’re at the point of a client actually buying your artwork (or not as the case may be). Surely I can’t just leave you here like a bad soap opera cliff-hanger? Well yes, I can. This is turning into another long post so please subscribe to my feed and you’ll receive the next thrilling instalment as soon as I get in some more ranting time.

To be continued…

My very first solo exhibition was held in the most unlikely location of a hairdressers salon, albeit a very swish large and classy inner-city one, with fantastic clear walls ready for art and great lighting once all the free standing hairdressing mirrors were tucked away. It worked rather well event though people had to lean over sinks and hair-washing attachments to see some of the art. The hairdressers and their clients made for a faaaabulous night darrrrling. Just use a bit of imagination and I’m sure you can come up with some great places to host an art exhibition. Here are some suggestions to get you started:

Local Community or Council run Public Gallery

If you have public gallery in your area which shows local artists work it’s worth investigating a bit further here. They are usually well equipped with great lighting and hanging equipment. You might (if you are lucky) even have assistance from volunteers who will hang your exhibition for you.

When it comes to promotion the press is often interested in covering stories related to a community focused gallery.

A public gallery will often have its own mailing list of people interested in art exhibitions and they may be willing publicise your event. Be aware though that these places tend to be frequented by artists and art fans rather than art buyers. If your aim is to raise your profile as a serious artist as opposed to raising serious cash a public gallery might be the go for you.

Don’t expect to just walk in the door though and have your exhibition booking accepted then and there. Public galleries are often booked well in advance and their may be a fee. Also be prepared to join in with the gallery’s other activities to boost your profile and increase your chances of getting an exhibition accepted.

A Hotel or Resort Conference Facility

A hotel or resort can be a fantastic place to hold an art exhibition, especially the five star ones where people have high disposable incomes and like to look at and buy art. The more stars the place has the better! Just the very fact that your art hangs on the walls of these places actually infers some kind of value on it, after all, resort management would not subject their high flying clients eyes to anything less than the best would they?

There are certain challenges with these places though. A five star hotel charges a five star price for hire of their rooms as they are generally geared to dealing with big businesses who pay big money to hold glitzy conferences in an elegant location. Lighting may also be an issue as its generally geared more towards a cosy, relaxing and reassuringly expensive atmosphere suitable for listening to a high profile keynote speaker than highlighting your artworks on their walls. They do however have that certain sense of style, class and all round poshness that art buyers love.

How would you ever get your art in here?

Tip!

These places sometimes have quiet times of year when no one actually wants to book a conference or event but conversely they have a resort full of guests. Think about it; would you want to hold a conference at Christmas? No, you’ll be too busy racing around buying Christmas gifts, wrapping presents and planning the parties you’ll having. Therein lies the opportunity. A vast, empty conference room makes no money for the resort. “Hey Mr Resort Manager! How about you let me hold an art exhibition all through the holidays? It will look great, provide entertainment for your Christmas and New Year holidaying guests, and I’ll even cut you in on the profits!”. It’s a win-win for you and the resort. This works well here in Australia where people go on holidays during Christmas, but if you do a bit of digging I’m sure you’ll find that there is an equivalent quiet time for conferences in your area which leaves these vast but luxurious spaces open for your keen negotiations with resort management!

The basic principle here is that you are looking for a win-win, matching how you can win as an artist (get your paintings in there and sell them) with a win for the resort (get a cut of the profits at an otherwise quiet time of the year, provide entertainment for guests, do some social good etc).

Community Halls

If you look around you’ll probably find that there are council run or community run meeting spaces in your area. The local Church or community hall are often the haunt of local art groups holding their annual exhibitions. They are generally cheap, easy to book, able to accommodate lots and lots of people and usually have a hole in the wall which gives access to the kitchen for the serving of tea and biscuits (bonus!). The main drawback with these places is that they are generally furbished in a utilitarian way, have poor lighting and are not particularly designed for hanging art. This should not prevent you, creative wunderkind that you are, from transforming a dull space into something magical, however, a community hall is not generally associated with the kind of glitz, glamour and poshness that generally play host to the actual extracting of credit cards from wallets in return for fabulous, expensive and rare artworks from up and coming artists. People generally visit these places and expect a cup of tea, a slice of cake and a nice sit down. Aspiring art superstars might look elsewhere if profile building and money come into the equation somewhere for you, however for price and convenience these places are hard to beat.

Empty Shops

Is there any empty shop in your town high street or shopping centre. The shop is probably making no money for the owner of the property, so why not seek the owner out and make them an offer to cut them in on the profits of your exhibition? You may have to do a bit of tidying up to make the place suitable for your exhibition, but if you can do this cheaply then you could secure great location for a short time.

Restaurants

How many times has someone said to “hey, you know what, I’ve got a great idea, you should hang your art in my coffee shop / restaurant / cafe!”. You start to think about it. You look at the numbers of people going through the place with disposable incomes, sipping their skinny-decaf-chocco-latte-chinos with nothing to do but look at your art. Surely this is a fantastic opportunity, surely this is an art exhibition with a ready made audience, heck you don’t even have to invite anyone along to see your art because people pour through this place all day long! You think about saying YES! YES! YES!

Think again my oh-too-keen and ready to be fleeced friend! People go to eating establishments to eat. They go to coffee shops to drink coffee. They go to art galleries and real art exhibitions to buy art. They don’t go to coffee shops to by art. They don’t go to restaurants to buy art UNLESS the establishment in question actually has a reputation as a gallery and restaurant double combo!

Often, all that will happen is that your art becomes free decoration for the restaurant, and it will stay there on the wall, probably hanging hanging at a strange angle because not one of the staff thinks to straighten it until the price tags start to fall off. Oh how they mourn when you finally call it a day and take your paintings back, leaving a big empty painting-less space on their walls.

How to use a restaurant for an exhibition that works:
Rather than just hanging your art in there on a permanent basis consider instead booking out the restaurant for a special one night only exhibition. This works best in upmarket establishments, though if your art is gRoOoVvy, EdGy and cOOL a trendy coffee house with a clientele to match could also be the go . If you can guarantee the manager that a certain number of people will actually turn up then you should be able to strike a sweet deal. I’ve heard of charity fundraiser art events at cafes and restaurants (where you donate a portion of your sales) that do rather well in this kind of location.

Offices

Like high class eating establishments, high profile corporate offices would seem to offer an opportunity to put your art in front of people with money and influence, but are the rich pickings here?

Large corporate foyers of the kind found in sky-rise office buildings offer a fantastic opportunity for an exhibition, and I’ve seen art gallery businesses that actively show in theses spaces, indicating that there is business to be had here. You are going to have to do some research to get on the inside track and figure out who can say yes to your exhibition proposal.

Your own home

Do you have one of those homes which looks like it came straight out of Cool Abode Magazine? No? How about if you tidied up a bit, evicted the kids toys from the living room, kicked the dog out into the back yard, actually used that vacuum cleaner and arranged a few fresh flowers in a vase? Is it starting to appear more inviting, as if someone creative and successful lives here? If so then maybe you need to look no further than your own place as a venue for your art exhibition. I’ve known many artists who as owners of beautiful homes who have held successful art exhibitions. The more gallery like your home the better, and an investment in the kind of gallery spotlighting that makes just about any art look like its worth a million dollars would be a wise move. I’ve even known artists that open their house up on a permanent basis as an art gallery. Of course, if exhibition opening night is going to cause a bit of a traffic jam on your street you had better warn the neighbours first, lest you embarrassingly find yourself negotiating with angry locals rather than potential art collectors. There’s nothing that kills an exhibition quicker than the artist being led away in handcuffs for getting into a ruckus with the crazy guy next door.

…or someone else’s home

As an alternative to trashing your own place, you might be able persuade your very trendy designer home owning friends to host your art exhibition at their place. This can work really well if the hosts are huge fans of your work and own a few pieces already and are likely to swan around the assembled gathering extolling the virtues of your art to all those assembled.

…or a home that you rent just for a weekend

You could seriously impress your potential art buyers by holding your exhibition in a ritzy location such as a dazzling penthouse apartment or palatial riverside home by just renting one for a weekend and then inviting a select group of potential art buyers for upmarket wine and nibblies.

Here’s my challenge to you

• Go and book an exhibition space immediately after reading this entire article.

Even if you don’t have enough artworks right now to fill an exhibition you can create more in time for the exhibition if you give yourself a long enough time-frame (not too long so you procrastinate though). This might be just the motivation you need to climb out of that bottom shaped depression you’re wearing in sofa and get on with the job. There’s nothing like the pressure of setting the time and date of your exhibition to get you up and running to your easel!