Ken, if you were training for a race, you would be the guy running your tail off on Friday night during a snow storm. You clearly “want it” bad enough!

Kathy P. Your comment is one of the more insightful comments I have read out of almost any post on this site. You clearly see the big forces at work here. Your comment about the artist from elsewhere is right on the money in my experience and is talked about exclusively in the book: “How To Become a Famous Artist and Still Paint Pictures” by Joe Innis.

I always remember, people get the art they deserve.
Another point is ,there are 300 plus million people in the
population, this means we all have lots of potential buyers in the mix.

Alyson, the short answer is yes. I think it is imperative to be directing the conversation to a sale. This past weekend, kicked off my 2015 schedule. I sold a piece to someone who first saw it in May 2014 and sold the same piece in a different size that I had at home to another couple who looked at the one I had on display earlier that same weekend.

As to repeat customers? Again, yes. Sold a piece this past weekend to another customer who now has 4 pieces of mine.

Again, at an art festival, this is high paced and not for every artist. A show that has 200 booths is just like a mall with 200 stores. If you cannot sell it then, most likely you won’t. I key in on the emotion that someone gushes because that emotion can gush on to others. It becomes infectious! I believe that once a customer gives you permission to sell to them, your mouth needs to be moving towards a sale.

True story. I am an introvert. I love working alone and being away from a crowd. At the end of a show, I am emotionally, mentally, and physically drained. I had to learn how to act like an extrovert! So, you can just imagine what I say to a fellow artist who tells me, they are an introvert 🙂

Patricia, I think this is a variation on what I call “Local Artist Syndrome”. Most people just don’t take local artists, authors, or musicians as seriously as they would if you were from somewhere else. Their attitude toward locals is kinda like the Church Lady: “Oh, isn’t that just special”, but there’s a limit (a very low one) to the value they see in your work. So they’re happy to drop a few bucks on something you donate to a local cause, because they want to help the cause. But they just can’t see how your work is worth much more than that, because, after all, you’re only a a local artist. Once you get “famous” somewhere else – the farther away the better – THEN they’ll want your work – and probably won’t be able to afford it.

I also think there are a lot of people who are genuinely fascinated by artists and creative people because they themselves can’t draw the proverbial straight line with a ruler. So they go to openings, gush and carry on about the wonderful work, but they just don’t see art as something that has any real value, like cars and furniture and such. To them, art is something people do for fun or amusement, and therefore we shouldn’t expect to be paid for it. This is why, when they ask what we do, a common response is, “Yes, but what’s your REAL job?”

Hi Alyson,
I donate art to my pet charity, one that I’ve supported for 50+ years. Any other requests for my art are politely turned down.

See me on You Tube, see my shoe box art. The paintings will fit a suitcase.
I price them to be budget friendly.