"Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears."
--Les Brown
A local business recently asked me to hang my art at their office. I was so excited and thrilled that I was approached and recognized for my artwork out of the blue. This feeling of euphoria was slowly replaced by a feeling of "oh no, what do I next". I do not have a lot of experience with art installs other than when I was a sophomore in high school, so I was feeling a little overwhelmed and admittedly a little scared.
But, my excitement prevailed, and I called the interested business back to get more information. Beforehand, I looked online to see what questions I should ask. Here were my main questions:
1. Will there be a monthly fee to hang my work?
Because I am a new artist, I honestly did not want to invest a lot of money upfrontif I was unsure how many sales I would get from this venture.
2. Will there be a consignment percentage taken from any sale from a portrait shown at the office?
Once again, being new to the scene, I do not want to mark up my prices to offset any consignment fees, especially because I do not have a firm grasp on my demand.
3. When would you like the art install to occur?
This question was driven by the nature of what I produce-- custom pet portraits, which means I do not have a lot of inventory because pet owners pay me to create portraits for them. I knew I needed time to produce more portraits, so I was hoping to get a month to complete three portraits (thanks to my mother-in-law who volunteered her portrait for the install, 1 down, 3 to go). A month for three portraits sounds like a lot of time, but if you have a day job or jobs you need extra time.
4. What do you need from me to get this confirmed?
I asked this because I was unsure what information they needed from me. For this business, they wanted a proposal. I asked for my contact's email address and went to work researching how to write a proposal for an art install.
I listed below the elements I included in my proposal. You may need more or less depending on who you are working with, the type of business, and their objective for showing your work. I think it will be something you need to feel out for yourself. Businessess are made of people, so be sure to get a sense of the business from the person you are in contact with. In my case, this business wanted art on their walls to improve decor and support a local artist. To me, this seemed like a really genuine and altruistic situation that I could not pass up.
Contact Information: Self explanatory
Artist Statement: My artisit statement for this proposal was brief because this business wanted a very focused genre-- pet portraiture. I had sentence about pet portraiture, my family, my origins, and done.
Start date: Date you would like to install the art.
End date: Date you would like to take your art back. For this one, I added an option to renew every 6 months if both parties agreed, and I also added an as needed portrait swap if I made a sale (or if my mother-in-law wanted her pet portrait back).
Description: Here, I basically detailed what I was going to provide for them: subject, title, size, medium, material, type of frame.
Arrangement: I outlined how the portraits would be hung in the space.
Installation method: I detailed the materials I would use to hang the portrait-- nail and picture hanger.
Copyright statement: Basically, I stated that my images were mine and could not be used without my permission or credit given.
Liability statement: Essentially, those in possession of the artwork are reponsible. This statement is in here mainly to protect my inventory and ultimately me.