Seven Grants for New England Artists

With Labor Day comes a reminder that artists too are laborers and the visual arts involves a great deal of hard work that is often underfunded. That being said, there are always interesting grant opportunities available. It sometimes takes some searching to find funding opportunities, but I have assembled a collection of six grants with deadlines coming up that are aimed at artists across New England. They are listed in order by deadline date. For more information on any of these grants, please follow the links provided or reach out to the respective grantmaking organization.

Vermont Arts Council
Artist Development Grants
Deadline: September 10, 2024

The Vermont Arts Council’s Artist Development Grant program is accepting applications through September 10, 2024. With maximum awards of $2,000 per artist, this program aims to aid individual artists with expenses related to things like professional development, professional services, and other costs. This year, flood relief is also an eligibility area. Details and full application can be found at www.vermontartscouncil.org.

Artadia
Boston Award
Deadline: September 15, 2024

Artadia is currently seeking applications for individual artist awards in a variety of cities including Boston. Awards are $15,000 and are unrestricted. This award is is open to contemporary artists who live and work within Bristol, Essex, Middlesex, Norfolk, Plymouth, and Suffolk Counties. Learn more and apply at www.artadia.org.

New England Foundation for the Arts
Public Art Learning Fund
Deadline: September 16, 2024

The New England Foundation for the Arts is providing grants of $500 - $3,000 to support professional development for artists seeking to improve their public art practices. Applications are due by September 16 and funding can be used for professional development in 2025. Full details can be found at www.nefa.org.

The Awesome Foundation
September grant
Deadline: September 18, 2024

The Awesome Foundation awards $1,000 grants monthly to a broad range of projects. Applications are due by the third Wednesday of the month, or by the time the 100th application comes in, whichever comes first. There are several chapters of this funder in New England including serving Rockport and Georgetown, Massachusetts, as well as individual chapters for Connecticut and Rhode Island. Full details can be found at www.awesomefoundation.org.

Connecticut Office of the Arts
Artist Fellowship Program
Deadline: September 20, 2024

The Connecticut Office of the Arts is seeking applicants for its Artist Fellowship Program through September 20, 2024. Grants in three categories will be awarded. Emerging Recognition Grants of $1,000, Artist Fellowship Grants of $3,000, and Artistic Excellence Grants of $5,000. Full details and application can be found at portal.ct.gov.

Monadnock Arts Alive
Mini Grants
Deadline: September 22, 2024

Artists in the Monadnock region of New Hampshire are eligible to apply for mini grant funding from Arts Alive through September 22, 2024. These small grants of $250 are designed to support emerging artists as well as those experiencing financial hardship. Full details and application can be found at www.monadnockartslive.org.

Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation
Artist’s Resource Trust Fund for Individuals
Deadline: October 15, 2024

Grants ranging from $1,000 - $10,000 are available to artists throughout New England and parts of New York from the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation’s ART Fund. Monies from this grant can be used toward a wide variety of expenses and are intended to support mid-career artists who also have demonstrated financial need. Full details are available at www.berkshiretaconic.org.

Header image: Michael Burrows via pexels.com

How to Incorporate Art Into Your Home via Redfin

Thank you to national real estate brokerage firm Redfin for featuring a quote from me in a new piece on their blog detailing professional advice about how homeowners can incorporate fine art into their spaces. Artists and art gallery professionals from across the country contributed to this listing of helpful pointers.

My feedback:

The key to getting the most out of art in your home is to acquire work that you’re passionate about. Whether you buy work to support a friend who is an artist or find items by artists you admire in an auction or consignment setting, collecting works you love is the best investment you can make. And don’t be intimidated because industry professionals like gallerists, auctioneers, and independent advisors can help you out along the way, too!

Read the full article and gain plenty of new ideas for adding art to your home by clicking here. Thanks once more to Redfin!

Sign Up to Receive My Newsletter

As 2019 comes to a close, I am planning to send a note to my email subscribers with details of some of my upcoming events. I hope you’ll consider joining my mailing list so I can share talks, courses, and other activities with you. I typically send between four and six emails annually and I will never share my mailing list with third parties. Fill out the form below to join my list and receive my newsletters.

You can also join me on social media or send me a note by clicking the icons below:

Thank you for taking an interest in my work. I look forward to sharing exciting projects with you via my newsletter and my social media channels!

Sincerely,
Michael

What Has Your Gallery Done For You Lately?

One of the questions I hear most frequently from artists is “how do I get my work  into a commercial gallery?” For most artists who operate primarily within a local and regional marketplace, this is a complicated question. Even in a culturally rich region such as the Northeast, the ratio of commercial galleries and art dealers to artists is deeply uneven with artists outnumbering venues enormously. Although many artists state their interest in breaking into the commercial gallery market, I rarely receive questions about what comes next. Namely, how to maintain a relationship with a gallery and examine its worth to an artist’s practice and business.

Because artists are so interested in being represented professionally, and because these resources are so scarce, artists tend to accept just about anything from their local gallerist. Commercial galleries are for profit businesses in which a gallerist makes their living representing the work of a select “stable” of artists. Particularly in these venues, certainly more so than non-profit arts collaborative, associations, or other membership-based organizations, commercial gallerists have a special responsibility to serve the artists they represent in a variety of areas.

In this post I will examine a few key areas where artists should be particularly critical of their gallery’s performance.

Reputation

Your gallery should have a good reputation. While its not always easy to discern a gallery’s standing in the community, it is simple to explore how a gallery interacts with other organizations, artists, and with the broader public. You can assess a gallery’s reputation by asking artists, collectors, and other galleries who have worked with them who they are and what they’re about. If a gallery has a reputation for being slow to pay their artists, or unethical, or disorganized, there may be some truth behind it. Ultimately, the gallery’s reputation will also become your reputation if you align your brand with theirs.

Mentorship
Your gallery should provide mentorship about your work. The gallerist should encourage your best work and discourage your weak material. How can a gallerist do this? A quality gallery professional will have the education, experience, and connoisseurship necessary to help you improve your work. For this reason its important to truly examine the qualifications of dealer or gallerist you’ll be working with when considering any gallery. Whether you like it or not, your gallerist should take a critical view of your work and thereby help you to grow, evolve, and improve both as an artist and as an art businessperson.

Marketing

Your gallery should be marketing your work specifically in addition to promotions for shows in which your work is included, or for the gallery itself. A good gallery relationship should not only include space on the wall but also an increased knowledge of your work in the marketplace. If your gallery has a poor website, a small following on social media, a weak mailing list, or rarely mentions your work publicly then it may be time to rethink the relationship. The gallery should be sharing your work with their audience, and you should tell your followers about your relationship with them.

Sales

Your gallery should be selling your work. And they should aid you in holding the line on your prices. A quality gallerist will help their artists find a price point for their work that validates the effort and materials involved but also reflects the realities of the marketplace. Again, a good gallerist should have the experience necessary to this task. They should be able to help artists set a reasonable price for their work and maintain it. As an artist, you too should be aware of the marketplace for work like yours in your area and be honest about its salability.

Collectors

Your gallery should connect your work with collectors of all varieties, not only frequent collectors (who are few and far between at the regional level), but also with first time art buyers and other customers who are seeking simply to buy work for their home or office. A few top tier regional galleries will be able to place work in permanent collections within corporate or institutional settings, but these opportunities are rare and the competition is fierce.

Networking

Your gallery should provide opportunities for you to meet their audience at events as well as through studio visits or other means. There should also be opportunities to connect with your fellow artists and members of your local art community. A professional gallery should be connected to the key individuals in the arts nearby, as well as have a broad array of fans and followers who regularly attend their openings, programs, and other events.

In addition to these topics, there are probably too many other considerations to mention in this short post, but there are a few key issues to consider. The first is that there are no strict qualifications for owning and operating a commercial art gallery and the talent pool in smaller commercial galleries is quite variable. If a gallerist has no educational background in the visual arts, few connections within the art community, or seems to own a gallery mostly for their own enjoyment, a question might be raised about their suitability to handle your work professionally and effectively.

Another issue is that often, smaller galleries focus on a few key artists at the expense of their broader stable. If your work is never on view and it’s hard to get your gallerist’s attention, you should examine the real value of the relationship honestly. It is also important to remember that you must always be assessing the quality of your gallery, their services, and their effectiveness. If things aren’t going well, you should have a conversation with your gallery professional. Communication is key to developing healthy and mutually beneficial relationships.

With all of the above considerations in mind, it is also important to remember that the pressures on small local and regional commercial galleries have never been greater. Between skyrocketing rents, and the many costs involved in operating a brick and mortar business of any kind, the profit margins can be razor thin or non-existent. Considering your gallery’s position will help you to put yourself in their shoes.

Ultimately, no small gallery can completely shape the market for an artist’s work and it is extremely important that artists take responsibility for their own professionalism and maintain their own art business vigilantly. Doing this will give you the wherewithal to thrive in the market even in spite of the sometimes precarious position of small local and regional galleries.

New Ways to Connect with Michael Rose Fine Art

I’m excited to share a few new ways you can connect with me if you would like to learn more about my newest classes and workshops as well as learn more about appraisals and advising.

I recently joined Fiverr, where I will be offering select writing and editing services as well as digital portfolio reviews. I realize that many artists feel intimidated at the prospect of engaging with a consultant, and through low-priced single project gigs on Fiverr, I hope I can make these services more affordable and more widely available.

I also created a professional Facebook business page to accompany this website as a place to follow what projects I am working on and learn more about my services. I will also be sharing art news and information on my new professional Twitter @michaelroseart.

Additionally, I have joined Pinterest and will be adding to art-related boards. Follow me on this platform for some fun and casual inspiration.

And finally, you can always add me on my Instagram, or join my email list to receive my quarterly e-newsletter update.

Thank you for following along!
Michael

How An Art Exhibition Juror Thinks

Many artists ask me what jurors look for when selecting work for juried exhibitions. This is a tough question to answer, given that every juror and every show is unique. Recently, Dr. Elliot Bostwick Davis, Chair of the American Wing at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, made her selections for our National Open Juried Exhibition: America, Now at the Providence Art Club. Her choices were formed partially by the theme of the show but also by her extensive and diverse academic and curatorial background. This week, I juried entries for another exhibition at the Providence Art Club, a show of work by members from Boston's St. Botolph Club coming this August. Like Dr. Davis, I was informed by my education and professional background but found choosing pieces for this exhibition to be a challenge. There were many options that I thought would be a great fit, but I had to work to shape a select group of diverse objects that would represent the talents of the St. Botolph Club community and also be of interest to members of the Providence Art Club. Later this summer, I will be the Juror for the Bristol Art Museum's Annual Members' Exhibition. So I thought it might be beneficial for me to share some of what goes into a juror's decision-making process and how artists can best go about applying to a juried exhibition.

The Call

First and foremost, no matter the show, you must closely and carefully read the exhibition's call for entry. The typical call for entry (or call for art) is a page or so long and contains all the information you should need when deciding what, or whether, to submit. Read the call and be honest with yourself about the relevance of your work to the request being put out by a gallery or institution. If you are uncertain if your work is a good fit to start with, you can reach out to the organization making the call to get your initial questions answered.

Presentation

Good presentation counts. Because most exhibitions are now juried virtually, jurors rely on digital images to make their decisions. Make sure you are submitting a high quality photograph that accurately represents your work. Blurry or otherwise poorly presented images that do not show the piece well will not benefit your application and will almost certainly hurt your chances. Most applications state the resolution and size required for digital images. Follow the guidelines given by the organization or entry platform. And if you need assistance, seek out a professional photographer. If you are submitting to a show where selections are made in person, your work should be professionally prepared and in good condition. Proper presentation may seem like common sense, but it is not to be overlooked.
 

Quality

After assessing presentation, the juror will likely move on to gauging the qualities inherent in each piece. This factors in formal aspects such as line, composition, color, et cetera, but also the conceptual qualities that might be obvious upon first glance. For this reason, submitting your most visually striking work can be helpful in catching the juror's eye. Asking peers and colleagues to critique the work you are considering for submission is a great way to get objective analysis, and to determine which artworks from your portfolio may be the most successful. Some of the qualities found in works of art are relatively objective, but the way a juror interprets them can obviously be very subjective, and influenced by individual taste.
 

Taste

Like I said earlier, every juror is unique. And each juror's selections are bound to be impacted by her or his personal background, education, and interests. The individual taste of a juror will naturally factor into their selections. This is difficult to account for when applying to an exhibition, but it can be helpful to research the juror and learn more about their background or shows they have previously juried or curated in order to determine if they have any obvious interests or biases. This information is often readily available in the juror's professional biography and may even be included in the call for entry. If the juror has a niche area of expertise or interest, they may be less inclined to choose works that fall outside their scope. But if they have a broad range of experience, it may be hard to determine what they will be most interested in.
 

Theme

If the exhibition you are submitting your work to has a theme, stick to it. This point is another seemingly obvious one, but hewing close to the theme can often play to your favor. This is not to say that your work should blatantly or explicitly shout the theme the show is based on, but it should at the very least contain a nod to the theme or express that you understand what the show is supposed to be about. Some themes are more explicit than others but, again, using the exhibition's call for entry for guidance can be helpful in ensuring your work matches the criteria that are being used to shape the tone and content of the show.
 

The Exhibition

It is important to remember that all the work selected has to hang together. As jurors review all the submissions for a particular show they are not only considering the qualities of individual works, but are also imagining how the pieces they choose can work together to create an exhibition that is cohesive. Cohesion does not necessarily mean that all the works must "match", per se, but it does suggest a level of aesthetic or conceptual harmony that creates a thread tying all the work together. Following the theme or, in lieu of a theme, submitting your most current and compelling work are both great ways to show that your work will contribute to a strong exhibition. And again, taking a look at shows previously curated by the juror can be helpful.
 

Takeaways

Ultimately, much of the judgement involved in jurying an exhibition is subjective and there are many potential outcomes. That being said, even a show with thousands of entries is not a "lottery" per se, as even a large exhibition is not shaped by chance. It is designed by a juror or jurors who have all the aforementioned details in mind and are utilizing them to make educated decisions about what works of art will create the most compelling exhibition.

Remember, if your work is not accepted to a particular show, it is not a comment on your worth as an artist. The final selections are always informed by all the factors I have outlined here, and then some. Through carefully reading the call, though, and using appropriate work presented well you will increase your chances of being accepted and hopefully snag a spot on the gallery walls.