Art League Rhode Island Annual Meeting
Featured Speakers: Michael Rose and Anastasia Azure
Wednesday, June 19, 4:30pm - 7:30pm
at the Providence Art Club

Admission: This program is for Art League Rhode Island Members.

I am pleased to be one of the featured speakers at the Art League Rhode Island’s Annual Meeting 2019. I will be giving a brief talk on the state of the local and regional art market for members of one of the premier visual arts organizations in the State of Rhode Island. I thank the Art League for inviting me to share my expertise with their artists, who comprise a large segment of artists working in the Southern New England marketplace.

Writing an Artist’s Bio with Michael Rose
at Rhode Island School of Design Continuing Education
Thursday, June 27, 6:30pm - 9:30pm
at the Rhode Island School of Design

Tuition: $85, To learn more and to register, visit RISD CE’s site.

I am grateful to The Rhode Island School of Design for inviting me back to teach another writing course in their Continuing Education Department. This class will focus on writing an artist’s bio that effective tells a story.

Course description from the RISD Catalogue: Learn how to share your personal story as an artist in a compelling and accessible way. Through the use of the third-person biographical essay, you'll discover how to develop your backstory to paint a more complete picture of yourself as an artist and as a person, and how to give readers a clear insight into your personal narrative and the inspiration, motivation and nature of your work. By the end of the workshop, you will have developed strategies of approach and a rough outline to write your bio for use in a variety of applications including web and print.

Art Lovers Book Club
Special Presentation on Sebastian Smee’s The Art of Rivalry
with Guest Speaker Michael Rose
Saturday, June 29, 2:00pm - 4:00pm
at the Attleboro Arts Museum

Admission: This program is free and open to the public. Reservations are requested but not required. To reserve call 508-222-2644 x10 or visit the Museum’s website.

I thank the Attleboro Arts Museum for inviting me to speak to their Art Lovers Book Club in June. The Attleboro Arts Museum’s Art Lovers Book Club launched in January 2010. A dynamic Museum member proposed this artful Book Club idea and the program was launched on a trial basis. After the success of the first meeting it was clear that the Book Club should live on. The Art Lovers Book Club meets in the Museum’s Ottmar Gallery from 2 – 4pm. This talk on June 29 will focus on Sebastian Smee’s book The Art of Rivalry, which features four friendships, betrayals and breakthroughs in modern art – Manet and Degas, Picasso and Matisse, Pollock and de Kooning, Freud and Bacon.

Work by Abba Cudney, which will be on view at BankRI during July’s Gallery Night.

Gallery Night Providence July
Celebrity Guide: Michael Rose
Thursday, July 18, 5:30pm - 7:30pm
at galleries throughout Providence, Rhode Island

Admission: This program is free and open to the public. See the Gallery Night website for more information about scheduling, parking, and other logistics.

I am thrilled to be the Celebrity Guide for Gallery Night Providence’s July installment. This free monthly program gives visitors access to galleries and museums throughout the city. My tour will begin at 5:30pm at Regency Plaza Apartments where free event parking is available. This tour will feature four stops including BankRI’s Exhibition of work by my friend and colleague at the Providence Art Club, the talented painter and printmaker Abba Cudney.

And coming this fall…
Plymouth Center for The Arts
50th Annual Juried Art Exhibition
Three Jurors including Michael Rose
Gala Reception: Saturday, September 21

In addition to these other programs, I am also excited that I have been invited to serve on a panel of three jurors selecting work for the Fiftieth Annual Juried Art Exhibition at the Plymouth Center for The Arts in Plymouth, Massachusetts. More information on this exhibition will be available soon.

For more information about any of these programs, please reach out to me. I am happy to chat more about collaboration ideas, scheduling availability, and pricing. I am always interested in learning about new venues and partnerships!

- Michael

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.

Upcoming Programs Summer 2019

How An Art Exhibition Juror Thinks