On Ethics and Elephants

Elephant in the Room? What? Where? Oh, that Elephant

In the interest of full disclosure, I must point out that I never thought about marketing in terms of the ethics involved. When I think about marketing my books to an unsuspecting public, the thing that leaps to the front of my mind is the “ick factor.”

Writing and cartooning are recent additions to my creative work. I’ve been painting more years than I care to remember, and it’s been my “day job” for the last 25 years. Almost seven years ago, pandas knocked on the door, demanded entry, put their feet up on the coffee table, and insisted that I write stories, draw cartoons, and perpetrate blasphemous adaptations of Sargent and Whistler paintings, all starring pandas.

They were really most insistent.

Arrangement in Black, White, and Gray //Anne Belov //all rights reserved

Selling paintings is mostly, although not entirely, different than selling books.  I’d have to sell  hundreds, if not thousands of books to equal the sale of one decent painting. And so marketing raises it’s (often) not so lovely head.

A recent post by Jane Steen got me thinking about the ethics of self publishing in general and about marketing my work in particular. I am, to say the very least, a reluctant marketer. By following a number of blogs about both the art and the business side of writing, it led me to realize that I was going to have to make peace with marketing, like it or not.

My cartoons appeared on my blog, The Panda Chronicles for almost four years before I published The Panda Chronicles Book 1: Your Brain on Pandas. My method for getting the word out was intuitive and organic. When I started my blog, I finally dove in to Facebook, and sought out panda fans, to see if they thought my panda-centric humor was funny, or whether they would chase me through town with pitchforks and burning torches, tar and feathers at the ready. (They liked them! Huzzah!)

I shared my cartoons freely and my fan base grew. I got an unanticipated bonus by reaching out to people on an individual basis because fans became connections and some friendships (real ones) have grown as a result of this, with meetings and gatherings of panda fans in real life.

The panda Faithful at San Diego Zoo in 2013

To be honest, this is a rather time consuming way of selling books. But I am a glutton for connections, maybe because I spend so much of my day holed up in my studio painting and drawing. When I look at the alternatives: auto tweets, constant buy my book/services links, guest posts which are barely disguised infomercials, I realize that the ick-factor detector is a pretty good ethical guide.

I think we must continually ask ourselves how we respond to marketing appeals by others as we try to figure out how to sell our work. Everyone has different threshold levels of what is offensive or annoying, but if it offends me, why would I do it? I’m still trying to figure it all out, and if I listen to my gut and avoid doing things that make me uncomfortable in the marketing of others, I think I am on the right track.

The sands that publishing is built on are shifting. As more people publish their work independently, we have to figure out how to be ethical, not only in the actual writing, but in how we tell the world about it. We are all on our own, trying to figure out just how we going to continue paying the mortgage, but we are also in it together.

My practice of making connections has served me well, in personal satisfaction and real bridges built, if not yet in monetary terms.  My followers number in the hundreds, rather than the tens of thousands, but they are real names, some even come with faces attached. I have decided to trust that what feels like the right path both artistically and ethically.

What do you think?

hey! Buy my book!

You can see more pandas (for free!) at The Panda Chronicles. You can also…um…find out where to buy my books there.

Can You Stand One More Post About Kickstarter?

I am in the countdown for the last hour of my Kickstarter project to fund Pandamorphosis, my wordless picture book, which I have been working on for about four years.

Pandas are yearning to spring forth!

Being tuned in to all things “Kickstarter” I’m always interested in reading news stories about it.  In the last two days I saw a story about how film-maker Spike Lee used Kickstarter to fund a film project, and I just read the “from the editor” column in Smithsonian Magazine, about how a recent article that required travel to foreign lands, was funded with Kickstarter. Still another article came up about a publishing company that was going to use crowd-funding to fund and assess appeal for a book.

One of the questions that I see pop up is “Is it fair for people who are already famous to use something like Kickstarter to fund their project?”

My answer, after a little consideration, is a resounding yes.  The truth is that even people that we perceive to have “made it” already, still need to keep working, and the gatekeepers, whether they be publishers, movie studios, music companies, or art galleries are growing increasingly squirrelly over making a financial investment/ commitment in “the talent.”

Pandamorphosis: at 245%  with 30 minutes to go. Go team.

I think that the fact that scholars, well known film-makers, and musicians are using crowd-funding gives the process visibility and credibility that it didn’t have at its inception. It gives small fish like me the opportunity to raise money for a small-ish project.  Yes, there have been artist project grants available from various sources for more than 30 years, but for those, you have a large number of artists competing for a small number of grants, that are decided by just a few people. Crowd-funding changes the dynamic and allows artists and creatives of all varieties the chance to take their project before the people who may be interested. I think it is a wonderful thing to come into being.

Well, my project has just about 30 minutes left to run. It’s been a wonderful experience, and I’ve gathered more than twice as much funding as I originally asked for.  Most of the money will go for project expenses and reward fulfillment, but there will be a small amount “leftover” to fund more projects that come out of my studio.

Thank you to all who have participated and supported me.  And if you’ve never contributed to a crowd-funding project, I urge you to get out there and find a project you love. Sign up as a backer, even if it’s just for a dollar. You might just have some fun, while doing something good.

Rising from the ashes, another phoenix emerges…

I was all set to write a post about some of the recent departures ( of the earthly life and death kind) that have happened over the the recent past.  But then I got other news from someone, that even though we have never met in person, I consider a friend.

In the summer of 2012, I launched my second Kickstarter project in order to publish the first collection of my panda cartoons, The Panda Chronicles Book 1: Your Brain on Pandas. 

The pandas help The Little Brown Farm with their Kickstarter campaign.

One of the things that I have grown to love about Kickstarter is the community that has formed around the process of raising funds for a project by putting it on the internet and seeing who salutes.

In addition to doing two of my own projects, I’ve also taken a hand in bringing several other projects to a successful conclusion, Including The Little Brown Farm’s project, Cook on Clay, and Island Shakespeare. I’ve also supported over 20 other projects, mostly in small ways, but it is putting the crowd in crowd-funding that is important.  Besides getting the funds needed to make a project happen, it is also a way to gage whether an idea has legs or not. One project I’m supporting now is Niya Christine’s 365 Story Paintings Art Book project. She spent an entire year doing a painting a day, and now would like to make a beautiful hardcover book. I hope you’ll take a look at it, and support it if you can.

I’m getting ready to launch another project, to get funding for some production work on Pandamorphosis, my wordless picture book that I have been working on for over 4 years.

Pandas are yearning to spring forth!

But the project I want to talk about now, is one that was going on at the same time as my Panda Chronicles project, The Kerfluffles Marshmallow project, to create a new business to make and sell homemade marshmallows. Their project was successful way beyond their wildest dreams, which in turn, created some logistical problems.  (Instead of the approximately 100-200 backers they were anticipating, they wound up with over 2,600 backers, which bumped their project to a level that necessitated a much larger scale operation.)

They did it! They launched a new business, a website, and were able to satisfy most of their backers in a reasonable amount of time. But last week tragedy struck.

A sad day for lovers of fluffy goodness and the Kerfluffles Marshmallow team

A fire destroyed the building where their commercial kitchen was, effectively putting them out of business. Now, as someone who has lived through a devastating house fire of my own, I know from experience that they have a long road to recovery.

Even though no one was physically hurt, fire is one of the more terrifying things that a person can live through.  Last year another friend barely escaped from a fire that consumed her office building in mere minutes.  Even though my house fire was almost 19 years ago, the smell of burning wood doesn’t make me think of campfires and happy times, it makes me think of fearing for my life and losing much of what I owned.

My heart goes out to them.  But Spring Barnickle is a strong person.  She  overcame other obstacles in her life, and emerged a kind, creative person.  I know she will come out the other side of this with even more compassion and a new mission in life.

I can’t wait to see what that is.

Ordinary Illuminated and Tim’s Vermeer

I’m in a show that starts this Saturday in Seattle, called Ordinary Illuminated.  When June Sekaguchi, the curator suggested the theme, I was just about beside myself.  Painter of Stuff is how I sometimes refer to myself.  I love taking something ho hum, like blue painters tape, and putting it in a really realistic still life with a bunch of other blue objects. It’s the play between objects, their shapes, their colors, the way light falls on them that makes them fascinating to me, not just what they are.

40 Shades of Blue// Oil on Panel//Anne Belov //all rights reserved

So, when I was listening to the radio the other day, I heard an interview on Studio 360, about how Tim Jenison re-created Vermeer‘s painting, The Music Room.  Now, he didn’t do what most painters do, which would be to get as good a reproduction as they can find, and then to copy the drawing via a grid and then while looking at the reproduction, figure out as best they could as to just how Vermeer did it.

Oh, no.

He built a whole frigging room with the light coming in from the same direction, ground his own paint, ground the optical lenses that he used to look at the scene he re-created, and went about it very scientifically.  Then he made a movie about it. Or someone else did, and it opens later this month. I plan to see it, even though I have very mixed feelings about the whole project.

It’s not that I have any qualms about doing master copies.  I’ve done quite a few of them, including a couple of Vermeers.  John Singer Sargent is my particular specialty. I learn a lot about putting paint on a canvas every time I do one.  In the interview with Mr. Jenison, he complains about how hard it was, how long it took him to paint the patterned turkish carpet.

Well, Duh.  It is hard to paint stuff so that it looks real, really real, or mostly real. It took me over 40 years to get good at it. I feel your pain. (sort of.)

Arrangement in Black, White, and Gray //Anne Belov //all rights reserved Okay, so this is SLIGHTLY different than the original…

On the whole, I’m looking forward to the movie, no matter how mixed my feelings are about it. I think that anything that gives non-painters an appreciation for how hard painting really is, is a very good thing.  If the movie becomes popular, there is always the possibility that there will be a new wave of appreciation for realism in fine art circles again. I’m all for that!

In the meantime, I hope you’ll check out my show if you’re in Seattle, or go to the Metropolitan Museum if you’re in New York. They have five Vermeers. Yeehaw! The National Gallery in Washington DC has four.

Anne Belov and Jennifer Frohwerk at the Ida Culver House Ravenna

date and location…

Learning New Tricks

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about following one’s dreams and living an unconventional life.  It’s partly because the economic climate of the U.S. (and indeed, much of the western world) has been in such a kerfuffle for the last 4 years.  For 10 or 12 of the 24 (almost 25!) years I have been supporting myself through my work as an artist, I have done reasonably well.  By that I mean, I could pay my rent, keep a car running, feed myself and my cat at a level greater than if I still worked in a coffee shop.  For the rest of those years, with the exception of the last 4, I could rely on my skills to live frugally and still live very well by much of the world’s standards, although not necessarily by the standards of upper middle class America.  No complaints here.  I live a wonderful life, rich with friends, beautiful surroundings, in a kick ass community where people celebrate each others triumphs and pitch in through the hard times.

40 Shades of Blue// Oil on Panel//Anne Belov //all rights reserved

So, I’m not trying to figure out how to quit my corporate, soul-sucking job so that I can go off and live on an island and paint full time, because I’ve already done that.  Huzzah! The question for me now is how do I continue to do the work I love, and still keep food on the table and a roof over that table.

Following the River// Oil on Panel//Anne Belov//all rights reserved

There are several avenues that I have been exploring, taking the slowdown in sales (and therefore the need to produce quite so much work)as an opportunity to push the boundaries of my creativity into new directions.  I like to say that I am artistically promiscuous (I said, artistically, smarty-pants!) in that I refuse to be limited to one subject matter or even one medium. In my over 35 years as an artist, I have worked in watercolor, oils, printmaking (etching, lithography, and monoprint), egg tempera, and drawing.  I recently went to Italy, which was partially funded by a Kickstarter campaign (and partially by an anonymous donor) in order to gain greater understanding and skills in the ancient medium of egg tempera.  (Not to be confused with shrimp tempura.)  I’ve also been working on a wordless children’s picture book, Pandamorphosis, which was fueled by my obsession with pandas, which has manifested itself in my cartoon series, Your Brain On Pandas.

I’ve also been reading a lot: books about children’s writing and illustrating, cartooning, publishing, business philosophy, blogs about creating your own self employed life, etc.  Somehow (maybe Alyson B. Stanfield’s Art Biz Blog) I stumbled onto The Traveling Writer, blog and newsletter of Alexis Grant.  That in turn led me to Chris Guillebeau’s  blog and book of the same name, The Art of Non-Conformity and his now annual Portland event, the World Domination Summit.  Is that cool or what?  OK, it’s cool because he’s using the term “world domination” at least a little ironically and he is definitely on the side of the angels, putting his money and time where his mouth is.  You really must read his blog and book for yourself, but his book boiled down to this for me: Find what you love; find a way to do what you love; the connections you make along the way are important – no, make that vital; and give back what you can, when you can, to make the world a better place.

Pretty simple, huh?  Definitely on the side of the angels.

More on this tomorrow (or the next day!)

Sucking Lemons

It really all comes down to the 10,000 hour thing, doesn’t it?

I recently wrote of native Whidbey Island daughter, Aleah Chapin, who, at the tender age of 26, has just won top prize in the British National Portrait Gallery’s portrait competition.  Oh, and then there was the bit about all her existing paintings selling the moment she got on the short list for the prize.  Let me say again, she is a hard working, extremely talented (not to mention humble) young artist.  So why do I feel like I’ve been sucking lemons every time I think twenty-six and 1st place in the British Portrait Competition, at the same time?  OK, this is definitely about me and not her.

Breathing Fire // copyright Anne Belov 2012

 

I can still remember being in art school and thinking, well, if I’m not famous by the time I’m 30, well, I’ll just have to kill myself.  I was not famous by the time I was thirty; not even close. I’m not dead yet, either.  As I got closer and closer to that magic, tragic number, I began to see that an art career is a journey and not a destination, at least not by the time you are 30.  I am well past 30 now (and not dead yet) and I’ve been supporting myself from my art work for the last 24 years.  Not too shabby an accomplishment, wouldn’t you say?  There have been some pretty high ups, and some very low downs, but all and all, it’s been a fabulous ride, which is not even close to being over.

If necessity is the mother of invention, I think that struggle is the mother of creativity. It is human nature to think that the other person has it so much easier than you do.  I firmly believe that the difficulties of supporting myself as an artist have enriched my creative vision.  When I teach, I always point out that in art school, I was not a star.  What I was, was stubborn.  Every time our professors pointed out that in 10 years, less than 1% of us would still be painting, I would silently pledge that I would be in that 1%.  Had I not had to work so hard to get where I am, if it had come early and easily, would I be doing what I am doing now? Living an artists life with a (really big-ass) studio and a cat?  I’d like to think so, but we’ll never really know, will we?

Early success, and the attention that comes with it, can be just as damaging to a career as obscurity and struggle.  However, Aleah has drive and talent, and if she is stubborn enough to resist the hype and distractions that this award will bring, she will do even more amazing things as an artist. I wish her the best of luck.

Limone #2 //Egg tempera and oil on linen //Anne Belov // all rights reserved

Another Whidbey Artist does good. Really good.

Ok, I know I should probably say “does well,” but it’s just so good!!!!!!  I don’t mean to be obscure here, so here’s the scoop, Aleah Chapin, who grew up on Whidbey Island, in a very modest house right at the top of First street, just won the 1st prize in the British Portrait international competition.  More than 2000 really, really, really good artists from all over the world entered this competition and we were all very proud when Aleah was named to the shortlist of 4 artists. To have her win is very exciting.

I would be lying if I told you that, along with my pride at one of our own winning such a prestigious art world prize, I wasn’t in the least envious.  Because I am completely green with envy. Now, I’m not exactly a slouch at making art, but the truth is, that I don’t travel in those circles.  Sometimes I think about how we move about the world depends on what we were brought up to expect out of the world.  The lessons I learned in childhood were, ‘keep your head down, don’t expect too much or you’ll be disappointed.  Fly beneath the radar.”  These are not the lessons that take you to the top prizes.  Still, I managed to still the inner and outer critics of my childhood enough to become a painter and to make my living from it for the last 25 years.  It is hard not to wonder what might have been possible had I had the courage to throw my hat into that ring.

Aleah is young and at the beginning of her artistic journey, and despite the early encouragement, great talent, and hard work that has brought her to this well deserved success, she will have her own hurdles to conquer.  One of my former art dealers used to say, “You’re only as good as your last show.”  The burden of great potential and early success and promise is not for the faint of heart.  This award will open doors to be sure.  But it’s what she does once she enters the room that will matter in the long run.  She’s worked hard to get to this point, so I feel reasonably sure that she will be up to the task.  But it’s easy to get distracted, especially when everyone is telling you how wonderful you are, and there are all the parties and celebrations, and your envious friends who have worked just as hard as you have.  So keep your head up, keep those brushes full of paint, and take advantage of all the doors that are going to open for you you right now.  They won’t stay open indefinitely.

With a little help from my friends…

Sottovoce - Lombardia - Oil on Linen - Anne Belov - all rights reserved

 

I’m still trying to catch my breath and get back to life as normal (aka working way too much).  I did get a little paint on a canvas today, which is a step in the right direction.

I know my Kickstarter project would not have been successfully funded without the help of my many friends and supporters, some of whom have been collecting my work over the years, and some, for whom this will be the first of my work in their collection.  I am grateful to you all.

Here are some things that I have learned in the process, what worked, what could have worked better if I had thought it through completely in advance:

1. Because I have been showing my art work oh these many years, I have a pretty good mailing list for snail mail, not so much for email, as I have only recently embraced (um…that may be too strong a word) the technology.  So did I have a postcard prepared to send out to 400 or so people? No.  Big oops.  Next time, I will definitely either get my email list up to snuff in advance, or send actual postcards to those of whom that is my only contact information.

2.  Have a regular schedule for sending out emails.  Did I do this? Well no.  I was a little concerned that I would over do the emails, causing people to automatically delete everything from me.  I think that once a week for the first two weeks would be fine, and then step it up a little for the last two weeks, only going into hyper drive at the last few days.  Keeping it fun and respectful, of course.  I forgot that even when something is of interest to me, if I don’t keep that email somewhere I will see it, I lose. them.

3.  Because this was a fine art project, rather than a “Panda Project,” I did not ask the panda’s help until almost the last week.  Then of course, the panda kindergarten went way too far,  with regrettable results.  Mehitabel is now fine, thanks for asking.  I have way more panda fans here in internet land (mostly because I put more effort into that blog than my fine art one…go figure.) and I wasn’t sure they would be interested in this fine art project.  The lesson here? You never know till you ask.  Turns out more than a few of my friends in pandyland think my fine art is worth supporting too.  Thank you all!

4.  Kickstarter is a funny little universe.  For your project to get a lot of help and extra notice from the KS staff, it has to grab the fancy of the staff, whom I’m sure are all amazingly brilliant, insightful, and astute observers of cultural trends.  ( a little sucking up for next time never hurts)  Otherwise, it’s really up to you to make sure your support base knows about your project.  I got a few supporters directly from Kickstarter, but most of my support came from people I actually know, either in person, with a strong showing from my panda fan base on facebook.

5.  Unless your project is one of those that leaps into the +100% support in the first 2 days, you should plan on monitoring it regularly, at least daily in the beginning, and then more often as the time period progresses.  For the last 24 hours, I was on there almost constantly, and doing a lot of electronic jumping up and down on facebook to make sure I didn’t run out of time before being funded.  You also shouldn’t obsessively watch to see if anyone is signing up.  That will definitely make you crazy, and you won’t get any work done.

6.  Remember to thank everyone.  Yup, I did that.  But, just in case you missed it, thank you again.  I’m working on my thank you notes, even as I speak!

Would I recommend that you use Kickstarter to get a project you have been working on off the ground?  Absolutely!  I’ve applied for many grants through arts and governmental commission competitions, and have gotten very few of them.  The cool thing about Kickstarter is that your funding comes from real people who want to make a difference for you, and maybe don’t have a couple thousand dollars to buy a painting.  But, for $25 or $50 or more, they can contribute in a way that, if a lot of people do it, is really beneficial and meaningful.  Your stake isn’t determined by a very small group of people who may (and probably do) have their own agenda.  Will I do another Kickstarter project?  Well, yes, but I have a lot of work to do on this one, and even though I have started the thinking and planning process, it will be a while, since I have this one to complete. (Oh yeah, and go to Italy as well.  Look at the time!)  I will tell you this: my next project will involve pandas.

So stay tuned!

And the beat goes on…..

Other Rooms; Oil on Linen

 

I had a fun “sit down” the other day with a young friend who just completed graduate school for painting.  I’ve known her since, well, since before she was born, since I went to graduate school with her mother.  (Of course I was only 4 when I was in grad school, so it’s not like I’m old enough to be her mother, is it?)  Any way, it’s been a wonderful experience watching this young woman grow up and discover painting, and then decide to go for it.  She’s going to stay back east in Baltimore and, having found a fabulous live/work studio space, do the restaurant job thing at night and paint in the day.  I don’t know whether to be envious of the excitement of the beginning of someone’s creative road, or incredibly relieved that I don’t have to do that part of MY journey over.  I think mostly I’m relieved.  I have my dream studio, and (mostly, except for this damn economy) make my living from painting.  Life IS good.  And it keeps on going no matter what we do. (Predictions of world end, notwithstanding)

Let me count the reasons…..

Arrangement in Blue and Red; oil on linen

I just finished teaching a two day painting class at the Whidbey Island Fine Arts Studio in Langley.  It’s a wonderful facility for teaching (and taking classes) and I’m happy to have it as an option for teaching, as my studio really isn’t set up for multiple people working there.  I like teaching (occasionally, that is) because it makes me marshall my thoughts and think about why I make the decisions about a painting, as opposed to just doing it.  So, here are some reasons that I think are good ones to take a class, as well as a few of the reasons it is good to teach one.

1. To learn something new.

2. To come at a problem from a different angle.

3. To get feedback.

4. To connect with other people interested in the same thing.

5. To expand your knowledge of a given medium or technique.

Here are some of the reasons I like to teach.

1. To give something back.

2. To continue the tradition of painting. (and by this I mean painting with real paint…not playing with pixels on a computer!)

3. To encourage people embrace their creative practice.

4. To fully realize how much I’ve learned over the course of more than 3 decades of following my creative path.

In today’s world of instant everything, I think there is a need to continue the traditions of making things by hand.  A need to follow our thoughts, not in the fastest way, but in a way that gives us the joy and fulfillment of creating something beautiful or wonderful or thought provoking, or all of the above.  Could I make pictures faster by using a computer tablet or “painting” program?  Probably.  Would it be as much fun? I don’t think so.

Thanks again to my students of this most recent class.  It was really great to meet you all, and I hope you will continue to use what you’ve learned, both from me, and from continuing to paint.  It’s a tradition worth keeping.