Shakedown: 5 Things I Learned From My First Photography Exhibition
Welcome to the first Shakedown! In this recurring series, I’ll dispense some of the knowledge that I’ve gained throughout my journey as a photographer. Some of this knowledge will be about photographic techniques, some will be about the aspects of the business, and some will be random tips that I find helpful.
My First Photography Exhibition
Last year I put on my first photography exhibition. It was a journey into a hemisphere of photography that I don’t normally get my passport stamped in. I learned quite a few things along the way — some about photography, some about the art world — which all made me a better photographer and businessman by the end of it.
Towards the beginning of 2010 I got the urge to put on a photography exhibition after attending some openings for my friend and artist Adam Doyle. Even though I don’t do “fine art photography,” I had loads of great photographs from my travels and also street photography around NYC.
1. Choose a simple theme
When it comes to choosing the theme for your show, K.I.S.S. should be in your head — no, not the band with all the makeup. Keep It Simple Stupid! If someone asks you what the theme of your show is, you should be able to articulate it in a short phrase or, at most, in one sentence.
The theme I chose for my show was “A Broad Home,” chosen to reflect the equal amount of joy I get both from traveling the world and also exploring the streets of NYC. Even though I was happy with the title, I now realize that I was trying to be too clever and ended up confusing people. Some people thought I had lived in all the places that were being shown or some thought I was a drifter and “considered the world my home.” My sentences (plural!) to correct them proved that I’m a sucker for a play on words and it bested my judgment of what a good, simple theme is.
2. Limit yourself to a handful of pieces
Pick around 10 pieces to represent your theme. This isn’t a hard and fast number by any means, but I think it’s a good starting point. Having too many pieces up will not only endanger your show of feeling like one big run-on sentence, but it will also make it more daunting to recoup those precious dollars you dropped on materials. You want to pick a small, tightly-edited group of photographs to represent your theme in a clear, concise, and cohesive manner.
I made the mistake of choosing 22 pieces to show, 11 from my travels and 11 from around NYC. I went with an equal number of pieces from each side to have a clear juxtaposition of the equal amount of joy I receive from each side of my life — the show’s internal yin and yang. I wanted to keep this equal contribution in place and trying to eliminate 1 or more pairs was too hard for me to do. Having 22 pieces in a fairly small space made it harder to have a physical flow to the work, which ended up hurting the presentation of the theme.
3. Learn the lost art of printing and framing
“The negative is the equivalent of the composer’s score, and the print the performance.” – Ansel Adams
A large portion of the photography community these days has no idea how to produce an accurate, archival-quality print of their work. Digital photography has cut out the printing process entirely for some photographers; their images migrate from camera to viewer while never being transformed to a physical print. Use this opportunity to learn the basics of producing a lasting, accurate print of your work along with how to properly mat and frame it.
A few months prior to starting my preparations for the show, I had purchased an Epson R2880, but had yet to put it through its paces with a batch of work that would ultimately be framed and hung for display. I ended up producing 20 of the 22 pieces myself, more than enough to ensure that by the time I was done, I was pretty good at the process (2 were title pieces from each half and printed on canvas wraps through Mpix).
4. Pricing is a tough lover to please
“What price should I charge for one of my prints?” is one of the hardest questions to answer when doing an exhibition. The one thing to know is that there is no one right answer — you have to factor in how you value your own work, the potential customers you want to sell to, the environment in which you’re showing, and countless other factors. The point is to find something you’re comfortable with, covers your costs, and holds some perceived value for your potential customer.
I chose to take a calculated approach and use the cost of production for a single print as a starting point. I literally calculated the cost of 1 sheet of 13″ x 19″ paper, ink for one print (very rough estimate here), 1 frame, 1 mat, and 1 piece of acrylic. This rounded out to $45 per 16″ x 22″ piece that I was producing. Since I had so many pieces in the show, I wanted the sale of 1 piece to cover the production costs of 2 pieces, so I set a price of $100 per piece. At the end of the day, this price was too high for the space I was showing in and their clientele. I did sell a few pieces, but they weren’t flying out the door.
5. Find the right place to show
Finding a gallery to show your work can be a daunting task. For your first show, I would definitely recommend thinking outside the box and drawing up a list of art-friendly establishments in your area. Often times restaurants, nice lounges, and even some retail stores will use pieces from local artists to decorate their place of business and offer them for sale at the same time, sometimes even handling the sales transactions for you. Wherever you choose to show your work, make sure you like the way they run things and have a good reputation with the artists they showcase.
The gallery where I showed was actually the space at the front of Astoria Wine & Spirits, a wine store in my neighborhood that supports local artists (and decorates a good portion of their store) with month-long shows. They kick off the exhibitions with an opening night wine tasting and provide the structure for you to sell your work throughout the whole month. And the best part is, they charge zero commission! All I had to do was put a price tag on my work and collect my sales at the end of the month. They have an employee on staff that is in charge of running the gallery portion of the store who is actually also an artist, so she was incredibly helpful at making things run smoothly.
My Exhibition, “A Broad Home”
Head over to one of my previous posts to see the works from my exhibition, “A Broad Home”.
So there you have it, some of my most important lessons learned through putting on my first photography exhibition. It was a great journey, and definitely one I will be taking again.
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Jon,
Thanks for sharing! This was insightful.
Cheers!
Thanks for dropping a note! I hope to write out some more helpful information like this in future installments of Shakedown, be on the lookout