Now I'm making an effort to take care of some of the business side of things. Without that, the art will never actually leave the studio.
Last week I developed an ad for private art instruction in my studio to place in a local, art-focused paper. I'm hoping to have a few new students by the end of October.
Monday I refreshed some items on my Etsy Shop and will soon be adding some new small watercolors to that site.
Tuesday night I sat in on an amazing live webcast by Xanadu Gallery in Phoenix Arizona. Each year they do a mentorship with a different artist to help take their careers to the next level--new web site, bio, presentation materials, and eventually a solo show at the gallery. All of the artists who competed for the mentorship are permitted to watch the mentoring sessions live on Google Hangouts. It's a great way to learn and meet other artists.
Wednesday I set up the email sign-on form in Mail Chimp so I could add it to my web site.
Thursday I reviewed my website and the code I would need to make updates.
Today I spent a marathon session updating my website. A lot of artists pay someone to do that but fortunately for me (or unfortunately depending on how you view it), I learned some basic web development when web sites were a brand new marketing tool at one of my many day jobs. I integrated the email sign up for my newsletter and updated a lot of my images with professionally shot images (something I can't do myself).
That is not to say I haven't been painting. I still managed to get in 2 - 4 hours of painting after work at my day job. I'm still working on my Circus Summer piece. I'm at the stage I usually reach when I'm about three quarters done where I think I've totally ruined it. I usually manage to pull through. Let's hope that's the case here.
