Michelle
This, sent along by my daughter. It’s worth watching:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-94JhLEiN0&hl=en&fs=1&]
Began processing some thirty prints for my September show at Hopkins Center for the Arts. No nudes in this one — all street photography from Italy, India, Guatemala, and elsewhere (including our own State Fair). A total of thirty-six prints; six of them will be reframed, replacing 12x18s and 12x15s that have been displayed in other shows. Dick Blick offers reasonably priced 18×24 frames that I’ll use for the remaining 12x18s (mounted in Blick’s 18×24 “digital mats”). All told, I expect to spend over $1,000 putting this show together, so some of those prints better sell. (For those that don’t, at least I’ll have a bunch of frames ready for another show.)
Other photographers have noted that this Great Recession has definitely hurt sales in the arts. Some photographers are selling — literally — nothing. Of course, galleries and other venues, having to make minimal investment in order to hold a show (and often requiring the artist to underwrite even the costs of an opening reception), expect to roll merrily along, with the artists picking up the tab for shows that sell nothing. (Yes, the galleries have rent, taxes, etc. That’s a separate problem than an artist having to plunk down $1,000+ in order to “play.”)
Somehow, I don’t think this downturn will change any of the calculations or the gallery-artist relationship. All these are among the reasons I started The Nude in Minnesota exhibition — to remove the galleries from the equation in displaying a collection of photographers’ nude work, minimizing artists’ expenses.
