The Minefield of Being an Indie Artist

Sorry I have been so quiet as of late, but I've been navigating the art and social media world trying to find the best place and methods to sell art, create art and what events to attend and vend at. One thing I've been up to is checking out different platforms to sell art on.

Turns out they are all a bust. I tried Threadless as I've heard good things and heard they are artist friendly. Their platform is easy to use and easy to upload art onto. They also have a marketplace however, and you have to be approved to sell on it. They denied me. They said my art doesn't "Match up with the shopping and buying habits": of their customers. I knew my art was weird, but I didn't think it was THAT weird. Not sure if I should be embarrassed or proud.

I found some events to vend at recently. One was called Witches Fest at a local mall. It was a fun show and some cool vendors and witchy people there. I took lots of old unopened Tarot decks I had from my old online occult store. I sold several Tarot decks for super discounted prices just trying to move as much as possible. But no art. I even had some of my art on t-shirts there, my Annabelle and Skull shirts. People seemed fascinated by them but no sales. Not giving up though.

I got accepted into an art show at a gallery in Austin for a Friday the 13th pop up show. Cool thing is, I can drop off a painting this week and they will display it for the whole month for sale. This is a pretty big deal for me even if it doesn't sell, I can say I've had stuff in a gallery. Friday the 13th I'll be able to sell art prints for the evening and hopefully get some movement there.

Also, a writer on Instagram wrote a poetry book and with my permission, included some of my art to go with his poems. So my stuff is getting out there. Just a matter of the right people finding it at the right time. At least that is what I tell myself.

I've begun journaling again and using my journal as part of my witchcraft practice to manifest and do spells for improvement in my life and art. I know this sounds like a lot of woo woo and I suppose it is, but I find it works for me and keeps me grounded and things do work as I slowly manifest them, so I try to keep it going. I won't delve too much into that part, that is a blog for a whole different day.

After being rejected by threadless, it occurred to me I do have this site where I have a blog and a storefront and can do pretty much everything here. Yes, I have to drive my own traffic, but I also don't have someone else's rules to follow or someone else taking a chunk of my sales. Going forward I've decided instead of trying to see what platform or marketplace I can get into for my online presence, I'm going to focus on being the best independent artist I can be.

That may be hard, and its all hard if I'm honest. But I'd rather maintain control and ownership of all my own art and storefront than follow someone else's rules and guidelines on exposure and whatnot. Maybe I'm bitter or bullheaded or both. But in the past doing things my own way have served me pretty well. I need to focus less on what others are doing and thrive on what I can do following my own instincts.

Not knocking anyone else's path at all. I have friends on Threadless who hare having great success and I'm excited for them. Their art and journey is totally different from mine, so I tried those ways, and its not working so my best bet is to focus on my unique art my unique way.

That also goes for my art itself. I am learning to draw actual things and sometimes I will and put it up in my market if I think its worth it. I enjoy it especially when it turns out the way I want it. But most times it doesn't, and drawing just isn't natural for me. Maybe its because I'm left handed. Maybe its just how my brain works. Abstract makes total sense to me, and I can see the abstract art as I'm doing it and "see" things on the page as they form no matter how wild the image looks. Actual drawing to me feels very mechanical and my hands just don't do what my mind sees, though I am getting better, I will likely never do any realism.

With abstract art, it reflects some of the strange things I see in my dreams. My dreams sometimes are very vivid, but are often very trippy and bizarre. Sometimes a mix of both, and i try to reflect what I see in my head into my art. And being I have bipolar and autism, abstract lets my mind and hands be free to create things that come from the deepest reaches of my mind. Once again, nothing against realism or drawing of any kind. And I'm still going to work on practicing drawing, my brain is just wired differently.

At any rate, thank you for sticking with me through all of this. Hopefully I'll have another blog much sooner as I plan on sticking around Wordpress for the long haul. Until next time (in the meantime check out my store!)