The Wealthy Artist: 6 Myths and 6 Tips on Marketing your Art

CanvasPop co-founder, Adrain Salamunovic, talks about how up-and-coming artists can market their works and still maintain their artistic integrity.

[thatsbadasswoodart]

I started a custom scroll saw wood art business out of my garage in December 2019. My goal was to make custom wood art for those who wouldn’t find what they wanted at generic home decor stores. I wanted to appeal to an audience like myself who’s into anime, video games and more. I’m happy to say that it’s been one whole year since I began, I have been self employed all year, gained all the legal knowledge of running my LLC legitimately, and have made nearly twice what I was making when I had an employer and was working 40+ hours a week. I get to work from home and be with my family. I get to create the custom art that makes me happy and makes me money. It wasn’t easy in the beginning few months, but I was patient and am fortunate for where I am today. If you’re reading this and want to make a living off of your art, don’t settle. Do/create what you love. Be patient. Life is good!

[PeterChorao]

Thank you Adrian! You're amazing and inspirational, those dna11 artworks are very beautiful, i love the glowing colors.
For those frustrated artists still waiting for a magic formula after listening to this video (sorry it takes work to sell art there is no magic formula)
Here are the notes i took on what advice Adrian rattles on about:
Myths:
1 selling out (you don't have to sign with the devil to make it)
2 Art galleries are the only way (not)
3 techie (you dont have to be a computer technician to sell on line)
4 you need a lot of money (not, there are even free options btw)
5 Prints cheapen art (not)
6 Put a very high price tag on your art (no, have a range of item prices)

Tips:
1 Know thy self
2 Know who are your buyers (know who you want to sell to)
3 Make remarkable art -best advertising is word of mouth
4 Make great art
5 make prints of your art to sell
6 Set up a website - or a blog, Adrain says he just has a blog on wordpress,
6a. Be on social media
b. Share
c. Use Online stores
d. Get ink (Printed media)
e. Dont use pr firms, only you or maybe a personal team member can do a proper job (sorry) you are gonna have to do your own pitching.
- What's your angle? Why is your art buzz worthy?
That's it that's all he gives us. Sorry unfortunately no magic formulas or how to sign with the devil to get out of doing the work, that probably wouldn't be a good idea to do anyway.

[wubologist]

the best tip from this video is to sell bite size art (ie stickers or something) that is affordable to the masses as opposed to only expensive originals as to help get your name out there and create buzz. everything else is common sense =P

[JohnHarrisOnGoogle]

Yes, even artists deserve to make a good living doing what they love.

[highstax_xylophones]

Paint what you feel like painting if you want to feel great; paint what they want you to paint to get paid.

I stopped painting what others want and it feels great. It was boring.

[katedanis]

Thank you so much for this talk. As an artist I got many useful pieces of advice from you

[friedricengravy]

Selling out is when u compromise ur craft, ur morals, or ur honesty in the pursuit of success. Making a living (even mad stacks jk lol) doing anything....even art is NOT selling out. Going from realism to abstract or singing pop songs though u prefer the blues....being someone u r not, supporting a false image, manipulation for the sake of popularity is selling out. Just my opinion. Make Art, Love Life

[ivycooper]

I'm a beginner in the art world and now I'm researching on what I have to do to become a successful artist, your video is great, your knowledge of becoming a successful artist is really helpful to me!

[devondevon]

Outside family I find art to be the most noble pursuit

[kirtimistry]

Simply amazing bro. I just loved the every words you spoke. it is so true. Mostry artist don't like word marketing, or they feel shy to sale, or they reserved to ask for money as an artist. But now new modern day artist will have ( Must have to ) learn marketing and feel proud about you. and Internet has made their job easy to sale. with maintaing 100% dignity. I pray for all artist for great journey.

[kellygeneartist]

Thank you so much it helps, am an artist but not starting selling yet; by seeing this video it motivating me to start selling now🙏

[pedrojuan]

wow this was so useful, heard it all the way through and a few of these were things i dont usually consider, i tend to be very self concious when trying to be confident cause i do not want to come out as cocky or arrogant, so its a bit dificult showing my work off to the world

[CkArtGirl]

Actually, mugs and mousepads earn money. Art licensing gets me a check every quarter, and your art gets 'rented', then reused. Work smart, not hard.

[geekyourlikeslulu]

Yes visual art should progress to future, break these old-fashioned myths.. Selling art only through galleries, gotta depend on art dealers to get assessed for my arts works, trying to keep only 1 copy to maintain value of it.. felt weird gap between fast changing reality/techs/cultures and these perceptions of fine arts rotten-in-the-past since was in an art school... so was even glad that art galleries and offline art scenes got depressed bcus of Corona virus. A video I rlyrly needed

[tamistone]

Myth listening to sales men like this guy will help you

[danrazART]

Fantastic Points Adrain.
It is funny to see so many negative comments here.
Some people think if something is not helping them that doesn't make it ZERO value!
it may be a big thing for some other person.
what is important is that they are not realizing that they themselves are full of NEGATIVE ENERGY and they are so full that they are leaving the stains everywhere they go such as posting negative comments on youtube.
However, Few things missing from this list are ARTIST'S NETWORK and SERENDIPITY! Artistic network means being part of a fraternity helps a WHOLE LOT! and serendipity means that going an unexpected route can sometimes prove fruitful.
I mostly sell through word of mouth and found a niche but I don't depend on that and branch out whenever I can. so, love and cheers everybody. be grateful being yourself.

[carolpreston]

This is excellent, sound advice. Thank you,

[terezinhanogueira]

thank you so much incredible presentation

[fernandolucioocamposandy]

I work hard learning about selling art and I found dificult selling my art on facebook, because I live in Bolivia and
banking here are not able to get money from other countries throug internet.
Any advice about my situation?
thank you, good video.

[mimiseton]

Really good vid! I bet it would be a much less inhumane world if more artists made great money, don't you think? I WANT people who make Beauty, who critique the culture and see through its falsehoods, who have future-vision and insight, who capture the moments that make life worth living or the moments that are painful but grow our souls...in short, I want people of DEPTH and soul to have money~ because I think they will encourage more humane values than whoever is running the show now...