Introduction
Artists might not like to hear it, but there is little-to-no conceptual air between trying to launch a startup and trying to launch an art career.
We can boil down the goals of a product launch to:
- Finding a product-market fit
- Differentiating yourself from the competition
Think of any of your favorite artists. One that suits a mood or fills a gap that no other artist quite touches. As antiseptic as it sounds, I’m leaning into the idea of an artist finding a kind of product-market fit.
There’s no checklist for what makes great art. There are no predetermined criteria. But we know great art when it speaks to us. Just as entrepreneurs need to cycle through idea after idea before they find success, artists are tireless explorers because the first and most important product-market fit is internal.
Caveat
Thousands of people are trying to do what you’re trying to do. Not all will be successful, but all will have access to the same information.
Information will not give you the creative edge. The only thing that will give you an advantage is bringing your creative edge to the information. This is where “differentiation” comes into play.
All advice, even the most granular and specific, will only ever be generic advice.
But you’re an artist. When have you ever taken generic advice? That’s not your calling!
Heed this advice like you would heed a blank canvas (or screen).
When someone says “promote your work,” don’t Google how to do that. Sit in the Discomfort Zone™. These are the moments when art is asking to be born. “Promoting your work” can be as much an act of artistic expression as making the work.
Lifting rote standard operating procedures is the clipart solution. The creative powers that bring life to your art must also be applied to the activities surrounding that art. Every bit of “advice” that follows is nothing more and nothing less than a prompt to create something from nothing, just as you do in your artistic life.
Develop your community-building style
Outside of making art, building community is the most critical thing for your career. This doesn’t necessarily mean hobnobbing on Twitter. Pak’s popular @Archillect Twitter account is a great example of a creative community-building style. It’s a bot that posts images based on certain parameters and functions as Pak’s personal mood board.
Standing out requires creativity not just within the medium but with the medium. Creative tweets are one thing; a creative Twitter practice is another. This is to say that it helps to find creative expression in the form as much as the content.
Is @Archillect wholly original and mold-breaking? Hardly. But it gracefully addresses community-building without leaning on traditional techniques or overtaxing the artist as influencer.
Create a practice of promoting others’ work
The best way to learn what’s out there while…
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