This article is for artists wondering if there is another way to make some income atypical from the many hours we spend marketing on social media. I spend a lot of time researching how to make a living as an artist. The advice I get quite often is to post on Instagram or another social media platform consistently and frequently. As most of you know this takes hours of time each week. This activity never feels right to me. I have the past experience of making a full-time living as an illustrator in the 90s and 00’s by simply advertising in one illustration book, and sending out a postcard once a quarter. That was all the marketing I had to do. The time it took was a fraction of the time that artists, especially young and new artists, spend on social media today.

My discontent with social media has a lot to do with me being over 50. I have several friends who are not on social media at all. I clearly remember being happier without it. But, at the same time, because of the huge amount of presence on social media, if I want to reach people, I still feel it is essential to be on it. So, I take the middle path of being intentional, and not feel like there is anyone judging me on how much I should be using Instagram. I realize that the main purpose of social media is to connect with others, but any business hours worked need to lead to financial return. And, the return I have found on social media, so far, is minimal. Therefore, I suggest trying something different in a physical space, such as having an art yard sale.

Sometimes, the strategy you least expect to work, turns out to have the best results. Quite often I find the most successful results for me is often not what everyone is telling me to do. I never hear people online suggest—have an art yard sale! But, that is what has produced the most financial return in one day for me. When you make the discovery of what works, repeat it.

The Required Components For An Art Yard Sale To Work

I’m not suggesting everyone go out and start having weekly yard sales. My success with this has a couple of key components. You would need to have a majority of these to have an art yard sale work for you.

• LOCATION: I’m grateful for the North Seattle neighborhood I live in. It both has lots of foot traffic, and is safe. I know this intellectually and have experienced it. I was saddened on my most recent trip out of the region (to Eau Claire, Wisconsin), where almost no one walked through the neighborhoods. One needs to see the people in their community. As an artist, you need to be seen by your community. I can’t tell you how many benefits one gets from living in a neighborhood with less cars and more walkers and bicycles! You must be in a pedestrian friendly location for your sale to work.
• LOCATION: Many people in my neighborhood are aesthetic, curious, and supportive. People saw our ads we placed on the Facebook neighborhood page and on Craigslist. And they came. I know a lot of people in my neighborhood personally, and they want to support me. If you live in a neighborhood where don’t have this kind of interest and support, an art yard sale will not work.
• LOCATION: Maybe you get my reference to the old expression, “location! location! location!” by now. But, the third reason: be in a city where people can afford art. I price my work to sell, but you need to be in a place where people have expendable income for this to work.
• THE REAL SOCIAL: COVID has been hard on all of us. Being a social person, the hardest thing for me has been not seeing people in person. Now that people are coming out again to socialize, my yard sales have had the feeling of a party! I invited my friends as well as people from the general public. If you are a shy person who chooses not to have a lot of friends, or reach out to the public in person, having an art yard sale would not work for you.
• INVENTORY: If you are a digital artist with no prints of your work, this advice is not for you. But, if you have original paintings or prints of your digital art, your yard can be your portfolio. Spread the art out on tables and blankets and it becomes a visually stunning display of your work. I’ve been a working illustrator and artist since 1994, so I have a huge inventory. Some years I created as many as 100 physical paintings a year.

The Benefits of an Art Yard Sale

There are many benefits to having an art yard sale. Some obvious, some discoveries I had not thought of.

• FREE: The event is free to you and the public. People get to attend a free art event, and you don’t have to spend a penny on tents, market entry costs, or sales commissions.
• INCOME: some of my income as an artist can be slow and laborious. But, due to the amount of inventory I have (30 years of making art), I can sell a lot of paintings in one day. My income for one day selling art is over half a month’s salary!
• MARKET TESTING: I think even better than social media, at an art yard sale, you get real feedback on what art people like. If you choose to be strategic, what work should you be making more of? For example, I leaned that people still love landscapes. All of my new landscape drawings have sold. I need to make more!
• MEETING A PATRON: One person in particular taught me something important at my last art yard sale. There is a market that I have ignored, that many people in it may be interested in contacting me directly, as she did. There are house staging designers who need art to stage the sale of their client’s home. It was not that I didn’t know this existed, but having someone buy several pieces of my art and explaining to me what they were doing, told me: this is something I need to pay attention to!

The last art yard sale I had, was a seminal moment for me. It confirmed in me that art has value. Art as a creative skill has value, and sometimes we don’t feel that, because of the present obsession with other things like politics, COVID, and technology. Yet art does, and has for centuries, connect people and make them feel something that their day-to-day tasks cannot. At the time of my last sale, I was preparing to move out of Washington state. The success of this art sale confirmed in me (along with many other messages I’ve received), that the Pacific Northwest is my home. The people here support me and understand me.

As an artist, you need to find your physical community. As a person who expresses themselves through art, and cares about my relationship with people, this is essential for my happiness. I hope that wherever you are, your community supports you and your art.

Tips To Beginning Illustrators

During my first career cycle as an illustrator spanning several years, the majority of commissions I received were from publications–editorial work. My work lends itself to editorial illustration, but this second phase of my illustration career, I’m trying something different, expanding in to new fields, some having to do with advertising. An illustrator at the beginning of their career asked me “what makes an illustration, and advertising illustration?” You can’t give a black and white answer to that question, but there are certainly repeating parameters placed on an advertising campaign, and the illustration must integrate with the advertising concept and successfully sell the product.

Following the Brand’s Color

An art director called me from T Mobile for an illustration assignment, and the number one thing I had to follow was the hot pink used in their brand. And, I wasn’t allowed to use a lot of colors with it. Obviously, this is not a requirement for all advertising illustration, but be aware of the brand colors and use them. The illustrations I’ve done for this article, has pink too, but no connection to T Mobile. That assignment was unfortunately canceled by people making decisions out of my control.

Graphic Shapes

I love texture and smear in fine art and illustration, but rarely will you see misty textured art in an advertisement. Although the illustration above has some texture and smear, the shapes of the trees and skier are still graphic shapes created with bold lines and simple objects. Visually simplistic illustration styles are commonly used in advertising illustration, because the imagery must grab the viewer quickly. In today’s fast past world, people don’t have time to look at a complex image. We hear this to the point where it is a cliché, but is true.

Keep it Happy, Show Success

I also love moody art and music, but the truth of the matter is conveying anything somber only works if it is an advertisement for a problem the customer may have. And, those kinds of advertisements are rare. Otherwise, the majority of advertising illustrations you will see are light in mood, or even comical, and almost always emotionally make others feel good.

Originality, But Not Too Original

You may see a groundbreaking campaign now and again, but those are rare. Most advertising campaigns are derivative of past concepts repackaged. The illustration styles art directors pick are going to be original, but not too original. This is a hard one to explain, but it is this magical combination of the illustration reminding us of something that makes us feel comfortable, but surprises us with aspects of it’s originality. Obviously, it depends on the client as to where on the scale the client falls from conservative comfort to a radical challenge.

It’s in the Data

Data controls what advertisers decide more than ever. Advertising agencies used to run on intuition (think Mad Men) and some data before data became so ubiquitous in the 21st century. Now advertising agencies follow the data primarily, with a little intuition added in. So, here is the hard news for us creative types—illustration will be used as long as the data supports it sells products. There is little we creatives can do about that cold, hard fact. Even, though I call this a “cold, hard fact” I hope I’m wrong, meaning—I hope intuition is still strong in advertising. I say this because intuition is linked to creativity and I like both of those human characteristics much more than data.

The Rise and Fall of Trends in Advertising

One reason I left illustration in 2008, was because it was not being used or valued due to the proliferation of tech, and downturn of the economy. Illustration in 2018 is a hopeful time where I open the New York Times and see illustrations in almost every section, and used on websites as a part of a business’ brand. In 2017, just when I had seen one too many childlike robot cartoon figures on a website, Mailchimp came out with a new branded image with illustrations that redefined what a brand can be. Mailchimp’s new look is one of the most radical expressions of Brand I have seen in years! Just when I started to wonder if the advertising images were a message that we were all turning in to little innocent, robotic avatars, Mailchimp brought humanism back and influenced others to bring back humanism as well. Dropbox followed suit with a new brand with illustration. Google has always been using illustration for their home page (I think you know the link by heart). These trends change frequently, about every 3 years. But, for now, I’m in my happy place. Keeping it human and creating art.

 

 

 

10 Years is a long time to take off from something you once loved to do. There were so many reasons for my leaving illustration and art behind. When you do anything all the time, you risk burnout, and one of the downfalls of being an illustrator is your creative profession can turn in to an assembly line. I burned myself out.

Also, technology, stock agencies, and recessions were devaluing illustration in the early 2000’s. Suddenly my custom illustrations were in competition with $5 stock art. We see this problem everywhere in fields that involve creativity. Now you can get a logo for $5. Some of us remember a different time. A time when individual creatives enjoyed the many hours of labor behind making something useful and beautiful, and were compensated with a livable wage.

Although my reasons for getting back in to illustration are personal, it is also nice to see this recent resurgence in illustration in new venues. Now we see illustrators selling illustrated products on Etsy. We see Patreon donors serially donating to illustrators who agree to provide a weekly illustration that they will one day provide as a compiled book. There are companies using illustration on their blogs, packaging, and collateral. Even though the field continues to be highly competitive, there seems to be more opportunity that a decade ago.

The past decade I have run a web and print design business called Schildbach Design, and still do. Although I do like providing web design for my clients, it demands more of my technical abilities and business sense, than it does my creativity. My web design business will certainly stay open for the foreseeable future, but I’m excited about bringing back making unique imagery in illustration.

I’m coming back to illustration with the spirit of why I originally did illustration in my 20’s. The reasons are multifaceted: Visual communication with a human touch. Telling stories. Feeling something from the art I create. Hopefully, getting others to feel something from the illustrations I create. Bringing beauty and soul back into our rushed and overly task driven lives.

It starts with the sketch I did of the vase of sunflowers I watched transform daily at the dinner table.