Selling at craft markets - hard lessons learned.

[JW Dewdney]

Kevin - I think what you're saying holds true for the lower-end "arts and crafts" market as far as people buying stuff to go over a suburban sofa goes. But I think Tim's pretty astute as far as all other markets go, and esp. the 'serious' art market. i'd have to support his comments on that. Granted though - I was doing most of my exhibiting and selling in the 80s - and I'm about to get into it again... but I really don't see the market having changed all that much. A killer piece is a killer piece... no matter how many of them are out there.

[David Crossley]

Tim nailed it.



David Crossley/Crossley Photography....

[Don Miller]

From my observations, B&W photographers don't last long on the art show circuit.

The number of truly bad photographers at many "juried" shows is stunning.

The guys who make good money have big setups with the right product at the right shows.

The OP could have simply asked several experienced art show photographers if they think his work would sell.

The exact name of the yahoo group is artshow_photo.

[Don Miller]

This guy is became wealthy selling "reproductions" and spends his time doing what he likes - traveling and shooting:

http://www.mangelsen.com/

There is plenty of evidence people will pay for photographs.

[Greg Lockrey]

"I really like that picture. Where did you take it so I can go and do it myself?"

Sure gets old hearing that one.

Tell them that it ain't there anymore. It's a strip mall now.

[kjsphotography]

why not cite some evidence that someone's wrong, instead of hurling an absurd generalization at them.

and speaking of evidence, i'm curious about your signature stating why "no one considers photography art."

how do you suppose all those people paying all-time record prices for photographs haven't gotten the message?

Show me living photographers (10+) that are making the same per piece of living painters such as Wyland, Pino, Vallejo, Hurst, etc… The list goes on and on.

Show me? Show me a living photographers ton one but many that can command $50K - $150K per piece on a daily basis as these living painters/ artist bring in per canvas?

Look at Loranc, Sexton, Kenna, Smith, etc.. They all bring in about $600 to 5K a photo where as a painters with the exact same name recognition can command 10 to 100 times more on every single sale.

The reason is that there is only 1 painting and a photograph is just another reproduction from the same negative in a sea just another pretty picture that anyone with a camera can take. Look through the camera, push the button, load into Photoshop and print until the heart is content. Or put the negative into the neg carrier or contact printing frame and print until your eyes grow tired. Noting more than reproduction time after time.

Why would anyone in their right mind pay $50K for a duplicate that anyone else can own.

Lets take it a step further. Why would someone pay $20K on an original Adams photograph when they can get a silver printed one by Alan Ross from Adams negative for $125 ?

Editions, duplicates, reproduction are the flaw with photography and this is why most people that collect ART would never consider purchasing a photograph. They tell me that they would not because they are not going to spend money on duplicates.

A gallery owner told me a story how people would come into his photography gallery on weekends and say to him that he has have really nice photograph, but where is the art? He would reply the photograph is art and then they would reply no art the paintings?
Most people not matter how much you disagree do not consider photography as art , but instead that of something that is technical in nature that anyone can do no matter what you thought you believed. I bought the lie and now I have to rethink what I am going to do.

I had another conversation with another gallery owner about a week ago and brought up to his attention the idea of 1/1 and he liked the idea, I then asked the owner if they thought people would consider it more of a work of art rather than a photograph by only allowing one and destroying the negative? He said if you want to be known as an artist this is the wrong medium and you should consider going back to painting. My jaw dropped but the person spoke the truth. It is all perception and people do not perceive photography as an art form but rather a technical process period.

I have talked to many collectors ( over 100 ) in the last 6 months, collectors of fine art ( real art not photographs ) and they all say the exact same thing. These guys/ladies have no problem paying $10-100K a painting but will not pay $2K for a photograph because there are multiple copies out there. Now with digital it has even worsened the photographic market as there is more crap in circulation as now anyone that owns a camera is a photographer.

You ever wonder why people that own a piano do not call themselves a pianist, but someone who owns a camera automatically calls themselves a photographer / fine artist? Then they go one step further goes into business for themselves as a portrait persons, wedding person, artist, fill in the blank but only lessens the value of photography as an art form even more. I just love those picture of fie art butterfly photographs! Really does a lot to help the photographic market if you ask me, or how about those picture of bears and flowers, but hey this is #1/100! But it now! Do you have any wonder why people are only willing to pay very little for a photograph?

This has cheapened photography to new lows. Most do not consider photography art but rather a technical form period.

Argue all you want but at the end of the month when you compare the sales fro the average painter to the average photographer the painters win hands down every single time. Why? Because people consider a painting a work of art and a photograph just an average pretty picture no matter how good it is.

My wife just started o get back into painting and she is killing me in sales and I have been at this for years. Like it or not even her clients will say I have nice pictures ( don’t even say photograph ) but only buy her paintings. Everyone comes over to pick up their paintings and ask to see my images but in the end they don’t buy only look and say how nice they are.

Argue all you want, but it is the way it is.

Will 1/1 photograph help? I have no idea but it will indeed raise the bar I believe to the sea of multiples and help leverage you apart from the masses doing what every else is doing and will keep you generating new work on a consistent basis. Also this will insure buyer that you are willing to sacrifice the negative to prove that photography is just as beautiful and important an art form as panting, and just like a painting there will only be 1 of the image they buy ever.

As long as there are editions of photograph form the same negative , photography will just be that another pretty picture in the sea of multiples.

Oh wait I just sold out the 8x10 edition of 10, I better make the 11x14 edition of 50 now from the same negative!

That is the problem!

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

That was unnecessary, Kevin. I love your work, own a couple of your bags, and might end up using your software, but in this case I'm afraid that Tim is right.

Why is Tim right? As far as I know he has not given any reasons for stating his opinion. I know that Kevin has talked to collectors, both of photography and painting, some which pay upwards of $20,000 for a painting, to gallery owners who are intrigued by the idea of a photographer treating his work like art and selling just one photograph and then destroying the negative. Has Tim posed this question to anybody, or is he just giving and opinion of which he knows nothing about?.... sorry, but Kevin stating that Tim is once more talking about something he has no clue about is more accuarte than it appears. However inpoliteit might have appear.

[riooso]

Here is a new slant on the "so I can go do it myself". Tell them no you can't because you need one of these! Roll out the 4x5 and lenses and pod. Their eyes pop open. The ones that are willing to expend the energy to try the LF journey end up supporting film and the vendors that I use. The ones that fall by the way side helped us all indirectly. I have a couple that came back and say "thank you".

Richard

[kjsphotography]

"I really like that picture. Where did you take it so I can go and do it myself?"

Sure gets old hearing that one.

Exactly, why buy it when they can grab that new digital capture device (DSLR) that is completely automated and take it themselves or garb there 35mm, 120, LF and pop in some film and snap away.

Unfortunately this is the medium of photography and unless we can change poeples view of it, we will always be stuck as wannabes no matter how hard that is to swallow.

[tim atherton]

Show me living photographers (10+) that are making the same per piece of living painters such as Wyland, Pino, Vallejo, Hurst, etc… The list goes on and on.

Show me? Show me a living photographers ton one but many that can command $50K - $150K per piece on a daily basis as these living painters/ artist bring in per canvas?

Gursky, Struth, Esser, Demand, Sugimoto, DiCorcia, Crewdson, Graham, Burtynsky, Richardson, Simon, Tillmans, Beard, Eggleston, Wall, Penn, Nixon, Barney... how many more do you want?

Photographers whining about how much painters sell really crappy paintings is like poets complaining about how many copy's of the last Harry Potter book sold, or sculptors complaining about how much film directors make (though I've heard one complain about how really awful painters constantly make more than them) - totally different things, different practices, with no bearing on each other

You can make far more money than most pretty good painters - and certainly any of those you mentioned - if you become a first class photographic artist