It’s true, you have an appointment scheduled for 10 A.M. and you’ll get to see the doctor by noon. Need a quick appointment? Be ready for dawn patrol, cause you’ll wind up going in at Seven A.M.
Schedule a test and at the last minute it will be canceled because the doctor forgot to send the correct paperwork along, if the doctor will trust a mere patient with the precious documents.
What possible distress could an appointment at Eight A. M. cause a person who is all ready sick? Or need a test which requires fasting? You’ll get it scheduled at two o’clock. Of course the technician may have trouble hearing over the rumbling of your empty stomach.
What about the location? You can bet that if there is a way to do the job locally you won’t have a pray of having the doctor agree, no, it’s off to Calcutta or Bangladesh or Poughkeepsie. And that’s if you are only sick as a dog. The thing which makes the Croakers the happiest is if you are so sick that they can ship you off in an ambulance without having to listen to you whine about the expense. It’s only money. The only guy who thinks there is such a thing as “Only money’ is someone who has more than they know what to do with.
So what do you care? You are an artist and avoid Quacks like the plague. Smart artist, but there comes a time when you just have to and then you’ll think about the ole Trawler and wonder why you didn’t pay more attention.
What? You are young and healthy and take unborn vampire’s sweat capsules so it won’t have an adverse effect when it gets to your stomach and meets up with the Garlique you took this morning and you know that you will never have to deal with the Croaker again.
Because you don’t ever want to treat your clients, the gallery guys or the shows masters like you get treated by the doctor!
Your time is extremely valuable. It is the single most precious thing that an artist has. It is more important than talent, training or practice. Time is the one thing you will never have enough of and cannot plan to use too wisely nor husband too carefully. And the same thing is true of the people you depend on to appreciate your efforts.
Those nice tourists folks are on a tight schedule, flitting from one coastal town to another and if you do not treat then with the respect that their time deserves you can bet those clever folks in Bandon or Brookings or Newport will.
That’s right if you don’t treat people with the respect they deserve they will drive on down the road to where there are people just dying to give all their own time to making these nice touristy folks feel like a million dollars and maybe extracting some of their vacation money so that those clever artists can buy supplies and do the same thing again tomorrow.
Do you keep your appointments like a professional? I don’t care if you have never sold a painting or if you sell so often that you have no back stock, every appointment, be it gallery owner, reporter, museum director is a gift and you should give it the all of the care and devotion you would if they came with cash in hand.
There is simply no excuse for missing an appointment and precious few for being late. The time of the people you waste is every bit as valuable to them as your time is to you. Don’t squander their resources with your own rudeness.
Do your read the prospectus when you enter a show? Read it from cover to cover or do you just flip through to see what they accept and how much prize money is being offered? Do you read, really read all of the submission requirements and pay attention?
Every artist should required to host a show. The amount of work that goes into getting a show mounted is much like getting the Children of Israel out of Egypt, you have to part the waters of the Red sea and that’s just the first act.
The administrative effort of getting all of those entries opened, reviewed, check and prepared so that the jury can come in and make its selection is staggering.
And when you fail to properly follow the rules set out in the prospectus you add to that effort geometrically. If every one of three hundred artists fails to do just one thing then the show sponsors start with three hundred extra problems in addition to all of the other things that they have to do to get your art on the walls. If half of the submitting artists make two errors, you get the picture, don’t be the problem, there are plenty of problems to be had by anyone silly enough to put on an art show and they just don’t need your creative efforts.
I know you are the sort of person who wants to get it right. You do not want to make a name for yourself by being someone who makes such a mess of things that you get whispered about at every show, gallery and meeting for the next calendar year.
Croakers can afford to be indifferent, insensitive and downright rude, cause you can’t walk out when you are in the hospital. Patrons of the Arts can do that very thing and they will unless you make them feel like they have not only found the greatest art in the world but it is a privilege to pay for it and display it and that they are not only getting Fine Art but they are doing business with a personal friend.
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