COMMANDMENT #9: THY ARTIST, BE COMPACTABLE

After a year, I finally got my FIRST “Golden Ticket” letter to a mid-size show with approximately 100 artists. Finally, I got to do the happy dance and my self-esteem was back to normal.

During the previous year, I showed at small cafés, coffee shops, galleries and small venues. For my birthday my family bought a small 5’ X 8’ covered traveling trailer because I was at maximum capacity and a truck and an SUV were not holding everything for the shows.

I worked on getting a variety of major upgrades. I bought a new more durable tent with a bag on wheels, purchased a full-booth indoor/outdoor wall unit, and added print wracks, jewelry stands, easels, and baskets. I purchased welcoming décor that added to the ambience of my space, a dolly to carry everything and #1 added a candy dish with various hard and chocolate candies.

I was ready to take on the world by storm!

We will now go back to my intro. Being a traveling artist isn’t for the faint of heart. The truth is, it is hard and laborious work. When you receive a set-up time, it is chaotic. Get there EARLY! Especially if you didn’t attempt to set-up your booth as a trial run in the garage or backyard. Woops! Big mistake! At least take a moment to look at the instructions and see if the instructions were written in hieroglyphics with bad English and schematics. We all learn from our mistakes.

*Side note - If the show offers an electrical option with your space for an extra charge, it is well worth the $35.00+. Even if you do not have a light set-up, bring a fan and/or space heater!

If you get lucky, the show coordinators will give you X amount of hours to set-up the night before. This is very important, especially if you haven’t set-up your booth space in a trial run. In reality, your set-up display should be so compact that you can install a space within 2 hours. If you have to bring your art back in the morning to hang, so be it. Just get there EARLY!

*Side note; I personally like the two-day shows over one-day events. It is not as taxing on the body physically or mentally. Granted it is a whole weekend, but if the weather is bad one day, (trust me my husband and I sat through a Saturday Monsoon and bought a tray of Chicken nuggets to ride out the storm), people do not buy art during tornados, go figure! At least you have another day of promise.

After my first experience with the set-up process, which ended up taking all hours into the night, I think we ended up staying 2-3 hours past the set-up cut-off time. What do you do? By this time we were wiped out! It was a learning experience. Well, we learned what to do next time.

My first real juried show was a success! I made a profit and loved it! I loved the art, people, artists and connections. The artist community is so wonderful. Like I wrote before, we all have the same story. It is community of help, exposure, learning and wonderful. I literally could write a whole book based on my personal experiences in traveling art shows. This takes us to final and last - COMMANDMENT #10.