I enjoy making images for myself. If someone enjoys my work and wants to further their relationship with a piece by purchasing it, that’s wonderful. But selling is not the driving force behind my work. It is really more about the personal expression and the journey than anything else.
As a fine art photographer, it was important to find gallery representation earlier in my career. I found that search very much about being in the right place at the right time. Over the years, I’ve had a number of galleries represent my work, and perhaps I always pulled the short straw and spent all my energies chasing gallerists to get paid, verses concentrating on producing the work. This by the way is an extremely common story among artists. The good thing about having gallery representation is that the work is seen in public.
I have now chosen a slightly different model in the form of a private dealer. A private dealer is someone who does not exhibit work in a public space, but rather in a private space, an office. Dealers are known to “move” work, they usually have very strong relationships with art buyers and sell work very consistently. Since moving to this model 6 or 7 years ago, I haven’t had any financial issues, but of course, a private dealer’s biggest limitation is that they don’t work out of a public space. There is no “foot traffic” to speak of. It also helps if you build your career before you approach a private dealer, or gallerist for that matter, so that you already come to them with a loyal following for your work. A dealer or gallerist will not invest in building your career at that level.
Another decision that I made early on was to donate all of the studio’s net profits to charities with an emphasis on breast cancer. So after all the models have been paid, the printing done, supplies and framing paid, all net proceeds are given away. It’s one of the parts of my life that I’m most proud of.
Portrait
of a Diskos Thrower, Profile
