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Selling Art

Writer's picture: TimTim

Updated: 3 days ago


A painting of a bus stop with a slug crawling up it.
A quick sketch of a bus stop. Plus slug. Contact me if interested.

I’ve now read a few books on selling art. It seems to me that it boils down to this. Find your niche, write your story, find your audience, then get out there and let them know you, and your art exist. Easy.


Let’s start with the niche. With so many artists out there already doing so many different subject matters in so many different styles, finding a niche is difficult. And that’s before you consider the audience for your niche. It’s not too difficult to think of a subject that probably hasn’t been covered, but chances are it hasn’t been covered for a reason. Let’s say you decide your niche is paintings of slugs. Or bus stops. Or slugs on bus stops. Not many paintings like that out there I’ll warrant, but not many fans of paintings of slugs on bus stops either. That shouldn’t stop you from trying, of course, but don’t expect the enquiries to roll in.


So, what do you paint? Paint what you like, of course. Do what interests you, what excites you, what catches your eye and fascinates you. Even if it’s a subject matter many other artists have covered, you never know - maybe there’s a way you do it that sheds some light on it (possibly quite literally) in a way that nobody else has done. Because niche isn’t just subject matter, it’s style too. But style is another tricky thing to stand out in, especially when you’re starting out because, intentionally or not, you often find yourself being influenced by the styles of those who have come before. Finding your own style takes time, courage, practise, and lots of experimentation.


I’ve often heard it said that you should tell your story, which is often connected to your niche, of course. Your story is likely to influence your niche. Everybody has a story. It just depends on whether you think it’s one worth telling. I have one story I’d love to tell, and I do hope to be able to soon. It will take courage, though. And I do wonder if anybody will like the paintings that come out of my story. It’s a very personal thing, not something I imagine many people would want to put up on their wall.


If I looked at my output so far, my niche, and story, would be hard to define, I think. Nice views of old buildings, people and animals. That’s about it really. I’m just doing the usual things, not giving anything about myself away. It’s all surface. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course. Many artists just paint things they find interesting or beautiful. It doesn’t have to be deep or meaningful. And that’s often the kind of things that people like to put up on their walls. They don’t want heavy tales of angst hanging in their living room. But that does mean it’s a crowded area and you’ll have difficulty standing out.


So I think I need to dig a little, or a lot, deeper. And start painting a bit more of what I really want to paint. I do enjoy the paintings I normally undertake; I wouldn't paint them if that wasn't the case. But there's a lot more to be said and done.

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