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  • Dee Hooks March 20, 2012 at 9:44am

      What I noticed about this interview was that he did not actually answer many of the questions that were asked of him.

  • Karen Steininger March 19, 2012 at 5:36pm

    I'm trying to figure out how the plaque and certification made no impression on the customers in the booth that Les monitored for two days, no impression on the customers in another 'certified' booth, but actually assisted an artist in making more money than usual at a show! It's either being noticed, or it's not; he can't say it works both ways.

    • Karen Steininger > Karen Steininger March 19, 2012 at 5:37pm

      And yes, thanks to Larry for taking on this task.

      • Nels Johnson > Karen Steininger March 19, 2012 at 7:21pm

        I was at Ft. Myers, and as I pointed out before, Les and I know each other well.  He came by my booth to browbeat me into contributing to the kids art.  He never once mentioned his proposal.  I find that very curious.

        This is still all about elitism.  Certain few were chosen and the rest of us left out.  Hardly the way to go about gathering support for an idea that would affect us all.

        BTW.  The artist at the Grove who had increased sales because of the enumerated sign--how can you be sure increased sales were because of this rather than it was just his lucky year.  That is pretty spurious correlation.

        Mr. Slesnick never made his living solely based on his art sales. He had a very profitable career to shore himself up with.  Yet he wants to be in the position of impacting our sales, the ones who do this for a living.  He is the wrong person--actually no one person deserves to be in that position.

        I would rather he spent more time in other activities rather than impacting our way of life.

        Sorry Les, that is just the way it is.

        There is no room for elitism in our biz yet he smacks of it every time he opens his mouth.

        • Robert Coomer > Nels Johnson March 20, 2012 at 1:41pm

          I was at the Winter Park meeting. The story went that a couple brought a piece of art up to purchase, and in the process they noticed the plaque. The artist told them the story about the plaque, why it was there, and the struggle of art shows. They purchased 2 additional pieces.

          I would argue the story of the artist's passion for shows and his struggles was what sold the additional pieces, and not the plaque.

          Most of the artists who seemed to agree with his idea or at least the concept seemed to be rooted in getting sales back to where they were, and looking for an outside fix, either getting rid of the 1 - 2% buy sell he pointed out, eliminating the lower cost artists / weekend warriors by forcing them to increase their prices, etc. etc. etc. Those are concepts not voiced by Les, but ambiguous hopes applied to his idea.

          I would argue if a change is truly necessary, it begins within us.  If you can't compete with buy sell, it's either not your buyers/market, or you really need to evaluate what you are doing as an artist or sales person and how you can reach your market, or find another.

  • Sara Aune March 19, 2012 at 4:57pm

    Thanks for doing this interview, Larry.  Though it in no way made me more comfortable with the concept. I can't help be feel it is his way of trying to insert himself into a new occupation.

  • Tahmi DeSchepper March 19, 2012 at 3:21pm

    Thanks Larry! I also forgot to ask just what being put on hold means? Is it "I've got to fix a few things in this proposal and will float it again in a few months" or "Arghhh!" (throws hands up in air and walks away). 

    I'm also curious as to who the artists were who participated in the early proposals that gave Les the sense that this would be well received by artists at large. What was the difference between those 2 groups and the group at Winter Park I wonder?

    • Larry Berman > Tahmi DeSchepper March 19, 2012 at 3:27pm

      If you read the interview when I first posted the link, there is now an added paragraph at the end kind of explaining the status.

      Larry Berman

      • Tahmi DeSchepper > Larry Berman March 19, 2012 at 4:59pm

        Thanks! That's exactly the info I was looking for :)

  • Tahmi DeSchepper March 19, 2012 at 2:48pm

    It's good to hear that this idea has been put on hold - although it would have been much better to hear that it's being abandoned. But I have to say that the whole interview just confused me more as to what exactly the point of the whole thing is/was. I point out this part of the interview:

    Larry: So my feeling about accreditation is that it’s much easier accrediting a few hundred people (jurors and show directors) than 15,000 to 20,000 people.
    Les: My goal was never to get it all accredited. My goal was to keep it quite small.
    Larry: But what’s the point of that if shows start using it as criteria for acceptance?
    Les: They never will.

    a). If this is to combat buy/sell, but he only ever intended to "certify" a very small number of artists, how does that help the problem? Is he saying that if you aren't part of the small select group your work might as well be buy/sell?

    b). If this is to combat buy/sell, but he never intended shows to use the certification as part of their approval process, then what is the point to the accreditation?

    Is there anything else that was said that might help shed light on this confusing issue?

    Thanks for doing the interview!

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