Next Monday I will be on a panel at the ZAPP conference in Atlanta with the topic: "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about the Jury But Were Afraid to Ask."
I'd love some input from you. Can you ask me now and I'll get answers for you and bring them back to this forum? Even long term veterans of this business have questions and I'm sure the newer members have lots. Artists live and die by the jurying -- so help me out so I can help you out. What are you dying to know?
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How do you determine the tastes of the area? The day of the show, directors and promoters (or better yet next year’s jurors) need to pay attention to what booths are constantly filled with people and what booths are not connecting with the people at the show. Another way would be to have a people’s choice award. I am always surprised that more shows don’t use this tool. I can think of no better way to determine the taste of the people who come to your show.
Willie: Not sure what you mean that customers are not "mythical". Nor is it to a choice of "high end" or "the lowest common denominator". You comments suggest, at least to me, you are painting with far too much of a black-and-white brush.
High end work that doesn't sell well at art shows is not a statement it is not great or that it is not spectacular - just that as Linnea pointed out, some of it is not what the public attending the event wants. Perhaps their market is galleries and museums and not art shows. And to support that contention, I believe if shows converted all the award money into patron purchase money, those artists would remove themselves from most shows, for without sales, they too could not economically justify attending events where they could not sell and there was not big award money to win.
Myself, I believe crowds at most show are more mainstream, for better or for worse from each person's perspective. And again, how successful overall can the event be longterm if the majority of artists are not selling well - meaning, the public is coming and buying artwork?
Last point. I met a woman doing mixed-media this year in Florida. She's been on the show circuit over 25 years. She explained that she uses as a reference to help her choose shows, a book of American artists, that provides bios on each. She sees who is on the jury, looks them up, then decides whether or not to apply, having learned from her 25+ years on the show circuit that she stands virtually little or no chance with jurors with certain types of backgrounds. I found it interesting, shocking, but probably a good way to proceed with the system as it currently exists. Demonstrates in yet another way of the prevalence of strong biases in the art world. A jury without biases is probably unrealistic, but my belief is every effort should be made to reduce the influence of jurors operating in the front end (e.g., doing onsite jurying) and trying to make it more meaningful to putting artwork in the show that people want to buy (e.g., commission shows where sales are known and good sales are biased for)
Larry Berman
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