Will My Style Of Art Be Accepted?

Hi again everyone,

Sorry to clutter the forum, but I have a ton of questions... As I said in another post, I'm completely new to fairs and I'm about to start sending out applications in July for a couple of Fall festivals. I'm worried though that my medium might not be accepted into many fairs... I do wildlife art in graphite in a "fantastical realism" style and I do traditional wildlife art in colored pencil. I'm new to colored pencil though, so I don't think my colored pencil drawings will get accepted; consequently I wasn't planning on submitting those ones for consideration. So that leaves my graphite drawings - but I'm not sure if jurists will be keen on graphite artwork...Can everyone please give me your opinions?

I'm including a picture here of each of my types of drawing. Please keep in mind that the graphite drawing I'm posting here is more "cutesy" than my usual type of graphite drawings (although I do often lean toward the whimsical or humorous in my graphite drawings). These are the only pieces I currently have pictures of (I'm getting professional photos taken of all of my pieces before I apply for the festivals). My colored pencil drawings usually have a background - these two pieces are just studies, but as you can see, I'm still a beginner at colored pencil, which is why I'm not planning to submit those. Nevertheless I'm including them for you to see just in case...

woodland-wars.jpg

coyote-finished.jpg

hummingbird-contest-final-cp.jpg

Replies

Savina Francisco June 23, 2014 at 2:18pm

Hi David, Thank you for that! I eventually hope to make it to east coast shows, so it's good to know there are some that would welcome my style! I was thinking I'd stay local for my first year though so I could get used to the jurying process & once I'm accepted into a show, I could get some practice...My toughest challenges are going to be my booth setup and producing enough new art! Dealing of which, how many pieces would you says is the minimum for an art vendor to have? I was thinking 10 - does that sound right?
Savina Francisco June 23, 2014 at 2:13pm

Hi Stephen - I'm just new to the art fair world & I wasn't sure if graphite wouldn't do as well because it's not colorful...I absolutely love the medium, but I know people love color, so I was concerned...
Dave Hinde June 23, 2014 at 1:24pm

I don't see any reason why you wouldn't be accepted. If you were closer to Virginia, I'd suggest a couple shows where you'd do excellent. My suggestion would be to start out with smaller, but established, art shows. The suggestion is mainly for you to get your feet wet. Artists sometimes jump into the deep end with large shows, and get discouraged quickly.
Stephen White June 23, 2014 at 11:39am

I'm curious why you feel your medium would not be accepted into many fairs? Is there something about the process that you think will be frowned on?
Savina Francisco June 22, 2014 at 4:27pm

Here's a better picture of the graphite drawing (the one I uploaded up top is the final one - I changed the mouse's hat, but this one is a better quality pic).
- Savina Francisco > Savina Francisco June 23, 2014 at 2:23pm
  
  Wow, thank you for that suggestion Chris - that's a great idea! I think of myself as a visual storyteller, so I was thinking of doing a couple of others with them, but hadn't thought of making them regular characters! That just boosted my day!
- Chris Hoyt > Savina Francisco June 23, 2014 at 6:53am
  
  I usually never comment on 2D art because either I like it or I don't.
  
  What struck me with this is there's an opportunity to have an entire character with the mouse and his steed.
  
  I would take the mouse and rabbit and place them in different and humorous situations, different costumes, etc.
  
  Name them and copyright the name. You could get a reputation just for those two characters. Add some color and people will come into your booth and buy them because they will make them feel good.
  
  Just a thought.

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