The Meaning of Success

Hi! See, still in September and I'm doing a new blog post. I'm cooking up a virtual blogging storm!

Well, not really, still could do better, but I'm trying. Part of the problem is, I'm so far behind with news that it feels a bit overwhelming. Let's see how much I can catch up with in this post: So, first I'll talk about what progress I'm making in getting my work OUT THERE, one of the biggest challenges artists seem to face, especially shy and retiring ones like me that aren't good at approaching scary people like gallery curators. I've had work in an exhibition called "No Place Like Home"  in a gallery in Huyton, a smallish town near Liverpool. The exhibition began in July and will run until October 11th. This was something I applied for months and months ago, and had kind of forgotten about when I got an email saying "We'd like to put 3 of your pieces into our exhibition". So, I had to rush and get the pieces printed and framed, and then put up. The gallery is an exhibition space attached to the local library, and is a really nice light and airy space. I haven't actually been back to see the exhibition since it was all hung, but I'm hoping to get there before the exhibition comes down, and combine it was a visit to Liverpool Biennial which is also coming to a close in October.
I also entered a piece into the Warrington Contemporary Open Exhibition, and to my great pleasure, got accepted into the photographic side. It's a competition/art exhibition, but I don't really care about the competitive bit, it's just really satisfying to get into the exhibition, especially as the main judge was also the judge for a previous art exhibition that I applied for but didn't get into. I think what did it was that I choose a piece that very clearly shows what my work is about - it looks like a piece of abstract painting, but at the same time it is clearly a piece of the urban environment. Here it is:

 It's just nice to get my work into a few exhibitions, especially ones that has a competitive element like this. I've applied for several during this last year when I've been seriously pursuing an art career, and I'd all but lost hope of getting anywhere. I only really entered this one because my friend who's a textile artist has got stuff in it before, and urged me to apply. She got her work in this year too, so we'll be off together to the opening night next Friday to sip wine and hob knob with the artist community. I'll post pictures and a write up in my next post!
Of course, exhibitions are all very well, but it's also nice to sell some work, and the good news is, I've been doing that too! I sold the two pieces that were in the Mill Bridge Gallery that I mentioned in a previous post, and as we speak, the gallery has a stand at the Manchester Buy Art Fair, which is on this weekend. In fact, when I finish this blog I'm going over there to man the stall for a few hours. There's a few of my pictures over there on the stand, but as of this moment, none of them have sold. Watch this space though! Here's a picture of the corner of the stand that has my work in it - they are the two pieces immediately behind the wooden sculpture.

 Also, I have sold 2 pieces fairly recently on my Artfinder page, bringing my grand total to 4. So, overall I've been making really good progress! Of course, I'm not really making much money from it - that may come in time, but experience of other artists suggests maybe not. It's hard to make being an artists into a paying career, I'm realistic about that. It's more important to me that people like my work enough to part with money for it, or to put it into the exhibition. That just confirms my belief that it IS good and worthwhile work, and that's the most important thing for me at the moment.

Ok, more soon. As usual, there so much more to say, but I have to go and try and sell a few more of my pictures!

Vote for Photo Abstracts!

Whew! It's been a while I know, but I can honestly say it's because I've been a busy, busy lady! I'm not sure exactly what all this running around has achieved, but run around I have. First things first. I've tidied up the blog a bit, as you can see. I think it was probably a bit too "busy" before, so I have decluttered a little. Hope you like it!

So, I guess the first and most exciting thing to tell you is that my art is now available to buy online, from two different third party sellers! They are Artfinder and Saatchi Art (formerly known as Saatchi Online.) I was kind of hoping this was going to lead to a flood of orders from around the world, but hey, whaddya know!?, that hasn't happened yet, but I'm hoping to be inundated any day now. I'm selling different work on each site as well, to see if that helps.

OK, so please do go check me out on these different sites. Both are good in their own way - I personally used artfinder to buy my husband a Christmas present (print of Hitchcock made up of all his film titles, as he's a big fan), and I think they were really good. Saatchi has the edge in terms of quality of artists signed up at the moment though, I would say. I could personally spend several thousand pounds on amazing artwork every single time I go there - I'll post some examples of some of my favourites soon. But first, me:

Artfinder: https://www.artfinder.com/hannah-cawthorne

Saatchi Art: http://www.saatchiart.com/profiles/portfolio/id/679404


I partly joined Saatchi Art as they currently have a competition running that I thought it would be good to enter, called Showdown. If you would be so kind to check out my entry and vote for it (only the top 300 as voted for by the public make it through to the next round), you can do so here. There are about 6500 entries in all, and you vote by grading them 1 (bad) to 5 (excellent). You can vote on as many as you have patience for, as once you have voted for mine (which you are going to, right?), they will just keep showing you new entries at random. The top 300 (I guess the one with the highest amounts of 5's) will then go through to the next round. It's actually pretty addictive, getting to pass judgement on loads of other artist's work. (Does that make me a bad person?) It's also just good to see what kind of work other artists are producing right now as well.
 The range of quality in the competition is pretty varied - there's lots of poor stuff, but there's equally loads of really wonderful stuff. I'm perfectly OK with the fact that I'm highly unlikely to make it through. I just hope some of my favourites get through to the next round. That's what keeps me voting, I want to have my say on as many entries as I can. And, I have to say, I think my picture holds its own, even against the best of the ones I've seen so far.


Here is my entry, one of the new batch of pictures that I have just finished editing, from my trip to Budapest last October.

That one just narrowly beat this one into second spot, and is one of several from this new batch that I'm really pleased with:

Of course, in situations like this, you might want to ask, "how do we judge a piece of art?" "Who are we to say that this work is "better" than that?" Well, give the voting a go and you'll soon get your own ideas about criteria. For me, I have my own unique mix of -  what probably aren't entirely objective, but I like to think they are so some extent -  criteria, and my own personal preferences. I'm looking for a good idea, well executed, with some original thought and creativity going into it. But for the top marks, I guess there's no denying my taste is going to come into it a lot, as I'm only giving 5's for things I really love; things I would happily hang on my wall and look at for minutes at a time. And I do have a particular brand of artwork I really like, and which might not be other's cups of tea at all. So I guess personal preference will always come into it when judging art, which makes these kind of competitions really hard to judge on, which is why I'm not too bothered that I won't win! (But maybe, just maybe....)

OK, as usual, so much more to say, but it's going to have to be another time once again! Now go check out that art competition!