J. Gordon Anderson - Contemporary Art

I advise all artists who are serious about trying to promote and sell their work to start a website of their own, and then have business cards made that have the web address on it, as well as other contact information. My website over the years has helped generate sales, shows, commissions, and other forms of publicity. While a fair amount of work has to go into maintaining these sites, the payoff is generally far greater than the work involved. While starting and maintaining an art website is easy, organizing it is another matter entirely. There seem to be two approaches to organizing it: 1) it is simply an online gallery, showing your work over the years. Many successful, major artists do this. 2) it is an online clearinghouse and way to sell your work, with pricing and purchase information. Or 3) it is a little of both. I have to admit that I don't really know which approach is best. I've tried all of them over the years. What I do now is more like a combination of all thre...

A woman I dated a number of years ago - a ceramic artist - suggested to me once that my paintings had uninteresting names... names like, " Two Figures and a Yellow Book, Old Man, Lonely Old Man, etc. " So I started giving my art more fantastic names. Overall the reaction has been great, and I am glad I did it. The name of a work is part of the work, just as a person's name is part of who he is, and even helps define that person. A more unusual name also alters the way a person views a work of art. " Gray Buildings " vs. " The Last Memento from a Torrid Love Affair " evoke radically different thoughts when looking at the work itself. In my experience the unusual name helps the viewer engage with the art more. So I think a lot of thought go into a name - it shouldn't be chosen off the cuff.