Opus Newsletter Contributor

This is the seventh and final article in a series by Alice Rich who has contributed to both our online and printed newsletters.

Alice Rich is well known to the BC art community for her seminars on business issues facing visual artists and in her own right, as a photographer and painter. Since graduating from UBC and Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design, Alice has worked in professional roles with two major galleries, founded a publishing company, and is presently working as an artist and seminar leader. She also has extensive community involvement on Art Boards and committees.

Due to popular demand, Alice Rich will present her Artrpreneur Seminar in Salmon Arm in May 2004. For registration details see the end of this article or email Alice at alice-rich@shaw.ca

Many of my articles and the last two in particular have conveyed information that I address in detail in my seminars. But to round out this series of articles I want to discuss the 'complete artist' or the 'whole artist'.

What is the complete artist? S/he is the artist who connects with and truly taps the creativity within to produce works that speak or dance like fine poetry. To be a complete artist, it is not enough to simply be good at selling and marketing your work. The complete artist lives with a full sense of enjoyment in what s/he does and achieves a career balance in which creative marketing builds on and supports creative work. In the busyness of our everyday world we are all committed to activity, and therefore production, but in truth, action is more important than activity in reaching our goals.

The real work is to discover the creative source which is you. You are the goal. Then, all else should fall into place. One direction for an artist is to acknowledge being and feeling; being as in consciousness and feeling as in compassion. This is where our personal aesthetic sense derives. Through action rather than activity we explore creativity. Artists are not all so practiced that we each can freely draw on our consciousness, compassion and creativity at whim. However, we have each experienced moments in which we have been touched with knowledge from observing and have found the harmony that comes from a deeper place. When this happens for an artist the creativity flows.

To achieve this state regularly requires discipline. It is a practice; the practice is you and your art. Your work is you, you are your work, your inspiration comes from your work, you inspire your work, you are the goal? It is all there already; you don't need to look anywhere else. If you plan to be any place other than here in your work, you will miss it. You will be forcing something that is only an idea. So to stay present in your work, breathe, dance, walk, meditate, do yoga, or whatever else it takes to observe and cut out the busyness, thereby allowing the complete artist full reign.

As you unleash your creative potential, the marketing will follow — people will react to the depth in your artwork. The right buyers will be attracted to your work and the prospects will flow to you. Art is a practice and just like all disciplines it takes work. It looks easy when it comes out in the form of a well-executed landscape or still life or sculpture, but when it reaches a depth that has impact, you can feel it and you know.

Art is the bridge, the connection of your being, to others. Your creativity is the marketable quotient; you are selling you [your goal] and your potential [through your portfolio]. Accept the challenge — be big, take a road outside the box, be an Artrepreneur and a complete artist.

Thank you for reading my articles. I value your feedback. Please check my website, www.alice-rich.com for upcoming seminars, past articles and events or ask to be on my mailing list.

Contributed by Alice Rich
alice-rich@shaw.ca

The Artrepreneur Seminar

Salmon Arm
May 22nd - 23rd, 2004

Register now for Alice Rich's popular Artrepreneur Seminar in Salmon Arm, BC. Opus is very pleased to bring you both of these special 2-day presentations of Alice Rich's popular Artrepreneur Seminar. The seminar is designed to assist artists with the marketing and self-promotion of their work.

For details on seminar topics, the cost of each 2-day seminar and to register, contact registrar, Joanne White at alice-rich@shaw.ca or call 604-255-1010, or visit Alice's website www.alice-rich.com