Save the Date | Kick Off 2018 with the Next #ArtistHotline

The monthly Twitter chat will return on Wednesday, January 17. 

Welcome to 2018! Are you ready to take your career to the next level in the new year? If you’re looking for actionable tips and advice from the creative community, join us for #ArtistHotline, NYFA’s monthly Artist Professional Development Day on Twitter. The chat, which is open to all and is easy to follow using the hashtag #ArtistHotline, takes place the third Wednesday of each month and will return to Twitter on Wednesday, January 17 from 11:00 AM – 4:00 PM EST. As always, there will be a Guest Chat on a dedicated theme, from 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM EST; January’s “New Year, New Budgets” Guest Chat will offer tips on budgeting for your personal life and arts career, and for your most ambitious artist project.

Read more about how you can participate on January 17 here, find a range of concrete pointers below, and, learn about December’s winners of our #ArtistHotline anniversary giveaway below! 

December Topics

During December’s #ArtistHotline, we shared a range of general arts career tips, such as:

• Build strong applications with compelling proposals and statements, and carefully though-out project budgets;
• Find opportunities online using tools like NYFA Source;
• Even the simplest organizational methods, like using spreadsheets, can help you keep track of deadlines;
• Fully fund your 2018 artist projects with fiscal sponsorship (learn about NYFA Fiscal Sponsorship here).

Key Takeaways from the “Tackling Creative Block” Guest Chat

Our December Guest Chat panelists were writer and curator Danielle Krysa; Design Matters founder and host Debbie Millman; and dancer, choreographer, and writer Wendy Perron. Here’s a partial summary of the dynamic chat:

• Creative block can make you dig deep and reinvent your methods;
• Sometimes it’s necessary to let yourself make “bad art,” or really rough work, which takes courage, and courage leads to confidence; 
• Just do it! That way, you at least have something to look at or edit;
• On the other hand, taking time off from a project, or from creating, is often a necessity, not a luxury. Rest and sleep can be the birthplace of creativity;
• It’s important to embrace where you are now, in order to get to where you want to be;
• Find the time of day that’s ideal for you to create, so you’re not forcing things and adding to a sense of fatigue;
• Seek feedback from others, especially those in the same arena or who are invested in a similar aesthetic. A few trusted people who consistently give you good feedback can be more than enough, and, if you live in a small town, you can always find your peers online!

“Work-Life Balance” Arts Administrator Q&A

Anna Ogier-Bloomer, Assistant Director of Career Development at the School of Visual Arts, and a feminist artist and photographer, answered questions about the delicate art of balance. Key takeaways:

• Allow the natural ebb and flow of the creative process and of a professional art life to exist;
• It’s OK to say “no” to things to help prioritize: when an opportunity comes in, assess what it will take for you to complete it, what you’ll get out of it, and any downsides to not participating;
• Designate time in your day or week to be in the studio and stick to it. Start small, hit your goal, then build on it over time;
• Be diligent about meeting application deadlines. It’s tough to stop working to submit an application, but it’s important to keep throwing your hat into the ring;
• There are an increasing number of residencies (and organizations!) that facilitate the role of artist-parent. Examples include the Sustainable Arts Foundation, the Wassaic Project, the Millay Colony for the Arts, Popps Packing, Womens Studio Workshop, Headlands Center for the Arts, and Marble House Project;
• Support structures are critical for artists. Help each other out on a grassroots level.

The Profitable Artist Giveaway

As a way to celebrate #ArtistHotline’s marking its 30-month milestone, we gave away a complementary copy of The Profitable Artist (Allworth Press, 2011) to three individuals. These artists qualified by using the hashtag #ArtistHotline during the day, and were randomly selected. The winners are: multi-disciplinary artist Jennifer Maria Córdoba Alvarez; watercolor artist Sophia Khan; and author Pam Stucky. Find these lucky #ArtistHotline participants tweeting at @JenniferMaria, @sophiasstudio, and @pamstucky. 

Thank you to everyone who participated last month! If you missed the December chat, you can read the full day’s conversation in our Wakelet recap. We hope you’ll join us from month to month for more professional development advice and goodies! In the meantime, stay up-to-date with NYFA by following us at @nyfacurrent on Twitter.

Inspired by the NYFA Source Hotline, #ArtistHotline is an initiative dedicated to creating an ongoing online conversation around the professional side of artistic practice. #ArtistHotline occurs on the third Wednesday of each month on Twitter. Our goal is to help artists discover the resources needed, online and off, to develop sustainable careers.

This initiative is supported by the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation.

Image: Fernanda Guerra