Spectrum Fantastic Art Live debuted in Kansas City last week with an aura of inspiration. Truly one of the most amazing groups of talent in one place I have ever experienced. Much credit goes to Arnie and Cathy Fenner along with their dedicated team. They pulled together a professional show that included educational panels and speakers as well as an awards show that blew the lid off any other art awards show existing today. Academy awards look out! I presented the Institutional, Silver and Gold winners on the stage of the beautiful 1927 Midland theater. More pics on the floor of the show here and here.It was wonderful seeing sooo many friends and their creations all in one place. It reminded me of Comic Con in the very early days. I was selling posters, prints, postcard sets, music, as well as signing lots of books, Magic cards, and meeting new collectors. Roxana was doing even better as her scents had people sniffing the air and making a beeline to her elegant showcase.I moderated a panel titled, Artist As Brand, Rise of the Artist Entrepreneur with Michael Whelan, Donato Giancola, William Stout, Virginie Ropars, and Arnie Fenner. Lovely group with much synergy. A large crowd joined the conversation.Three days before I set up a booth with Roxana for the show, I presented an Artist As Brand® workshop at the Aladdin Hotel to ten individuals who traveled from across America to experience the seminar together. More on this soon. Greg Montana was Skyped in for a live coaching session and Roxana gave an inspired presentation too.The poignant documentary film by Maria Cabardo, Better Things, Life & Choices of Jeffrey Catherine Jones premiered at Spectrum Live too. This is a beautiful biopic. Well done!
Sign Up deadline is Now.
Spectrum Fantastic Art Live! and Artist As Brand are aligning to bring creative empowerment and prosperity to artists in Kansas City, May, 2012.
Spectrum Fantastic Art Live! is a natural extension of the eighteen-year success of the award-winning Spectrum: The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art annual.
I designed the Artist As Brand Workshop for all artists who desire clarity of purpose in their art, and want a proven method to attract fans, patrons, collectors. It is open to all serious artists, students and professionals. Learn the secrets of connecting the power of your essence with your art directly to the people who will buy it, and see how these principles can be applied at an event like Spectrum Live.
All participants will receive free access to all three days of Spectrum Fantastic Art Live. The workshop is held at the Historic Aladdin Holiday Inn Hotel, just blocks from the convention center.
Learn more about the workshop on theABOUT page.Read the REGISTER page before signing up.See what art professors, professionals, and college students are saying on the RESULTS page.
Register Here
Sign Up deadline is May 6th.
Spectrum Fantastic Art Live! and Artist As Brand are aligning to bring creative empowerment and prosperity to artists in Kansas City, May, 2012.
Spectrum Fantastic Art Live! is a natural extension of the eighteen-year success of the award-winning Spectrum: The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art annual.The Spectrum book has come to symbolize the vibrancy, diversity, and overall excellence of this international art community. Spectrum Fantastic Art Live! is an art fair in which creators will be able to sell originals and prints while promoting their work to patrons, collectors, and potential clients. Whereas the ubiquitous comic con focuses on all facets of popular art culture, Spectrum Fantastic Art Live! focuses on the artist and their sales.
This focus makes it a perfect fit with Artist As Brand! I will be presenting a workshop three days before the event. It is open to all serious artists, students and professionals. Learn the secrets of connecting the power of your essence with your art, to your collectors, and see how these principles can be applied at an event like Spectrum Live.
All participants will receive free access to all three days of Spectrum Fantastic Art Live. The workshop is held at the Historic Aladdin Holiday Inn Hotel, just blocks from the convention center.
Learn more about the workshop on theABOUT page.Read the REGISTER page before signing up.See what art professors, professionals, and college students are saying on the RESULTS page.
Register Here
Kendall Students
I presented an Artist As Brand workshop at Kendall College of Art and Design this past weekend and wow, these students were on fire! They were already formulating ideas for a multimedia community art event to be held at the school next year. I was impressed with the strong independent art spirits in this group. Go Kendall!The amazing life coach Greg Montana was Skyped into our session pumping up the group. Twenty eight students, alumni and faculty stuck it out for the three ten hour days. You could feel the love! See more pics here.
Artist As Brand was a complete success!!! 3 day illustration boot camp, followed by a lovely dinner with the amazing illustrator that created it!... I have had the best weekend ever!! I mean ever!!.... priceless.-Amanda Schaub
I am going for what I want in life. I'm getting my mind, body, and soul together and failure is a foreign word now.-La'kenya Shauray TerrellI can't thank Greg enough for sharing his wealth of knowledge and more importantly, touching my heart. -Kirbi FaganSweet! I will be back next year.Thank you also to Christine Brown, Nancy Hart, and Jon Mcdonald for introducing me to such an awesome school.PeaceGreg
I am presenting a three day workshop May 15 (Tues), 16 (Wed.), 17 (Thurs), before the May 18-20 Spectrum Live event in Kansas City, MO. This is a great opportunity for all artists to learn the Artist As Brand principles and then see how it applies at an event like Spectrum Live, where I will have a booth too!Which artists know how to present themselves in a unique and professional manner? Who stands out? What can you do that nobody else is doing? How to present yourself at a shows like Spectrum Live is only a small part of what you will learn in this course. You will be empowered and prepared to manifest your own art empire. Get ready to see your professional art career from a very different perspective.And receive a free 3 day pass to Spectrum Live!Read the REGISTER page before signing up.Learn more about the workshop on theABOUT page.See what art professors, professionals, and college students are sayinghere.
The Beerhorst Family
The Beerhorst Family is pure Artist As Brand. In fact Rick Beerhorst says the family is a brand! Take a look at this article on Etsy and the video and see what I mean.
Empowerment People!
Greg
I am honored to be presenting a workshop at the historic Westbeth in NYC.Located in West Greenwich Village, Westbeth has provided affordable living and working spaces for artists and their families since 1970. The workshop is open to all artists. I guarantee that any participant that faithfully applies the principles learned in the class will sell more art in the coming year than they did the year before or I will refund their registration fee.
$295
$150 For Westbeth residents!
REGISTRATION CLOSED
REGISTER BY LEAVING YOUR NAME AND CONTACT INFORMATIONHERE.
Westbeth (Community Room) 55 Bethune Street New York City, 10014 212- 691-1500
Read the REGISTER page before signing up.
Learn more about the workshop on the
page.See what art professors, professionals, and college students are saying
When you finish this seminar you will be empowered to take any success you have now to another level.See you soon!
Greg Spalenka
LESSONS LEARNED
Experiences are going to be good and bad depending on your perspective, but if we focus on the lessons learned we can always view it through a positive lens. Every San Diego Comic Convention since my first in 1974 has taught me something. In the beginning Comic Con was all about fans appreciating comics and the creators behind the art of these stories. Writers, artists, publishers, merchandisers, all gathered for this large show and tell of popular art culture, to be seen as well as trade and sell their products. Comic Con grew on this simple premise.
The film and television industries were always present at the event but more on the fringes. Over the last decade the tables have turned and promotions for the large media conglomerates have taken center stage, literally. This has changed the fan base. Serious collectors that flocked to the event are becoming rare. I was elated to see Mr. Katz, one of my best patrons stop by the booth. When I asked why he had not been to the Con in nine years he waved his hand toward the FOX and Warner Brothers islands and said, "I could do without all this."
Ric Meyers (writer and presenter of the Kung Fu extravaganza at Comic Con) mentioned "the artists and merchandisers are being pushed towards the walls, and disappearing into them." Many of my favorite artists do not come to Con anymore because it is too expensive.
This year a group of Pixar artists started an event called “Tr!ckster” across the street from Con in response to what they consider an impersonal giant. It's fascinating that a group of artists who make their livings strapped to a corporate entity are putting together alternate events to Comic Con. This highlights the dilemma I see in the corporate world all the time. Artists become addicted to the salaries they receive working for industry, yet yearn for independence. The challenge is you have very little time to do your own work once you are locked into that system.
The shining light in all this is that your fans, your patrons and collectors will stick with you wherever you are. Some of my collectors who I met at Comic Con years ago stopped by to see me and purchased art (one is the Batgirl painting above that I worked on at the booth). I love my supporters, they make the trip to San Diego worth while. Also seeing my artist friends at this event is enjoyable.There are other conventions popping up around the U.S. I was speaking with Arnie and Cathy Fenner about Spectrum Live to be held next May in Kansas City. It is an event that is focused on the artist. I will be there with a booth and as well as presenting an Artist As Brand workshop! Yes, stay tuned, Spectrum and Artist As Brand are aligning.What did I learn this year? Comic Con is becoming less of a place to sell and more of a venue to promote. The big question is if it's worth it? That being said my Crescoptiscope from The Visions of Vespertina was a hit and brought many curious eyes to the booth. I wish you could have all seen it in action. Had to be there!
For those of you who could not make it to San Diego, I have a few Masters of Science Fiction and Fantasy Art left. See some of the bookhere. I am in it with Brom, Kinuko Craft, Dan Dos Santos, Donato, Charles Vess, Stephan Martiniere, James Gurney, and more. It is an awesome collection, with insightful commentary by the artists. $25.00, shipping included. You can purchase it at Amazon for the same price but mine comes signed.
To your art empire,
Greg
Google's settlement with authors and publishers has been tossed out, shining a spotlight on copyright law.
I have been following the Orphans Works and Google digital library showdowns for a while now. These issues are important for all creators who copyright their work to protect it from unauthorized use. In a nutshell the Orphans Works issue concerns books, illustrations that are out of print and authors or artists who created them but cannot be found easily. Companies like Google and other large image houses like Corbis Images would have no problem selling that work without compensating the creator.
The Google Digital Library falls into this category too. The idea of a world wide digital library is an awesome concept. However whenever there is a corporation involved you can bet that there must be a profit margin plugged into that idea. The beauty and power behind libraries is that they share knowledge for free, or next to it. Google wanted to charge you for that privilege. Plus did they really attempt to contact all the artists, authors, and estates that may be connected to the deceased ones? Probably no.As the Illustrators' Partnership comments, "The $125 million commercial agreement would have rewarded Google and the US Authors Guild for the largest mass infringement of authors' copyrights in history. Instead, the judge ruled it a business deal "too far."Learn more about Orphaned Works here.Read more about the Google Court Case here.To your creative empowerment,Greg
Spalenka for Chester College
The power of the Blog has turned marketing on it's head. When you have large companies showcasing and catering to the creators of intimate and niche Blogs you come to the conclusion that either these corporate entities have run out of ideas to promote their products and services or they realize the potential in one of the smartest and influential online mediums of our day. I compare the Blog to an individual zine or magazine that can be updated daily or weekly. When the creator of this publication has something unique to say and can tap into the mind set of their niche market it is truly amazing the numbers of people that will come to see what is up.
Utilizing the Blog as a promotional tool for artists is crucial.Updating it consistently is crucial. During my Artist As Brand workshops we look at what makes up a successful Blog. It really can be a fun and enlightening process when you truly devote some time to this medium. More importantly it seduces the viewer into your world.
This article, Marketing's New Rage: Brands Sponsoring Influential Bloggers in WWD (Women's Wear Daily) by Cate T. Corcoran showcases how Barneys New York, Gap, Coach and other big brands are collaborating with bloggers to create new and controversial forms of advertising for a more social age. They might invite a blogger to guest blog, sponsor a series of daily outfit posts featuring their product, create or request a video of the blogger talking about the brand or wearing the product or even ask the blogger to design for the brand.
You don't have to be picked up by another brand to showcase your own unique art empire! Of course Blog alignments are important, but that is a story for another time. Bottom line is: Blog's Have Power. Use it.
To artist empowerment,
Greg
Produce Your Own Unique Art Empire!
FIND ART GALLERYAugust 6, 7, 8 Friday-Sunday 10AM- 8PM1640 Superior Ave. Costa Mesa, CA 92627
With Special Guest Lectures by writer and art critic Peter Clothier, licensing expert Maria Brophy, social media master & botanical perfumer Roxana Villa.
Please read the REGISTER page before signing up.
Learn more about Artist As Brand on the ABOUT page.