Artist Ann Rea

After over seven years of not painting, I quit my job, sold my house, and I moved to the beach in San Francisco determined to make a living as a painter.

I had no plan, but because I’m a creative, I created one. Then I turned a profit in my first year in business – shattering the starving artist myth.

And in the past five years I have received considerable national media attention without the benefit of a publicist.   They include national media features on the “Fine Living Channel” and NBC’s “In Wine Country“, and in “The Wine Enthusiast“, “Practical Winery and Vineyard Management” and “Fortune” magazines. And Jonathan Fields profiled my blue ocean business strategy in “Career Renegade“, published by Random House this year.

Along with my work, these features have focused on my business model, a blue ocean strategy.  As a result, artists began contacting me from across the globe asking for help.   They wanted to earn more money, they wanted to sell their art.  I suggested that they needed help defining their market, shaping a unique selling proposition, and growing their sales,  foreign concepts for too many artists.

Since the business of art is one of my favorite topics, each Monday I began coaching and consulting by phone with a select number of established, part-time, and reemerging artists from across the globe.  This list has grown to include painters, mixed media artists, photographers, sculptors, craftsmen, and fashion and interior designers.

Marketing is easy and innate for me. At my first job at a design firm, I initiated the concept of selling GM’s Saturn car for the same price to everyone.  My marketing clients range from E&J Gallo, a billion dollar corporation, to individual artists and entrepreneurs.

This year when the Dean of the business school at Mills College asked if I would consider helping them develop a MBA program for the Arts in the future, I realized that I had something.

But there are only so many Mondays and I have my own business to run and paintings to paint.

Maybe I can reach a broader audience and I can attract a community of thriving artists who I could profile in a future book?

So my intention is to cultivate a positive and productive on-line global community of thriving artists and to provide guidance through a series of Q&A posts.

You’re invited to submit your contribution or your question and I’ll do my best to provide useful answers based on my experience.  The more specific your question, the more likely that I can answer it.

And if you are interested in applying for my consulting services, I invite you to schedule a 10 minute complimentary phone consultation.

Here is my first draft of The Artists Who Thrive manifesto. I welcome your comments and contributions.

• We believe that we have shaped our artistic voice and that we have something to say.
• We believe we offer creative expression that adds value to the world and therefore the marketplace.
• We believe that we are creating and growing a business.
• We articulate our unique selling proposition to our defined market.
• We believe that we will not be discovered but our value can if we promote it.
• We believe that the traditional model of artist representation is too often broken so we represent ourselves using effective strategic marketing.
• We believe in getting a nice piece of the pie in the art market.
• We are confident and optimistic that we are in control of our destiny.
• We know that in the new economy “the right brainers will rule the world.”*

* “A Whole New Mind” by Daniel Pink

I invite you to join this forum and post your question or comment to this whining free zone.

Post your specific question below.