The Artist's Statement
Listen, if you can't tell what your work is all about, someone else will define it for you."
- See Joerg Colberg - Defining one's work - On Statements
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An artist's statement provides:
In short, an artist's statement is a brief summary of what an artist would say if they could explain their own work in person. It focuses on the present while providing as much information from the past as is relevant. |
The best artist's statement is authentic and is written in the artist's own voice, although not always by the artist, and in language which is always simple and accessible. An artist’s statement is a living document that changes as your work progresses. Your statement could be updated at about the same rate that you might update a CV. A good statement will give you the ability to discuss and have confidence in your work. |
The ubiquitous request “Please include an artist statement …” inspires cringes and groans among artists. An artist friend of mine called artist statements “the dentistry of the art world,”
- See Jennifer Liese's article (below) "Towards a History (and Future) of the Artist Statement"
ART-WRITE: The Writing Guide for Visual Artists
by Vicki Krohn Amorose
by Vicki Krohn Amorose
For today's artist writing skills are essential to self-promotion, connection and ongoing career opportunity
  The aim of the book is to teach the reader how to write about art. |
Part One covers how to develop and write an Artist Statement.
Part Two focuses on other types of writing related to having a career in art e.g.
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Paperback: 126 pages
Publisher: Vicki Krohn Amorose Date: January 11, 2013 RECOMMENDED: USA: Rated an average of 4.8 out of 5 stars (72 customer reviews) BUY THIS BOOK Art-Write: The Writing Guide for Visual Artists
from Amazon.comArt-Write: The Writing Guide for Visual Artists
 from Amazon UK |
Relevant articles and blog posts
Read around and see why people think an artist's statement is an essential part of marketing your art
- RECOMMENDED Artquest |Artist statements - An artist's statement is a short piece of writing about your work, practice and any wider intellectual concerns.
- Artbusiness.com |Your Artist Statement: Explaining the Unexplainable - Artist statements are not stupid; they're more like essential. And you don't have to be a writer to write one.
- Making a Mark: Marketing art - people buy you as well as your art #1
As an artist, how often do you regard yourself as part of the selling experience? Do you regard yourself as personally relevant to whether or not people collect or buy your art - or not? - Towards a History (and Future) of the Artist Statement - an intelligent review by Jennifer Liese of how the phenomenon of the artist statement has developed over time
- Writing About Your Photographs | A Photo Teacher (Paul Turounet)
Writing about one's work, an artist's statement, can be quite a daunting and challenging task. However, once the challenge is embraced, the artist's statement can provide a tremendous benefit in the presentation of one's work. - Conscientious | Defining one's work - On Statements
Conscientious - By Joerg Colberg "Of course, there are many different ways of writing one, and - needless to say - there exists a fairly large group of people who refuse to do it (I'll call them the refuseniks). - Conscientious in limbo: So what is a statement good for?
RECOMMENDED Quotes a photographer Paul Turounet who neatly defines (in a comment on this post) what an artist statement is good for - DLK COLLECTION: A Few Additions to the Discussion of Artist Statements
"I thought there might be a couple of nuances from a collector's perspective that would be worth adding to the discussion. For us, artist statements are like road maps: they give us clues to better understand the work we are seeing.
The Wikipedia Perspective
- Artist's statement - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
An artist's statement (or artist statement) is a brief verbal representation (didactic, descriptive, or reflective in nature) created by the artist about his or her own work.
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