My First Gallery Approach
A Metaphor For Patience
I lived in Charlottesville, VA from 2007 until 2015. It’s a beautiful albeit turbulent place, with an extraordinary history yet marked by slavery and racism.
This was a transitional time period for me. I was tiring of my career (medical illustration) and felt this increasing need to get off computers and back into painting. I bought some oil painting supplies and climbed into the Blue Ridge. It was a time of rapid experimenting, learning how much I didn’t know, yet having a vision of where I wanted to go.
At least a year passed as I built a small portfolio. I decided it was time to seek out a gallery who of course would immediately accept everything I’d done.
Little did I know.
I hit downtown Charlottesville to determine which gallery might be a good fit. Finally one accepted a portfolio review appointment. Excited, nervous and prepared, I headed into town ready for my grand emergence.
In all fairness, the gallery owner was running a business; her time was limited. What I didn’t expect was the cruelty. She haughtily looked at my portfolio and some small originals - I don’t think I used an I-pad back then - then laughed out loud with a big smirk on her face: “You’re not ever going to make it as an artist. You should have stuck to medical illustration. You’re terrible. This interview is over.”
To say I was crushed is an understatement. I’m sure I went home, cried and decided to quit.
An amazing, completely unexpected thing came in the mail that day. An official letter from ArtInPlace, a national competition, congratulating me for winning the ArtInPlace competition with this tiny, 8 X 10” oil:
Not only had I won the competition, I was awarded $500. And, the painting would be enlarged on aluminum to 12 X 24 FEET and placed alongside a very busy highway in Charlottesville for as long as it would last.
What this adventure taught me:
Don’t ever minimize or be cruel to anyone when they’re baring their soul and their work to you. Not that I would, but some things need saying.
One gallery owner’s opinion is one gallery owner’s opinion. That’s all it is.
Life can change in a heartbeat. Wait for the diagnostics.
Of course, then there’s karma. I checked on that gallery after awhile. It had gone out of business and the owner had left town.
No, I haven’t given up.