Craft Labs: 2012

February 13, 2012: How to Tell Your Story

Telling stories is how we identify, learn, and share our history. If your goal is to educate, persuade, or simply connect in a meaningful way with a particular audience, storytelling is the single most powerful communication tool available to you and can be your best selling tool. Come learn how to tell your story as a craft maker. Executive Director, Gwynne Rukenbrod will teach you the importance of learning how to tell your unique story and hone your skills at story telling. Gwynne will talk about the three steps in a good story and group exercises will lead you through each step of YOUR story.

March 13, 2012 Wholesale 101

Are you interested in creating a product for the wholesale market? Do you want to better understand the aspects of wholesaling your work? What things do you need to consider? How do you know your product is a good candidate for wholesale? Learn about the wholesale market and the various aspects that need to be considered before you decide to enter the wholesale market.

April 10, 2012 How to Engage a Visitor in Your Studio

Do you like having visitors in your studio, but don’t know how to engage them? Do you want to participate in your area’s studio tours but don’t know what to do to prep your studio? Do you know the right questions to ask a potential customer to get them to buy?

May 8, 2012 Arranging and Selling from Your Booth

Do you wonder if your booth has the optimum set up for engaging your visitor? Do you know what questions to ask your booth visitor? Come learn the answer to these and other questions. The basics of setups and sales techniques will be discussed. June 12, 2012 Artist Statements Have you always wanted to know how to write your own artist statement? What should be included in it? How long should it be? Why do I need to include this in my portfolio? If you have asked yourself any of these or other questions relating to the Artist Statement, then this free class is for you! Come hear from the new Executive Director of HandMade in America, Gwynne Rukenbrod, about how to write an artist statement. You will actually begin to write your statement as a part of the class exercises and walk away with a clearer understanding of what your statement should be.

July 10, 2012 Artist Critiques Artists often don’t get together to formally critique each other’s work, but it can be one of the best learning experiences. Hearing what someone else sees when they look at your work gives you new insight to what you make. Come participate in a formal critique of your work with HandMade’s Executive Director, Gwynne Rukenbrod. Everyone who wishes to participate must bring one piece for critique.

Other classes offered:

How to Get Your Work Seen

Come find out what goes in a portfolio, how to think outside the box about exhibitions, and some insider tips of how to get your work seen. Learn from curator and director, Gwynne Rukenbrod about how to approach galleries, create a portfolio, and what is the difference between an artist’s bio and statement.

Why Buy HandMade?

As an artist you need to be able to talk about the value of buying handmade. Come engage in a conversation with Executive Director, Gwynne Rukenbrod and Director of Craft Entrepreneurship, Kari Rinn about why you need to know why other people buy handmade and learn how to talk to a potential client about the value of handmade.

Pricing Your Work

Pricing your artwork is not a formula, even though many people want one. It can be a complicated set of calculations, but anyone can easily learn the various aspects that need to be taken into account when pricing your work. Come hear about all of those aspects of pricing your work.

Art and Fear

The book Art and Fear By Ted Orland and David Bayles is a quick and interesting read. “The book explores the way art gets made, the reasons it often doesn’t get made, and the nature of the difficulties that cause so many artists to give up along the way. The book’s co-authors, David Bayles and Ted Orland, are themselves both working artists, grappling daily with the problems of making art in the real world. Their insights and observations, drawn from personal experience, provide an incisive view into the world of art as it is expeienced by artmakers themselves.” Quoted from Amazon. Read the book and then come have a discussion with Gwynne Rukenbrod about various issues in the book.

Budgeting

Dealing with your inner creativity, often doesn’t leave time for dealing with your business. Come find out how to set up a budget for your business, giving you an idea of what it will take for you to run a sustainable business. Learn how to set up a budget in Excel and how to create a way to document your expenses and income. Bring your laptop if you have Excel to create your own budget.

The Exhibition Proposal

HandMade in America is one example of organizations offering exhibition opportunities to artists, but require a submission of an exhibition proposal. Come learn what an exhibition proposal is and what goes into one. Also learn about some basic PowerPoint slide show set ups. Bring your laptop if you have PowerPoint to create your own exhibition proposal.