Q: How do you decide how much to charge for your paintings?
Barbara’s studio
A: What to charge for my work is a complex question. The prices of my pastel paintings take into account many tangible and intangible factors. Here are a few:
Sales history.
My thirty-year-long exhibition history.
The costs of maintaining a studio in New York. My overhead goes up annually, but I do not raise prices every year to offset these expenses.
The countless hours of labor, cost of art materials, framing, photography, transportation, foreign travel, etc. that go into creating a painting.
Costs for marketing, social media, advertising, website design and upkeep, ongoing education, etc.
Somewhat less quantifiable factors such as my reputation as an artist, the real demand for my work, goodwill, the fact that I work full-time as a professional artist, etc.
Comments are welcome!
Posted on May 2, 2015, in An Artist's Life, Art Works in Progress, Black Paintings, Creative Process, Pastel Painting, Photography, Studio, Working methods and tagged account, annually, art, artist, charge, complex, cost, countless, creating, decide, demand, design, education, exhibition, expenses, factors, foreign, framing, full-time, goodwill, history, hours, intangible, labor, maintaining, marketing, materials, New York, offset, ongoing, overhead, paintings, pastel, photography, prices, professional, quantifiable, question, raise, real, reputation, sales, social media, Studio, tangible, transportation, travel, upkeep, website, year. Bookmark the permalink. 4 Comments.
You’ve given something great to think about
Thanks, Christopher.
My experience suggests amateur artists tend to charge too much. They should just seek to recover their material costs so that they can enjoy their past time. Emerging artists don’t charge enough, they tend think they are not good enough.
Ken, that is probably true. I think I undervalued my work when I was starting out.