Yesterday was a quiet day at home and I had time to browse a bit. What I ended up doing was looking for art competitions. I found all sorts of things including advice on how to choose which competitions to enter.
As artists we all want recognition for our work and what I came up with after more than an hour of browsing was a warning.
There are way too many art competitions to enter these days and almost each and every one of them wants an entry fee. There has to be a budget for that and the entry fee should be reasonable. Now I know it costs money to run a competition but what if the competition is the business too? As artists I sometimes think that we are supporting way more businesses than the income from our art justifies.
What I’ve noticed is that there are more and more online art competitons than ever before and all of them want our money. Sometimes they want our entry fee and our information and our future business too. Running an online competition is a good way to build up a list of members for a site and/or a list of potential customers for services as well. And here we are, all of us hopefuls willing to pay for the priviledge too!
Not to get too negative, but it’s like anything else you buy online; know who you are sending your money to;
Who is running the competition? Is there a bricks and mortar location that belongs to the site too? How long has it been established? Is it a for-profit business, a collective or a public gallery space? What kind of audience does it attract? What are the numbers of visitors? What kind of traffic does the site attract? How long has it been around? If there are members – how many and would your work and views fit in?
Only after you’ve looked at the whole picture should you decide if the entry fee is reasonable for the audience the competition will attract and if it fits your budget.
If what you need is some recognition and a bit of support, maybe entering a competition to become part of an online community where people critique each other’s work will be good enough. If you need to build up a serious CV you will have to look for regional, national and international competitions run by recognized arts organisations or public galleries. The competition will be stiffer and there will be more of it, but it may give you more recognition in your home community and possibly open some doors too.
So after all that looking, what did I find? Well check out ‘The World of Wearable Art Competition’.
The name that came up in searches used to confuse me as the competition is in New Zealand, but it has been changed now. No longer called the Montana World of Wearable Art but using the ‘Brancott Estates’ name now which relates to Brancott Wines of New Zealand.
And there’s no entry fee for international entries (only the cost of making a costume that can take being handled and worn about 20 times, packing and shipping – sigh. . .). The entry deadline won’t come around again until next spring but who doesn’t need time to get a costume like that together! For costume designers and artists they say. . .
Who knows? Maybe someday I’ll have a chance to visit New Zealand.