Robert, Im in Kingston. Cmon down Mon

Yes Robert, by all means, lets give this artist, who is obviously living in the black, prime real estate with a full listing on your website. My Goodness, what a calamity this artist must be having. Wondering how to juggle all those galleries and all those clients clamouring to buy her works....Really Robert??
Right now, as I am about to open my own exhibition next month, I have a few things you might be able to help me out with. I have been working for a year on this new collection. Wondering about what I am expressing and communicating in my work and will anyone connect and understand what I am painting. I have plastered the city with posters and cards that I produced at my own expense. I have been a media whore and sent out endless press releases in order to garner some media attention. I follow up with each and every one of them too. All the while creating and paying for a web page, linked to my facebook, Facebook-artist page, pinterest, twitter and vimeo. I have followed up with anyone who even sniffs at my work to see if they would be interested in buying one of my pieces.
Meanwhile, four nights a week, I don black pants and a starched white shirt and waiter table just to make sure my bills and rent are paid...When I look at the success of an artist like the one described it is hard to think they might have had to work as hard as some of us do. As this is the REALity of being an artist in 2013.
But yeah, lets make sure that when we all have 1/2 dozen galleries carrying our works that we know the art of the deal and how to appease everyone. I think you have an amazing platform here Robert and you reach out to more people than you know. It has also been my experience that an artist does more for a gallery than the gallery does for the artist. Then again, that is just me.
John Ferrie

Artists without galleries (see above) have to spend a fair amount of time and treasure getting out the vote.

By making so much available to so many, the Internet is changing the face of commerce. Older ideas of "control" and "artificial rarity" are more difficult to maintain.

As a dealer and storefront gallery we offer a finders fee to other galleries, decorators and other associates and friends--usually 10 percent, who connect new customers to us. We want as many to go fully through us as possible but we do not mind the small percentage but we just cannot make a living on our regular 40% commission with gallery overhead--we have two staff plus rental, etc. Also we do all the advertising and do not charge our artists for shows or wallspace, etc. Genn's idea is very idealistic but it would not work in this backward town where no one is at all interested in art. We need everything we can get.

Like it or not, Genn's idea is the way of the future. The writing is on the wall. Dealers must now share or suffer. The internet is here to stay.

I'm glad art galleries are reading this. The art buying public is becoming more and more in control, and more knowledgable, unlike just a few years ago where there were gullible people around who would wander into galleries and be told a line of bull. It doesn't look to me like galleries are laughing all the way to the bank anymore. Hawaii.

The gallery in our city is pretty well the only one and except for frame shops has control of all the local artists and a few better ones from out of state. They have just now started to offer expensive paintings borrowed from out of state galleries on split consignment which they may or may not sell which gives the gallery a more sophisticated flavor and may even help to sell us locals.

People like the idea of having difficulty finding just what they want. Look at women's clothing. Finding the painting all the way off in Toronto, (or Morrocco) is part of the mystique.

Artists need to do like R, Genn, once in a while and get behind high walls--even in their own studios--and concentrate on getting better as artists. This is the message I have often received from Genn after several years of reading here. And those others who see fit to respond are truly appreciated. They make this site so strong.

John Ferrie's last comment above tells a true story, at least from my 50+ years of dealing with galleries. I never worked as hard as John but did really work at it until I decided being 80 I'd let up some. Let me repeat his words,"...an artist does more for a gallery than the gallery does for the artist." Right on, John, from here!

for those of us who do not try to sell through galleries, but only love doing art, this information is not necessary but interesting. It's good to know art is getting more democratic.

I am not interested in selling, but because I don't sell, my relatives don't think very much of it when I give them my work. I gave one to my mother recently and she used it to draw on the back of.

I don't sell, don't give, don't care. I put 'em in my basement. I am a genius.

Whenever any of my galleries have something unique or unusual happening, like discounting or commission splitting, I ask them to share it with me before the fact. This helps me to get an understanding of their situation and what they have to go through when working with me and other artists. Of course there are some difficult dealers but I soon threw those out. While i know some of my fellow artists are difficult to deal with as well, I try to be easy going and understanding and sometimes i help out where I can. Dealers are only ogres to those who have had little experience with the wonderful work that they do for both the customer and the artist.

Without the promise and potential of commercial art galleries, the art supplies industry would hardly exist.

Nothing happens until someone makes a sale.

I wonder, Mr Genn and all of your associates, whether you ever see a time coming when the middleman in art will cease to exist? There are so many painters going in this direction right now, but so far the prices are insignificant. Is this business model happening? Does it have a future? Thank you so much for this forum. Essex.

I own a successful gallery in the midwest. We gross about a million a year, which may not seem like a lot but half of that goes to mostly five artists that we sell by far the most of. Part of our mandate is to help these artists in other geographic zones where they are not well represented or at all. We do everything we can to help these artists --even when it comes to splitting commissions. There is more and more of this going on--and we are proud to have connected two of our painters to other markets and are pleased with their success in those markets.

I never show gallery paintings on my web site. I show paintings that are for sale in my own studio. I feel like my gallery should be responsible for promoting the work that they have as part of their commission fees.

That unfortunate remark about the only good painting being available in Toronto would be hilarious if it were not so sad.

This one is so true! We tend to hang on to the one percent of criticism. Nothing stranger than we humans it seems.
The good part is “what other people think of me is none of my business” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

My galleries implied to me that they would rather keep the piece and wait until they sell it for a full commission, than share the commission with another gallery and deal with shipping back and forth. It also seems that they don't trust and don’t like to talk to each other. I always wondered why. I also noticed small remarks implying that I send better paintings to other galleries. Dealer’s paranoia?

I like to think of my website as an online gallery so I set it up to give visitors good size pics of my art. I've been on some sites where the pics are the size of postage stamps. Click for a larger view and another pic pops up the size of a slightly larger postage stamp.

I always hope if I have more than one gallery, they will work with each other on a sale. Some money is better than no money in my opinion.

I have another problem at the moment... a company that provides artwork in a state across the country from me contacted me about paintings of my state by me. They also wanted the wholesale pricing. I directed them to my website which has the retail price no matter where the painting is sold from. I did say they can calculate the wholesale price from that. We are now talking about specific paintings, three of which are at my local gallery. I was discussing specifics with them about these paintings, really thinking this was just another scam and would probably go away. Now, I am beginning to feel they are legitimate and so what is my plan going to be? I must contact them and say they will have to discuss those paintings and negotiate with the gallery? My gut tells me this is what should happen. So, we shall see how this one shakes out. In the meantime, I will notifiy my local gallery and let them know what is going on. We do have a good relationship and feel they will know how to handle the situation. It has been interesting reading the other thoughts expressed here. Selling art is no easy matter ... and sometimes can end up being a slippery slope if not careful.

Regarding paintings being somewhere other than the client, I have a story. I live in France but used to live in Italy where a friend is an avid collector of paintings by artists local to his home city, Rieti, from whatever period. Having French skills, I helped him some years ago bit for and acquire a painting, long lost to his city, when it came up for sale at a Paris gallery. Some months ago, he contacted me again to say that, looking through old catalogues, he noted that a collection of six pictures that interested him had been offered by the same gallery ten years ago without finding a buyer. Could I phone and ask if the gallery knew where they were now in case they were still available. I emailed first as I had the details in the computer but the email received no reply. So after a time, I phoned the gallery to ask if they had seen my email. They wouldn't admit to having seen and ignored it. Well, can you put me in touch with the vendor? Out of the question, client secrecy etc. Well, could you please follow up the query and if possible let the vendor know we are interested and give him my details and at the very least, contact me when you manage to trace the paintings.
Crashing silence since, Robert. Now, short of presenting myself in Paris, which is 500km from where I live, I wonder what you have to do to persuade a gallery, 10 years on, to politely reply to a query regarding an unsold item for someone who has already bought from them. Meanwhile, the owner probably doesn't know that someone would now love to pay him for the pictures which may well be languishing in store as they aren't exceptional, just interesting in the niche market my friends likes.