Artists don't need studio management services. They need a profile in NYT. If you actually gave them a gallerist and a dedicated pro agent, then yeah that could launch some careers. But that would need to be non public information, because that type of manufacture goes against authenticity.
Art is nothing more than branding and social connections. Absolutely nothing more.
But looking at their website, they’re mainly trying to add some much needed standardization in how to deal with artists
and its totally fine for them to burn their own capital to do that
the friction they are trying to solve is how to close a deal better
artists frequently aspire to make money, and are wholly unprepared on how to. these are the people running around worried that venmo is going to snitch on them for taxes, a concept that requires complete segregation from being a merchant with any semblance of organization
this trickles down into other things, is this commission work for hire, does the commissioner or buyer own it? for existing pieces, what? and many other issues that can completely wreck a deal just by presenting a contract to an artist at all
so they want to incorporate all the artists and give them legal counsel and CPAs, and then their network
this is logical, it might not work out for this firm. one way to make it more likely to work out is getting a Techcrunch article and people discussing it. the artists will reach out themselves.
Do you mean, in the context of pursuing art as a profession? Or just generally? Curious to learn more.
That's why you see the crazy antics of ie a urinal as an artwork, taping a banana to the wall, and the insane art writing that come with an artwork.
A piece of art is not bought for its craftsmanship or what it looks like. It is bought because of the story of the artist, the fact that other people know the artists story, so hanging it on your wall means something. It is part of culture. A Picasso is worth a lot because of its part of art history.
You're right that you cannot apply the tech VC model - without significant modifications that honor the differences between artists and entrepreneurs. But you're wrong about them not needing studio management services. We work with artists who are earning, in some cases, hundreds of thousands of dollars. They deal with contracts, invoicing, exhibition logistics, insurance claims, hiring service providers like photographers, and much more. All of those things require management that distracts them from creating artwork. If an artist can spend 20 hours making a work of art that would sell for $20,000 (aka, they earn $1k per hour), it is an absolute waste of time for them to spend 4 hours per week on these tasks. That's over 200 hours a year, and a theoretical $200k loss in creative output.
60% of the artists we work with already have gallery representation, and 40% have already been in the NY Times.
The usual trajectory is something like:
1. Get a studio assistant. 2. Get a couple more studio assistants. 3. Get a studio manager. 4. Get an accountant. 5. Get team of assistants. 6. Oops now we need HR.
Yes, this is spot on. And it is so hard to navigate doing this well, as part-time studio assistants require training, often leave when a new semester starts or they get their own solo exhibition offered to them, requiring replacing them and retraining that replacement. You're also only getting the skill set of those individuals, whereas with our company you're getting a team with a deep network and highly diverse experience. When our Artist Liaison doesn't know how to deal with something, they don't go back to the artist and make them handle it. They come to our management team and we help them do it well. We scale up and down with their income and operational needs, and our goal is to prepare them to take over our systems when they outgrow us and can afford a full time staff of their own, which we would even help them hire.