How to write an Artist Bio
If you are an exhibiting artist, who actively engages with others you are bound to be asked for a bio. Nothing is easier than to hide under a mask of obscurity, but when you are working with the public and like to be recognized for your work, you have to share a bit about yourself through your artist bio.
I find bios really boring and have spend some time to make them more interesting by using my blog to feed supporting information and photos to an otherwise rather uninteresting bio line up on my web site.
Since the web site is usually the first place seen by potential clients or galleries it is important that the information provided on the bio page is presented in an easy to follow format. So I set out to refine my bio and decided to share the process with you.
1. Describe your art
2. Where you were born and where you currently live
3. List Exhibitions and Shows
4. Public and Private Collections
5. Education
6. Affiliations
When you are working with the press or art agents, you need to provide more information and make your bio more interesting. Remember an interesting life story makes for a good read! This is where I found my blog to be of great use. A blog post allows you to share as much as you like about yourself and let's you embellish stories with supporting photos. Make sure to link the two together!
At first it felt rather awkward to be sharing so much about myself, but I soon discovered that people like to know who I am and why it is what I do. We often think we have nothing to say, but that is so far from the truth.
1. Describing your work
Your work style should be the easiest to define. Mention what medium you work in and what type of painting style your body of work concentrates on.
2. Born/Lives
Use these locals to say something more about yourself. I have traveled a great deal in my life and have lived in many different places. This has affected greatly who I am today and why it is that I am so drawn to portraiture. Ask yourself, how your birthplace and the place you currently reside at have influenced who you are today as an artist.
3. Exhibition and Show Listings
If you have not kept a list, well shame on you! How is anyone supposed to know where you have shown and what you have been up to? Well, fortunately, you can still create a list. Start with the most recent event that comes to mind and work your way back. I like to include the year, city, state and mention weather it was a group, solo or charity exhibit. Some people break these into different categories, but I leave that up to you. To spruce it up, each listing links to my blog where I have written about the event and provided photos. In a way it supports my activities and makes it much more interesting to browse through.
4. Public and Private Collections
Again some people like to make two lists. I prefer to make a mention in the very beginning of the introduction where in the world my work resides and then provide a detailed client list towards the end of the page, for those who really want to know everything.
5. Education
You can start by saying where you have received your art degree, list school name, city and state.
I don't have an impressive line up of art schools and was at a total loss what to do about it. For the longest time I considered myself mainly self taught until I took intensive workshops, but that sounded sort of lame too. So rather than list it on my bio page, I invite people to read
. Through this post,I show my artistic progression through a little narrative, which is supported by my paintings.
6. Affiliations
Who you hang out with says a lot about who you are. I find it important to list what groups I belong to, because it says something about my involvement in the artist community.
I hope you find this post useful. I welcome your feedback and love to hear how you have spruced up your artist bio.
