Watching artists grow - part 1

One of the greatest joys of my life is watching artists grow and develop.  First of all, it's quite difficult to become an artist.  It's one of the most difficult things a person can do.  (Check out this earlier blog for another example)  So watching it happen is sort of like watching a miracle.

Case in point - Emily Hickman.  I first met Emily when she contacted me for an Art Business Consultation.  She'd been honing her metalsmithing skills for several years, and wanted to learn how to get her work into more shops and galleries.  She had four "lines" at that time.  For the uninitiated, a "line" is a group of pieces that work together based on similarities.  Emily's four lines were 1. sea creatures, 2. items featuring a cats eye shell, 3. simple shapes brightly colored with enamel on copper, and 4. hammered silver pieces.  All were quite different from each other.  Each would have to be marketed separately to a different clientele all together - which makes producing marketing materials rather expensive, and typically drives an artist to distraction trying to keep it all together under one roof in her head.

Narrowing the scope was imperative.  But bodies of work were already created in each category, and it seemed so wasteful to just give up without trying.  So we crafted a temporary plan to market the other liens, while turning all her creative energy to the hammered silver line.  And thus, Hammering Woman was born.

Interesting things happen when an artist focuses on one area.  I hear artists all the time balking about this because they feel it limits their creativity.  But an unexpected thing happens by imposing this limitation: the creativity within that limitation expands exponentially.  Secondly, by focusing on this area, the skill level increases dramatically.  Thus, the confidence to create ever-increasingly challenging work grows.  Thus the line grows because (confidence in technical skill) + (time spent creating new work) = increased creativity.

So Emily has been sending me photos of her newest pieces, and they are simply stunning.  Her earlier pieces in the Hammering Woman line were characterized by classic shapes (rectangles, teardrops, circles) with slightly organic edges.  The simple shapes and lines are very popular, and among our best-sellers at Manya Vee Selects.  The newest pieces still retain the classic shapes, but have a new elegance to them - a refined quality that is quite breathtaking.  She's even experimenting with incorporating bits of 18-karat gold with the sterling, such as a little gold ball on the surface of a silver earring, or an amazing stone bezel set in 18-karat gold.

So keep it up, Emily!  Now we are all watching to see how you grow!

Manya

www.ManyaVeeSelects.com

Manya@manyaveeselects.com