A Small Lesson

As you all know, I have been busy working 2 jobs, painting 7 pieces for a client and taking an online course in Museum and Cultural Management from the University of Victoria. Currently, I am on vacation, a much needed break and relaxation time to concentrate on myself and what would be best for my future, which may seem selfish but for the best considering what this last year has been like.

Anyway, here is a little lesson for those of us in the art world who have been equally excited in receiving a request to commission pieces as I was. In the hype of my excitement, and what I can only assume the excitement of my client, we verbally agreed to prices, which they had wrote down on a piece of paper and I had gotten a copy of. Trust was given on both parties, not just one party.In the months to lead up to me finishing these commission pieces, they had "misplaced" their copy of prices and what was agreed upon. When I was finished all the pieces, they were shocked about the price I had quoted them. Long story short, I have half the paintings, which they still have to pay for.

My lesson, email is great for communication and starting your business with quotes. Also, do a contract! Figure out all what is to be concluded between you and your client, once that is done, do a contract up and have them sign it. This way you are covering your end and they are covering their end of a signed DEAL!

Here is a basic guide line for you, which you can tweak as you must in order to accommodate yourself and your client:

1.) state who the contract is between.

eg. ________________(artist) and ___________________(client)

2.) indicate how many pieces you are agreeing to create for your client.

3.) determine if the client is to make monthly payments or half of what the total is when you start the projects and half (along with the material costs) when the pieces are to be complete.

4.) indicate the client is responsible to pay for the materials you may have to order in order to create these pieces and it will be added to the cost of the final payment.

5.) indicate a time frame in which the piece(s) will be completed.

6.) state that both you AND the client will be in contact with each other throughout the contract to keep each other up to date with the progress of your works, either by studio visits, email, phone calls, text messages, etc. At no point should you send the client photos or the client take photos of your works in progress. They could use it to show others what you have bee creating and others can use those photos....seems far fetched but can happen, plus various other events can happen in the long run.

7.) state when the pieces are done, it is up to the client (or you) to pick up (or deliver) the artworks. If you are in the same community or close by, I would definitely take care of delivering them yourself, however, if it is to another province, state or country, it would be up to the client to arrange pick up or a delivery of the pieces.

8.) It may also be a good idea to suggest a clause, where if the client backs out, they are still responsible to pay you for your time and materials (this would be the case if the client did not pay you monthly or half of the cost to begin with)

9.) you also may want to state at the end no photography of the piece is to be taken to be reproduce into posters and such as it infringes on your right of your artwork and the copyright laws......but this is getting into a whole other situation of legal rules of the art world.

Again these are just pointers to help you out first. Eventually you may not need one or you may add more or take points out of this list but for beginners, it is a great start to your business as an artist. You might even get a lawyer involved if things go really south on your contracts and agreements. Verbally agreements are not always the best thing, pen to paper is! You can see it and make copies.

All in all, I am encouraging you to cover your own butt in deals, basic common sense. You may be really excited but get your eggs all in one basket, start negotiations and paper work. It might take a day or two or a month.....but as long as you have it down and both parties sign, it'll go much smoother.

I do hope this helps some beginner artist(s) out. Some of your clients will not be pleased about a contract but you are also not giving out free labour or your creations for pennies when you and I both know they are worth more than just pennies. Your work has value and the client has to know and understand this. If they are not wanting to sign a small contract, explain to them this is your business and you want to cover all bases of being a business. If they are still not willing to, tell them to keep in contact with you. They may change their minds in a few days once the initial shock of this is over and they realize what you are protecting, yourself and your work.

Cheers!

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