How to Prepare for Your First Art Show

Some art shows are different than others, in regards to whether they offer power or not, offer tables and chairs or not, etc. But, in general, you will have to pretty much provide your entire set-up. Follow some of the tips below to help get you started on preparing for an art show.

#1.) Obviously, before anything else, you need products to sell. Visit Faville Photo's Giclee Printing Site to learn more about our giclee printing products. Please feel free at any time, to contact us via e-mail at FavillePhoto@Gmail.com or call us at (623) 204-7516. We're always here to answer questions, give advice or recommendations about our different printing products, or help you figure out the best way to prepare for your up-coming show. We're easy to work with, fast, affordable, reliable, and professional. We look forward to hearing from you and helping with your event!

#2.) Now that you have your prints, let's talk about your setup. With the exception of a couple of shows, pop-up tents are not mandatory for display, but HIGHLY recommended, especially during the hotter months (which in Arizona seems like that's 11 of the 12 months in the year). Tents also look much more professional. You can find great pop-up tents for less than $100.00 at both Wal-Mart and Target.

#3.) After the tent, the exact setup depends on what kind of art you're displaying, but since Faville Photo is a Giclee Print Shop, and specializes in photo printing and stretched canvas printing, let's assume you're going to be displaying some of the products that we probably created for you. The best way to display stretched canvas pieces is on a wall. We recommend visiting your local home improvement store like Home Depot and picking up either Pegboard Wall or Garden Lattice Wall. The Lattice wall is a little cheaper and lighter (easier to transport), but the Pegboard wall is more sturdy and, in our opinion, more customizable. Either way, you'll enclose your tent with a couple sheets of the wall of your choice. We recommend getting cable zip ties from the same home improvement store to mount the wall pieces to your tent. These are strong, easy to work with, and easy to remove at the end of the night.

#4.) With the wall in place, you'll need a way to display your work on the wall. If you decided to go with pegboard, be sure to also get pegboard hooks. These will mount right to the pegboard and you can set your art on top of them. If you chose the Lattice wall, you'll want to get S-hooks, and hang your art on the wall with those hooks.

#5.) Now that you have your tent and walls in place, you'll want to get a table so you can lay out all of your information. You can get a nice looking and easy to transport fold up table for $50 dollars at Wal-Mart or Target, along with the tent. Always take business cards, fliers, brochures, etc. At a lot of of these art shows, you are trying to immediately sell your work, but you're also trying to build a fan base, or take commission work. And, in some cases, people just don't bring the cash with them, but they're honestly interested in your work. Give them some information so they can get back in touch with you later.

#6.) The table is also a great place to display some of your smaller products. We always recommend creating your work in large options as well as smaller options. If someone absolutely loves one of your pieces, but can't afford $300.00 on a large canvas print, there's no reason why they shouldn't leave your booth having purchased a $30.00 matted print of it instead. Get a matted print rack from Jerry's Artarama, or any other local Art Supply Store, so you can display all of your smaller print options in one of those. They make it easy to transport, and easy to display. Another great option for a smaller product is our mini canvas' (each one comes with a mini easel as well).

Displaying at an art show is easy as that. There are always exceptions to the rule. Some shows, like First Friday's are at night, so you have to deal with lighting issues, and electrical issues to power your lights. Night shows, or shows that don't provide electricity are rare, so we're not going to cover that here. If your art show is different, or you are displaying different kinds of products, or you just have a question about something we didn't cover in this article, please feel free to contact us at any time. You can reach us 7 days a week, 8am to 10pm at (623) 204-7516, or you can e-mail us 24 hours a day, 7 days a week at FavillePhoto@Gmail.com