Creatives and artists, especially painters and photographers, are always looking for a good space to exhibit their art. Whether it’s a gallery, cafe, a display home, friend’s Airbnb property or other, one of the great places to exhibit your art is your local coworking space.
The benefits of displaying your art in coworking spaces are potentially huge and depend on the type of clientele and events that are offered in the space. Many tech companies are big advocates of hot desking, but artists and creative types often need more than a space to plug in a laptop. Coworking spaces have been around for some time but in regional Victoria they are a relatively new business. Most of the coworking spaces I have tried in Melbourne or regional VIC have a really good design, ergonomic desks and workspaces, walls of lush green plants (one of my favourite things in a coworking space!) and great natural light, which makes your art really stand out.
How to present your art
The way you present your art is very important. Just like in a gallery, most of coworking places owners are busy people so make it easier for them and provide an already framed, ready to hang artwork. Thoughtful consideration should be given on which style of art (and frames) would be the most suitable for the specific display location, so it looks its best, has enough light, is hung at the comfortable height for viewers and minimises reflections. It should be a piece of art that goes well with the vibe of the space. All these decisions are important to consider to drive an interest to your artwork or a traffic to your website.
Above: Timelapse of my Milka cow mural installation, Herd Coworking Warragul
Your artwork has a story
Apart from a good presentation, it’s a great opportunity to share with the audience the story behind your artwork, alongside information like archival paper qualities, size, price and edition number or how it was made. What you should also add is a pack of business cards and an A4-size description of how the artwork came about, what was the inspiration behind it and its story presented in an Artist Statement with paper copies, so people can take them home.
Presentation
All the above, if executed and presented well, will make an amazing difference to an already funky workspace and together, have the potential to bring you more work or collaboration opportunities from people who use the space for work. It is also a win-win scenario for both – you as an artist and for a coworking space owner as you support each other’s business.
Here’s an example of a local Ballarat coworking space, Platypus Coworking, an initiative supportive of local artists and entrepreneurs, currently displaying a selection of my framed limited edition prints from the Wimmera Lake Hindmarsh series.
