1) Fill in all the details. Yes, this sounds absurd – but you’d be amazed how many artists leave out crucial information such as contact details or the medium of the work they have submitted. Fill in the forms provided carefully, and go back over them afterwards to make sure you’ve given everything that is required. If you know from past experience that you’re prone to leaving things out, get someone you trust to check it for you.

2) Write in the language of the competition. Sometimes this is irrelevant, and sometimes it’s clear that two or more languages are acceptable in context. You have to use your judgment about what’s appropriate, but in general a French competition, for example, will be more amenable to entries in French, while an American one, such as the Chelsea International Fine Art Competition, will prefer English. The easier you make it for the administrators and the juror to understand and appreciate you and your work, the better.

3) Take your time with the entry. Very few competitions have an incredibly small window of opportunity for entering – in general, you’ll have days or weeks to compile all the information you need. Even if the time available is shorter, you can gather much of it beforehand, and give some thought to the images and information you’d like to present. Don’t rush – give it due consideration, and maybe even return to it after a short time to review.

4) Choose your images carefully. The particular pieces you decide to submit should vary depending on the nature of the competition. Some competitions are exclusively for a particular medium; don’t enter a watercolor competition with a work in acrylic! More often, though, you’ll need to consider the style and subject matter that is appropriate. You may consider different pieces for a competition run by a children’s hospital, for example, than you would for something like a corporate contest. Whichever images you pick, make sure that they are high quality; remember that often this is the only representation of your work that the juror will see. Make them clear and non-pixelated.

5) Make sure the work you submit is available. If the juror loves the art you entered with, you may well need to produce it or similar pieces later, either directly for the competition process or because collectors who came across it are interested in that style or work. Don’t submit artworks from fifteen years ago, when your style has moved on since then.

6) Before entering, check out the prizes. It’s always a great feeling to win, of course, but entering a competition takes time and energy. Before you expend that, you should check that the prize is something that will benefit you. If it’s to go to a conference you’ve attended in the past and which this year is on a date you know you can’t make, for instance, then it’s probably not something you want to be concentrating your efforts on achieving.

7) Don’t care about it too much. When all is said and done, it’s only one competition. You’ll enter plenty more in your time as an artist, apply to many galleries and set up at lots of art fairs. You’ll sell work and talk to collectors and touch people with your art. Don’t let a single contest become too important to you – remember to keep it all in context. If you aren’t chosen in this one, it’s no reflection on you or your work; in a different year, the results would be different.

Do you have tips that you find helpful when entering competitions? Share them in the comments!

What the most artistic city in America? It’s not what you think…

British art: making people feel better.

The world’s first blockbuster art exhibit? Picasso, unsurprisingly. What’s more unexpected is that it was in 1960.

Smells, scents & fragrances – the newest form of art.

Popular stories from the week:

The art of illusion – an exhibition where visitors hang off buildings.

The artist behind the icon – famous photographs and their famous photos.

It’s a still life – but this one is interactive.

The artist who disappears into the background.

In many ways this is hard to answer precisely. It varies from person to person, and from day to day. Installation days, for example, are unlike any others – in fact they deserve a separate post all to themselves! – but even more ordinary days can be full of surprises. The gallery may look pristine, calm and relaxed – but that doesn’t mean that the people working in it aren’t frantically busy sometimes. Every week presents us with new challenges, but also with new sources of interest and enjoyment.

The main thing that we’ve found is to expect the unexpected. You might have thought you were going to spend most of your day making sure all the details for the coming reception were sorted out and contacting artists about their artwork, but in fact you might end up unpacking art that has arrived earlier than anticipated and talking to customs about incoming works. Of course, sometimes your list has tasks which simply have to take priority, but often the important thing is to go with the flow and deal with whatever issue presents itself to you. As long as you take it all calmly, there’s usually time for everything in the end.

When you really do run out of time, a colleague might be able to help you with some of the things that really need to happen. We’re very fortunate in the gallery in that we work well as a team, and knowing that you can always call on someone else for help or advice makes everything seem easier. Having said that, of course each member of staff has their own area of expertise and responsibility, and that will have an impact on how an individual’s day or week works out.

Maintaining a good relationship with all the people and companies who help us make exhibitions and events a success is also crucial. For example, many artists ask us to have their works framed when they arrive in the U.S. This has a number of advantages – it can be cheaper to send, is often easier to pack, and it means that we can choose the frame that suits the work best for when it is in the gallery. All this means that the framer is a crucial person in getting everything done in time and in the right way – so having a good dynamic with him is pretty important!

A number of our daily surprises come by phone and email – questions about how the gallery runs, how representation works, about artwork viewed on ARTmine and how to purchase it, and so on – but sometimes from walk-ins as well. Agora is on the second floor of our building, but that doesn’t lessen the number of people who wander in; New York is a vertical city, and even someone who is visiting relatively briefly understands that very quickly. The result is that a number of passers-by enjoy the atmosphere of the gallery, ask questions about artists, and sometimes fall in love with a particular work and just have to have it.

So what is it like working in the gallery? It’s challenging, surprising and a lot of fun!

3 of the 10 most expensive works sold at auction last year were by Chinese artists. Welcome to the new art market.

Larry Gagosian sued for selling works it is said he had no right to sell.

The Arab Spring has helped Arab art to flourish.

Britain has talented young artists – and they’re totally different to the YBA.

Could street art represent one of Australia’s most important cultural movements?

Latin American art – why it has its own identity.

Popular stories from the week:

Reimagining famous paintings – part of an age old tradition.

Should the role of art be partly to give us what we need?

Postage stamps placed in context through painting.

Yosemite in time-lapse – inspiring on a cold day.

There is an abiding sense of honesty and integrity that runs through the works that make up Figuratively Speaking. Whether the artist seeks to capture aspects of the natural world, the complexity of human nature or a personal emotion or experience, there is no doubt that their creation is motivated by a powerful belief and a desire to share a message and understanding. This, combined with the artists’ skill, makes viewing these artworks a profoundly memorable experience.

In Degrees of Abstraction, visitors will be fascinated by the varying approaches to form and the way it is portrayed. Allowing their backgrounds and knowledge to influence their artistic process, these artists use their own sources of inspiration to share that valuable energy with others, pouring creative vivacity into their creations so that it can, in turn, reach the hearts and minds of those who come into contact with the works.

Portal to Enigma presents a collection of compelling artworks that speak to their audience on a number of levels and through many different techniques. While full of an awareness of the vulnerabilities and frailties of human nature, they are also impressively optimistic and encouraging, standing as proof that new perceptions are possible and that the potential for change is always there to be grasped.

Exhibition dates: January 17, 2012 – February 7, 2012
Reception: Thursday, January 19, 2012 6-8 PM
Gallery Location: 530 West 25th St, New York City
Gallery Hours: Tues – Sat, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m.

Featured artists:
Figuratively Speaking: Jim Cobb, Nancy De Boni, Lane M. Duncan, Pat Gastreich, Eliza Gomez, Gwen Graham, Patrick Mason, Coco Mobuli, Trevin Prince, Shyamala Rao, Mark Salevitz, Carmen Sotuela
Degrees of Abstraction: Sevega Adriano, Lawrence R. Armstrong, Brigitte Balbinot, Christian Bundegaard, Carmen Egea, Yuri Elperin, Laila Khan Furniturewalla, Ivana Kosanovic, Deva Lei, Marianna Merler, Marjolijn Oude Vrielink, Andreas Strobel
Portal to Enigma: Mauricio Cadavid, Roula Chreim, Rodolfo Cuesta, Jacques Desgagnés, Debra Fitzsimmons, Ignacio Hábrika, Kiko Sobrino, Jesús Uclés, Zae Ulrich, Aleksandra Vavilova

One aspect many artists worry about is time management. Sometimes it can seem as if there are such a lot of things competing for your time and efforts that it’s impossible to decide between them, and nearly impossible to do them all. To tell whether you really are taking on too much, you need to analyze your tasks and how much time things should take. It may be that you need to say ‘no’ to certain projects, or put others off until a quieter time. Don’t let guilt or a fear of missing an opportunity force you into taking on more than you can handle; in the end, you’ll only end up shortchanging something or even everything you’re doing in a desperate attempt to do it all.

Often, however, getting everything you want to do done is just a matter of managing your time effectively. To do this, you need to work out your priorities. What is most important to you? What balance of time and energy do you want to give to the different demands in your life? You’re the only one who can know this, and it’s important to work it out before you start trying to work out any kind of schedule for you time. If your priority this year is getting into a gallery, or entering a number of fine art competitions, then you need to put a lot of time aside for achieving this, and not end up spending all your time in your studio sculpting or painting, however tempting that might be.

Once you have decided on your priorities, you need to sit down and work out what time is available for art-related work during your week. This varies enormously from person to person; some artists do most of their art-related work at the weekend, while others have made it a full-time job that takes place between 9am and 5pm. Others work best at night, or only in the early morning. You know what time you have, and unless you can change the other factors in your life to accommodate an alternative arrangement, it’s vital to be able to work effectively in the time you have, whether that’s 2 hours a week, or 40.

You need to make sure everyone around you knows when your ‘art hours’ are and that they are times when you should not be disturbed for anything trivial. Whether you’re making phone calls to galleries and collectors, emailing buyers and readers, making arrangements for participation in an art fair, or working on a piece of artwork, you need to be able to concentrate on it and give it your full attention as much as is possible. If for some reason you’re having trouble focusing on your task one day, or one week, use the time that you couldn’t paint in to make calls, or the time when you couldn’t get through to anyone on the phone to write your next email. There are always other things waiting to be done. Then, you can do the postponed task during time set aside for whatever you ended up doing instead.

Despite all of this planning, you have to accept the fact that your ideal schedule will probably vary according to the other things going on in your life. It’s important to realize this from the beginning, or you risk experiencing continual unnecessary frustration and irritation that will make enjoying life harder and won’t help your art either. Just as you’ll sometimes have to rethink how to spend the time spent doing art-related work, you’ll sometimes need to give less time than you’d like to it at all, as other things take priority. However, it works the other way around as well – there will be weeks when things worked out more easily than expected, or some other plan was canceled, and you have more time for art than you expected. Don’t worry about this natural fluctuation; expect it and simply try to use your time well doing whatever needs to be done in the moment.

Do you have tips to share about managing the time you spend on art-related work? Share them in the comments!

However, there have also been a number of larger events which have also played a part in characterizing 2011. One of them was certainly the remarkable success of young artist Aelita Andre, the four year old whose astonishing work captivated Angela, our Gallery Director, before she found out the age of the artist. Aelita Andre’s solo exhibition at Agora Gallery was enormously successful, with collectors snapping up the works on display, both in the gallery and on online gallery ARTmine, and representatives from the media showing fascinated interest in the talent of this unusual artist.

In addition, there have been a number of other fabulous and inspiring solo exhibitions this year. Audiences have been delighted by the colorful and passionate work of Marcela Cadena and by Lynda Pogue’s optimistic and exhilarating creations. Paul M. Cote returned for a second, wonderful exhibition entitled Vers la Lumière, which displayed the artist’s developing talent, and Lydia van den Berg enchanted viewers with her paintings which persuasively mix childhood themes with adult ideas. Later in the year, L. Byrne’s striking, vibrant abstract impressionist works took center stage, followed by the art of Z. Todorova, which spoke so movingly of the artist’s personal conviction of a connection between humanity and the world in which we live. Most recently Carlo Proietto presented his unique artworks, created through the unusual method of pyrography, which the artist has elevated to a fine art technique.

The 2011 Chelsea International Fine Art Competition was also a highlight of the year. It was a pleasure to see so many high quality submissions; the juror, Elisabeth Sherman of the Whitney Museum of American Art, had a difficult job in choosing the selected artists! The competition exhibition, held in August, was also deservedly popular, with visitors appreciating the diversity and depth of the works on view.

One of our usual highlights is a biannual event – the publication of contemporary art magazine ARTisSpectrum, which covers such a range of interesting topics and themes relating to the art world. The magazines published in May and November of 2011 received much positive feedback from readers and from artists around the world – and at Agora Gallery, we particularly enjoyed posing in the shoes that were specially painted for the cover article of Volume 25, which focused on the synergy that exists between gallery staff.

This year as well, Agora Gallery’s main site got a brand new look. Designed to continue on seamlessly from the old format, the new version allows visitors to feel as if they are almost standing in the gallery, viewing the works on display and finding out more about the artists, the exhibitions and Agora. If you haven’t explored it yet, have a look now!

On Sunday September 18, 2011, Team Agora took part in the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. It’s an annual event that takes place in Central Park, in which participants run, jog and walk, participating in order to raise funds to combat breast cancer. Members of our family and friends have been affected by this terrible disease, and so we are especially glad to be able to participate in the race.

One other memorable event of the year – though it wasn’t exactly a highlight in the normal sense of the word – was Hurricane Irene. We were so touched to receive messages of support and concern from artists and art lovers all around the world. We kept in contact during that dramatic weekend, and you can read more about the experiences of some of the gallery staff on the blog.

We’re looking forward to 2012 and the new challenges, excitements and surprises it will bring. We hope you’ll join us for the ride, and in the meantime, happy new year!