Why are people selling their art so cheaply?

Ditto David. I have to agree also.

I read the whole thread and wow! Long. :slight_smile: And about to get longer!

This art biz is taking time uh because I donā€™t know someone famous who would tweet about me or invite me on their talk-show.

My intent is to be able to do the thing I love to do, to grow as an artist and to make something worthy of being bought and enjoyed by someone else and in so doing-make money. Then Iā€™d be able to do it more and more and I donā€™t huge need piles of art here anyway and it really isnā€™t ā€˜bornā€™ until itā€™s out in the world after allā€¦ :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

I tried many many things attempting to achieve this. I rode the wave on ebay. I sold doing cheap auctions when auctions were still more popular and you could be found there, when they werenā€™t yet weighed down by fake low quality prints from China being passed off as originalsā€¦until I landed here on DPW when they opened this site up to everyone. At that time, auctions still seemed more visited and I sold but usually only got 1 or 2 bids. So I didnā€™t start out very low for that reason.

In my spare time I pursued my passion. I read everything I could on the subject of art by the artists I really loved and studied the body of art as they produced it to define what I loved about eachā€¦like Carol Marine, Brian Burt, Karin Jurick, Duane Keiser, Shawn Kenney, Michael Naples, and many many othersā€¦ And a lot of them wrote in various posts and in email when I askedā€“just paint small and often, you will improve, and just do what you love.

And I found it to be true. YES! I am not the only bread winner in the house and I no longer have to work full time so maybe itā€™s going quicker for me. But somehow, the tidbits I received from lots of different people and the time I did spend painting small and as often as possible is resulting in better paintings and better money. Like baking a cake, I put the ingredients in, slopped it in a pan and when it was baked, it was delicious!

Now, Iā€™m not saying my art is delicious, some is still slop! But Iā€™m happy to be improving, painting more often and as a result, selling more. It takes time and some work too, but it will be worth it. Because if what makes us get up in the morning isnā€™t art, why would we bother with it at all?

If we keep working on it, we can get there. It wasnā€™t much different for the artists who have arrived. They had middles too like where most of us are now. And knowing me, I may never arrive. Income may go up, sure, but I will probably never be satisfied with my current state of ability. Thereā€™s something in my mindā€™s eye that I still struggle to paintā€¦better. And thereā€™s so much more beauty I find every day that begs to be painted!

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Thatā€™s fine as long as youā€™re doing what you want and not just what you think will sell

I am retired and the reason I put my paintings up at such low prices is they are only meant to supplement my social security and a small pension. Iā€™m not looking to become the next Grandma Moses - just looking to make some extra money.

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I just went on the active bidding auction page and out of 37 paintings 10 of them were going at $5 or less and another 3-4 for under $12. So sad.

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Right now I am amazed at how few auctions are be bid on at all!

I started looking at auctions on DPW back in October. Quite consistently until April there were about 90 active auctions whenever I looked. In April it started to slow down. Last night there were under 20 auctions listed. Is the market flooded with paintings? Are buyers buying somewhere else? Is this part of an annual pattern?

Yes, the number of sales and active auctions (those with bids) are very seasonal. As we have been seeing, summer time is the slowest for both, however, like clockwork, sales jump right back up at the end of summer, peaking before the holidays, only to fall again thereafter. While it may not be welcomed, it does make sense.

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That is also my experience. 2 weeks ago, like magic sales started again on other site. If I had posted new work on DPW, it may have alsoā€¦but I found the abstracts do not sell on DPW, the realism, still life work does.

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Sunnyā€¦do you post your abstracts somewhere else? I also find DPW 's sales are more for realism.

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Yes, I do sell a lot of abstracts. I have 2 IDs on ebay (yuck), but they sell there. And I would like to do some shows next season.

It was a slow summer but I was busy painting walls (ha), and has just started to pick up again. One of the IDā€™s:
http://www.ebay.com/usr/sunnyavocadoart

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Thank you Sunny. All the very best with your work.

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Yes, sales are slowly going down to nothing for me. I was doing well on this site but this year I have months where there are no sales at all. I always sell my work at what I call reasonable prices. Iā€™m retired and the sole purpose of my selling my artwork is simply because I enjoy painting and to supplement my retirement income. Lately even low prices hasnā€™t helped my sales. I get lots and lots of views but lately no sales. Though Iā€™m still active here, Iā€™ve gone back to Ebay for ACEO sales there. In effect, rebuilding my following there because I know I canā€™t continue to pay for this site if there are no sales here for me.

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I think the same. Iā€™ve only had one sale on here which came shortly after I joined. I keep thinking that I need to cancel the subscription but then give it one more go with another piece.

I agree with that. You are new on DPW. Iā€™ve been here over three years. The first year was great and I thought this was going to be a place where I could supplement my income. The second year was slightly less and then this yearā€¦almost nothing :frowning: Whatever happened it was sudden and happened last year or early this year. Like I said, I get tons of views. Sometimes almost 100 in a 24 hour period. I cannot believe that none of those people wanted to buy especially since my prices are among the lowest on DPW. Iā€™ve gone back to Ebay. Its slow regaining a following but I am getting sales there. Good luck to you whatever you decide to do.

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Iā€™ve tried eBay but my prices are too much I think.

I also think that maybe the whole Daily Painting craze has plateauā€™d - that it went through a major heyday as anything new does, that it peaked & has now blended in with the other art world items. And I think the art market got saturated by the # of daily painters out there (Internet does open the doors up all over the world). I think maybe those who were able to get into the Daily Painting craze from the beginning, were able to build a good following - good enough to keep a cash flow going now, but itā€™s probably smaller than it once was. Those of us (myself) who got into the craze after it started, were able to sell some pieces, and build a bit of a following if we were lucky.

I have an expression I use in my graphic arts job - ā€œeverything becomes a use to, everything!ā€ We use to do it this way, we use to sell it that way, we use to make a lot of money, etc. Everything changes, as does the clients tastes, their wallets, where they shop, where they buy, and even if they buy. I donā€™t know what the next craze in the art field will be - wish I had the gift to see & predict!

Bottom line is - no single place will be the end all for selling art for all time. Diversify by doing classes, workshops, videos, etc. - and show work in shows, galleries, various online places. Diversity is probably the best thing to do.

(BTW - this is my no means a ā€œdigā€ against DPW, or the people who run it! Daily PaintIng is a art thing that is happening now, and not solely specific to DPW, although they share the name!)

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Totally agree. Same conversation is going on in Artfinder. Is there a magic formula to sales. No not really. Like you said do your best work and put it in lots of pots.

I agree thereā€™s no magic formula. If I didnā€™t list things on here, I would only expose my productions twice a year at local art group events. Maybe thatā€™s the true limit for meā€¦twice a year. But being with DPW means that although I donā€™t create a finished work per day, it subconsciously encourages me to do something, otherwise I think it would be easy to just ā€œdriftā€. I have a small pension, any earnings from painting are nice to have but donā€™t keep me afloat.

I can say, with regards to Ebay UK, that there have been a lot of problems recently for sellers of all kinds of stuff. I have items listed there (but not artwork) and the business forum has been quite an eye-opener. Ebay is rapidly pushing its selling-model in favour of mobile-phone users and visibility of products has started to suffer, both in terms of images on-screen and finding things via search-engine. The mobile phone is a darn fiddly thing to operate at the best of times. October has seen many sellersā€™ sales plummet (outages, tech issues).
There was a time (around ten/twelve years ago) when Ebay was a pretty good platform, but once they started taking commission on postage costs, they shot themselves. It is widely believed that Ebay would like to get rid of small sellers entirely and just become a mega-online high street full of the Big Boys.
None of which bodes well for art sales either.
As Nan said, diversification is probably the way to go.

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Your comment illustrates perfectly why artists should charge more! Those artists on the podcasts had other income!!! So basically you are saying that there is no such thing as career artist. Would you tell that Dominoā€™s Manager to get another job to pay for his pizza making hobby? NO! Is art just a hobby that might give you money for more paint? How many artists you do know that are making a full time living and not receiving support from a spouse? I find it extremely sad that this is the reality of artists in America, I donā€™t know very many artists that arenā€™t working some other job, being supported by a spouse, teaching, or doing something else to try to support their art career.