Getting a city to buy your artwork
“Your Honor, the jury has reached a verdict: we need to spend money on art, for the good of Seattle’s residents, its employees and its artists. The following are the artworks we recommend the city adding to its art collection...”
Artist Colleen Monette’s reaction to learning her collage will enter Seattle’s municipal art collection.
Okay, it didn’t actually go down like that. But it did take a while for me and four other art professionals to review the applications — 816 of them, with one to four artworks submitted per application. It’s usually between 100 to 200 applications. But a check from the city for your art looks really good while COVID-19 keeps people at home and spending less.
A mural on a boarded-up business reminds viewers that the coronavirus quarantine will end soon.
Here’s what I learned, as a panelist, that might strengthen your application next year.
Submit at least one ‘challenging’ work: Yes, even for an office setting. I remember an artwork with clear references to European colonialism, and it still made the final cut. The hope is that the work prompts uncomfortable but important conversations and action, from visitors and employees alike.
Avoid overthinking your art submission: Never mind picking “office-friendly” art. Submit at least one piece you love, even if you’re sure it’s too weird/ dark/ whatever. One application contained a single artwork that would probably fit into any office. We didn’t pick it.
Give it another shot: Apply again next year, especially if the panelists change every year. That means new people who might choose artworks totally unlike what the city already owns. Also, city art budgets expand and contract. It’s very possible the jurors adored your work, but ran out of money this year.
One last thing: signing up for an arts organization’s mailing list is worth it. You’re less likely to miss out on — or miss the deadline for — an opportunity that’s crying out for your work. Congratulations to Colleen Monette and the other selected artists!
Artwork purchase: and the new owner is...
I can give my crossed fingers a rest now: “Relatively Progressive” now belongs to the city of Shoreline!
The city will add my collage to its permanent art collection! In addition to my work centering the civil rights leader Edwin Pratt, Shoreline acquired two other pieces from the “Living the Dream” exhibit: Kemba Opio’s “Sunday Living”…
… and “A Brighter Tomorrow” by Vincent Keele.
Vincent Keele with Sarah Haycox, who helped name a Shoreline early education center after Edwin Pratt
I’m so thrilled to have created a collage that speaks to the African American presence in Shoreline, as well as the city’s present-day reckoning with its past. Public art coordinator and curator David Francis and I have had some illuminating conversations in that regard. And I’m grateful to the Black Heritage Society of Washington, which holds the original image of Edwin Pratt I used in “Relatively Progressive.”
Next step for my "Evolution"
When a Good Thing happens in my life, sometimes I like to hug it close for a day or two before I share it. That's why I took a day to savor this news: one of my collages is going to live in a Seattle city art collection!
"Waterfront Evolution" was purchased for the Seattle Public Utilities Collection, through a program of the city's Office of Arts & Culture. The collage joins a collection that includes work by emerging and established artists like Mary Ann Peters, Kara Walker, Barbara Earl Thomas and Dale Chihuly.
Artworks in this collection are portable so they can rotate throughout municipal buildings. So there's a good chance you'll see my giraffes in a waiting room, or while you're paying a bill, or in a meeting room. Not sure yet where the collage will go first, but I figure there must be a calendar or tracking system that'll tell me. And that bit of info I'll share right away!