Helping Artists in Isolation Move to the Spotlight
The Montana Arts Council’s brand, our promise, is to strengthen the creative economy of Montana. And a large part of our creative economy is the thousands of artists who call Big Sky Country their home. In fact, one out of every 60 people in Montana’s labor market is a working artist, according to the Montana State Department of Labor.
Visual and traditional artists around the world frequently work in isolation. Here in Montana, that isolation is compounded by daunting geographic realities.
Imagine working in a “frontier”
Imagine Montana; a place so large that 11 other U.S. states could fit within its borders. If Montana’s eastern border was in Washington, DC, our western border would land in Chicago. Our state just exceeded one million in population. Forty-six of Montana’s 56 counties are designated as frontier populations--even more rural than “rural,” with less than six people per square mile. In fact, one’s nearest neighbor may be 1-20 miles away.
The nearest major markets for artists are 500-800 miles away, and the Montana Arts Council knows that the number one need voiced by artists in our state is for help expanding marketing opportunities and access to markets.
The Montana Artrepreneur Program
Our gold-star model for market expansion is the Montana Artrepreneur Program--we call it MAP--created by Dr. Cindy Kittredge (who recently retired from our staff). MAP is a flexible, accessible, and affordable program geared to helping visual and traditional artists create a sustainable future in the business of art. Instituted in 2009, and now in its sixth year, MAP is an economic development training center for hundreds of artists throughout the state.
The program is designed to address the geographic isolation of artists and bridge the vast distances in Montana. It centers on a coach-and-learning-artist-cohort model set in rural communities across the state. Each cohort consists of six to twelve artists coached by an artist, usually from their own area of the state, who has gone through the MAP artist-training program. The artists spend ten months together (usually meeting once a month) developing their marketing and business skills, resulting in the creation of an “Artrepreneur’s Toolbox” of 35 elements. To date, 350 artists have enrolled in the training. Twenty-seven coaches are trained, and at present, ten have active cohorts.
The Secret Sauce
Sheri Jarvis, our current MAP Program Director, says that the “secret sauce” that makes this program especially effective includes the following ingredients:
Affirmation
There is something special that happens when an artist finds a group of people who speak the same language and have been pursuing art as a credible profession for so long. There is always a lovely mix of relief and excitement in the room when they get together.
Support
Because artists are natural problem-solvers and creative engineers, there is no better place than MAP to share ideas. At 300+ artists and growing, the network is substantial and media-diverse so our artists can find support for most any challenge, whether business- or studio-related. Montanans are strong, humble, and generous people by nature. Though we are few and far between, we find ways of bridging the barriers of distance to help each other. Thanks to the rich combination of our general nature coupled with social media and the structure of MAP, Montana artists have a support system unavailable to most artists in other states.
Authenticity
It’s beautifully challenging for each artist to work with a group of people who “really see” their talent and potential and who will hold them to the highest standard of their genius. Artists ask more from one another--it’s not enough to simply be “artsy.” Artists will boldly and honestly encourage each other to move beyond mediocrity.
Work
Participating in a MAP group is work. Each MAP cohort starts its meeting talking about their artit’s the foundation of everything they do, their product and their purpose. Each person brings something that they have finished or are working on to report their progress as makers to the group. In learning to describe and share the story of why they make what they make, they hone the craft of communication--the essence of marketing. From there, they build their business tools together, leaning in to the hardest parts through lively small group discussions that engage each person in the room. All of this is hard for artists who would much rather be alone in the studio expressing themselves without language.
Sales Impact
The Montana Arts Council recently conducted an in-depth evaluation of the MAP program, steered by a well-established researcher in our field, Surale Phillips. We asked her to go deep and research MAP artists’ sales, and economic impact on household income from 2009 to 2013.
Artists who received “certification” by completing the program and submitting their portfolio of 35 tools in their “Toolbox,” mentioned before:
- generated a 391 percent increase in net sales of art with some gross sales as high as $68,000/year;
- increased out-of-state sales by 53 percent; and
- reported that in 2013, 29 percent of their gross personal income was derived from their art sales.
