Artists
This week, the number of artists who’ve secured venues doubled, many of whom are local. Several have secured space in venues besides UICA and Old Federal, which means other venues are getting in the game.

Out of the 1,141 registered artists, we’re concerned that some will wait until the registration deadline, July 31, to finish their proposal. We’re sending out emails reminding artists that venues are making selections now and they should finish their profile ASAP.

Probable change for next year: Matching begins after registration ends, and registration can start earlier (a luxury we did not have for 2009).

Venues
Talking with quite a few hosts for larger venues, we learned they’re in the process of negotiating Hosting Agreements with multiple artists. A couple venues decided to try charging a fee to show work (Open Concept and Alten Place). Considering we got calls from artists upset over discovering the fee in the venue’s Hosting Agreement, we strongly recommend any venue charging a fee put it on their page and tell the artist BEFORE sending a Hosting Agreement.

Facebook
Our Facebook page spiked on Tuesday to over 4,000 fans and we had our highest traffic day since April (for reasons we haven’t fully figured out, yet).

Search
The most commonly used filtered search for venues: Indoor/Has lighting. For artist search: 2D. Does this mean there’ll be an abundance of painting this year? We’ll see.

Don’t miss on the blog:

• Steve Samson offers advice to venues and artists. (He is Exhibitions Manager at UICA and the one who secured the first ten artists for ArtPrize)
• We’ve started a list of local fabricators for artists looking for resources locally
• If you haven’t already, learn the basics of insuring art
• And what you need to know about the Hosting Agreement