Does it pay to be an artist online?

The title of this post may be deceptive if you take it literally. This is not about money and selling art online, although the benefits I enjoyed with my online presence have led to some sales.

I am going to describe some opportunities I had because of my website, my blog and more recently Twitter. You will notice the variety of these examples.

A slideshow of my paintings on the BBC Wiltshire website

It was nice to have some of my paintings featured on the BBCWiltshire website.

One of my paintings included in a Mexican book on dragon fruits

This one came as a surprise… One day, I received the book with my painting in it. Because the author is an academic, I did not mind him using the image (Note: this is an exception – I own the copyright in my painting and any reproduction needs my consent)

I wrote a guest post for Fine Art Tips

The chance to write a guest post for Fine Art Tips came through Twitter.

My “Cable car ride” painting made the front page of JMCP magazine

JMCP (Journal of Managed Care Pharmacy) is a US non-profit pharmaceutical magazine. The circulation of the magazine is close to 20,000. Their audience is mainly pharmacists and physicians.

My Painting Cable car ride featured on the March 2012 magazine cover, to coincide with a conference in San Francisco.

In the magazine was a full-page article about me and my work, in a section titled “Cover Impressions - About Our Cover Artist.”

I have been commissioned to make a Cyanometer

In July 2008, I wrote two blog posts on the cyanometer, which is an apparatus that allows you to judge the blueness of the sky. See, Bluesky research with a cyanometer and How to build a cyanometer.

 While making her research, a journalist who was preparing a radio program for BBC3 titled “Skylarking” contacted me. She wanted me to make the larger version of the cyanometer. You can read how I made the cyanometer in my article Cyanometer revisited. 

Conclusion

I have not tried to generate revenues from the blog (I always refused to put advertising on it, and my total earnings from affiliate links paid for a paperback book…)

This blog, like many others, is about something different. You reach people you never dreamt of reaching before. When you go digital, the planet is your village.

It may sound cheesy, but you need to give to receive.

It takes time...

Be patient and keep building-up your own blog.