“A great practical guide
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 27 December 2020
Verified Purchase
“This is a great guide. Even as a gallery owner myself, I’ve already learned so much from Lisa’s experience, particularly around social media and the practical side, some of the stuff you just don’t really think about, so it’s great to have it all spelled out. It would be nice to see all the images in their lovely colours, but it didn’t really take away from it. I would love to see some digital packs of related worksheets, Docs or guides or something from Lisa next! :) It’s a lovely project to start a mini, pop up or guerrilla gallery or as promotion for your own
artwork, I highly recommend it particularly during any pandemics that happen to occur during your lifetime – art must fill any corner, window, or online space it can!”
The Tiny Art Gallery Manual:
How to Set up and Promote your Own Tiny Art Gallery
It can be hard for very established artists to get into galleries. It sometimes feels impossible for new and emerging artists.
As an artist, running your own gallery will allow you to get an idea of how your work could look in a gallery setting. It will also give you an insight into what a gallery needs from creatives, which will make working with them easier in the future.
If you are interested in curating exhibitions, a no risk step towards renting space is to run a miniature version of a gallery!
Book writing logistics
Writing environment
The actual bare bones writing of the book came pretty easily. I use Google Docs because it can be set to work on or offline, which means I can sit in the garden with no WiFi and write, it will update in the cloud when I’m next near a signal.
It helps me to start with a rough outline. Make the headings first and you can see the table of contents start to rack up on the left of the screen. This really helps with navigation and to get a sense of flow through the book. Use headings in order, Heading 1, Heading 2 etc, to denote chapters and sections within the chapters. I often write random chunks of wisdom and leave them floating at the end of the document in case they come in handy, but usually I just start with a section and get writing. Breaking it down into chunks makes life a lot easier.
Layout and publishing
I used InDesign to lay the book out. I am new to the programme and it was a very steep learning curve but the end result looks pretty good. I had help from the amazing Sally Eldars who meticulously proof read for me! Open source software Scribus works just as well as InDesign and is just as steep a learning curve.
Your publisher will dictate what page sizes you can have. My book is about tiny galleries so I went for the smallest size. Everything (including the cover) is uploaded as a PDF.
This book is self published via Amazon KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing). It is printed on demand so I don’t need to pay for any stock to be made in advance. I know that Amazon is evil and I feel bad about using it, but this is a no risk way of publishing. There is a good list of other companies here. I’m going to try Barnes and Nobel next time. Be careful about signing away any exclusivity rights on Amazon, that will mean you can only sell through them.
You should be able to buy author copies which you can sell yourself if you have an exhibition or a show. Don’t expect to make a fortune. For each book sold on Amazon I make a couple of quid. They cost me a few quid to buy as author copies plus postage.
Collaboration
Finding people to include in your book helps with content, it can stretch a topic into more viewpoints and areas and people who are featured in a book tend to promote it, so it helps with marketing.
The Tiny Art Gallery Manual has case studies from all these wonderful small galleries: @groocksgallery @acardboardmonkey @thedollshouseartgallery @the.open.dresser.gallery @dogandbonegallery #beyondscalegallery @tiffany_struwig_fine_art @minigallery_dontcry
Buy the book
If you want to see the book for yourself you can get it from Amazon or from my website.
