08-Art & Success: A Conversation with Kristin Cronic
Mariana:
So tell me if you've ever been scrolling on Instagram and you see an artist posting about how the collection that they just launched earlier that day or earlier that hour is completely sold out. Tell me if there's not a tiny little part of you, maybe hidden really deep inside, that thinks that the measure of success of your own art launches depends on how quickly it sells out. Yes? No? Is it just me?
No, but seriously, I have seen these posts every once in a blue moon and it does give me a moment to pause and wonder is how fast you sell a painting or a collection a measure of how successful it is or how good it is? Is it a function of the quality of the work? Or is it the marketing behind the work? Or could there be some other types of forces that are influencing the speed at which art sells? These are the questions that pop into my mind whenever I see those kinds of posts. In today's episode, my guest and I are going to be talking about the artist's journey and what success as an artist can look like. Please enjoy episode eight, Art and Success: A Conversation with Kristin Cronic.
Hey artist friend. This is Mariana Durst from The Liberated Artist Podcast, a space for unvarnished conversations about selling art online from a place of artistry, integrity, and courage. Whether you've got yellow ochre under your fingernails or clay dust on your jeans, I'll be your go-to guide as you bridge the gap between art and entrepreneurship. Your art isn't meant to stay stacked against the studio walls ready to walk this path together. Let's get started.
Hey, liberated artist. I have such a special guest. You can probably hear this big smile on my face, because I'm bringing to you one of my favorite people, somebody who I've known since the beginning of my career as a designer, copywriter for artists. She was one of the first people to trust me with her art and her business. I have her here because she has such an interesting story that we're going to totally dive into. My special guest is a US Naval Academy graduate. She's a Navy veteran. She is an artist. She is an entrepreneur. Wow, what an entrepreneur. She's also an educator, teaching artists all about painting and all the things, so welcome Kristin Cronic.
Kristin:
Thank you so much for having me, Mariana. I adore you. You know I do.
Mariana:
Me too. Me too. Oh, my God. Like fangirl, 100%.
Kristin:
In so many ways I feel like I would not be here without you. Because having just the space on the internet and the counseling that you gave me early on, those two things combined just set me in the right direction. I am so grateful I had you and still do.
Mariana:
I was not prepared for this. I'm going to start crying. Oh my gosh, what an honor. It's really been an honor to just know you and how we ended up just connecting through a random Facebook group post.
Kristin:
Yeah. That was it. Yeah.
Mariana:
I remember exactly what you said. Like, "You're exactly what I've been looking for," and I didn't know what to expect with you before we started our journey together. Just for all the listeners, Kristin and I have worked together on not just one, but four websites. Oh my gosh.
Kristin:
Yeah, four now. Yeah.
Mariana:
Four websites. It has been such an honor and a privilege. When Kristin came to me, she had a very, or still has, a very successful art business focused on creating art and goods inspired by your time at the US Naval Academy. Tell me all about that. What's your connection to it? Tell us about that-
Kristin:
Sure.
Mariana:
... crazy journey.
Kristin:
One of the websites you made, one of the brands you helped develop, well, helped me develop is called Easel on Stribling. It's a website where I, a community now, that I've dedicated to painting about the Naval Academy and the Navy experience. Really, what I've come to learn is it's a place where we can celebrate creativity within the military community, which is something that I feel like is lacking. We do that in many ways. It still is a platform for my original paintings, which is how it started. There's also just fun design projects. I'm an amateur designer and that's really fun for me, to do fabric and mugs and cute things like that.
But it's also a place where I can invest in other curators too, because I've got a platform now. We do that by collaborating with other makers and I would sell them retail. I've also wholesale purchased from people, so I would sell retail, and just find ways to make things work all with other veteran or military spouses. It's just been so much fun. It's turned into exhibits now at the Naval Academy Museum at the US Pentagon. Then just more recently at the National Veterans Memorial Museum as well. It's everything, from products and fun stuff to fine art and everything in between. The book.
Mariana:
What a way to really, yeah, the book. I was going to bring that up, because I'm like, "You're missing this one thing."
Kristin:
Just one thing.
Mariana:
Just a little, right. But when Kristin came to me, she had this vision and she was like, "In the future, this is what I'm planning for." It was a very long-term plan, like your book, A Midshipman's Journey. I so recommend it to anybody. You don't even have to be associated with the military in any sort of way, because it really speaks about a journey of creativity and sticking to things. It's so beautiful. Even though it's in the context of Kristin's experience in the US Naval Academy, it's really universal in its theme.
Kristin:
Absolutely.
Mariana:
I totally need to plug that in, because it is such-
Kristin:
Thank you.
Mariana:
... an amazing work, but that was a goal that you had set for yourself years ago and the book only just came out in May.
Kristin:
No, it's technically published June 13th.
Mariana:
Oh, my gosh.
Kristin:
As we're recording this, not even yet. Technically, I have it on my website, so I've been able to make, send things out. But on Amazon, it won't ship until June 13th, so...
Mariana:
Oh, my gosh.
Kristin:
But yeah, to your point, that was my goal from the beginning. In my head, this started probably 13 years ago, when I was like, "Maybe one day I'll become a good enough painter to do this project," and then actively paint for about four years and then about a year of just the book itself. When we started it, that was the end goal, but now that we're there, there's just new goals.
Mariana:
Right. Just new goals come and take its place. I think you've proven to yourself that you are so capable in casting this dream and taking the actions that will help accomplish it. That's pretty major. Aside from this Easel on Stribling that is Kristin's Naval Academy inspired business, she also has her own art website and business where she explores all different sorts of themes, like nature, motherhood, all of these important and so exciting explorations in color and color palettes. Tell me about that part of your business.
Kristin:
That's just my name, it's Kristin Cronic and it's just my studio work. That one was definitely, it's actually helpful to look back to when we worked together, because that was a really good marker of the beginning of it. I've always been an artist, but really, when I was like, "This is happening." That one was by far the hardest to nail down as a brand, because it was so like, and honestly, in so many ways, I'm still discovering it. What I'm discovering also is that is just the artist's journey. I've learned a lot about it, but it was something that I'm now five years in, I do have my sentence.
This took an MFA to get to. I joke, I'm like, "This took me two years to say this one sentence, but my work is about the journeys we take and the relationships that shape our lives." That's what my work's about. It comes across through many different themes, many different colors, and many different mediums. But at the end of the day, it's about journeys, it's about relationships and community and that's it. But when we first started doing a website, I was like, "I don't know how to condense this. I don't know, there's so much stuff here."
That's really, the more I've come to this, this is the place that I get to be free to just be an artist. I'm not as less concerned about, like when I compare my fine art website and Easel on Stribling side by side, they're very different animals. This is the place that I get to treasure just being a free spirited ADHD artist. I get to make things and weave and I have ideas of what I'll do throughout the year. I kind of give myself deadlines just to help focus, but things take twists and turns all the time. That's really where my fun and freedom lie.
Mariana:
Oh my gosh, I remember narrowing down what is the process and I think I've seen your journey just really honoring and leveraging that ADHD and neurodivergence, which doesn't have to be a negative thing. It's actually a really positive thing, because it makes following you as an artist so exciting.
Kristin:
Yeah. That's my biggest fear going into this. Because when I was starting, and I'll probably get to this, but when I was starting, I was just seeing artists with just super cohesive feeds on Instagram and there was this, my heart sunk, because I'm like, "I don't think that's the way I'm going to work. I don't see me ever finding that." Yeah, I'll stick to themes and I return to them, but yeah, I've been painting almost every day for five years now and I shift often.
I've learned to try to stick with an idea for a little longer now, maybe a couple of weeks versus boo-boo-boo-boo-boo. This helps me calm down too. But the biggest fear I had was that someone would force me to just do one thing for the rest of my life. But for me, that's not what being an artist is. I think it's okay, if that's good for somebody else, but I just knew for me, that's not going to work. I'm too curious. There's too many things to play with.
Mariana:
You are the most playful person that I know. I love it, because I think about it and with my reemerging painting practice and letting myself be playful and giving myself that permission to move from one idea to the next on a different canvas and saying, "That is okay. I see Kristin is doing it and she is a successful artist and I treasure her journey and being a witness to that, so I'm going to give myself that permission." I think it's important that that not over curation of Instagram and to allow everybody to come in and peek into what it actually means for you, Kristin, and your artistic practice. Because otherwise, it would just be the same artistic journey for every artist if we all did the same things and curated to the same level.
Kristin:
For sure.
Mariana:
How boring is that?
Kristin:
I have two thoughts on that to expand on from the art marketing and art selling standpoint. Because whenever you sell a collection, it does need to be tied together by some idea. I've noticed with myself, sometimes I can finish a thought and then there's a collection and it's a couple of months later, and I'm like, "Beautiful." Then sometimes, I'll do one or two and then I'll put them aside. I've learned that's okay. There's actually a very strong physical space feed. I actually got a storage unit to help with this, for whenever I'm like, "I just did one at a time, but I still like it. I don't want to, it's not complete and it's thought of, but it's there."
I'll put it away and I'll bring it back out. I'm working on something now that I started two years ago, and now I get to finish it. I wanted to talk about that. Then also with the marketing side, it's the same idea. At least trying to stick to a theme outwardly with emails or social media. But one thing I've really given myself the freedom to do is, in my stories, to share whatever the heck I feel like I'm working on. To be like, "If you're intimate enough to look at my stories, I'm not going to hide the fact that I am all over the place." That's my place to play too.
Mariana:
Yeah, I think that that's one of the things that I most love about knowing you and following you on Instagram, and just seeing you be yourself, be yourself online. It's so refreshing and I just love it. I'm glad that you brought these things up about how sometimes collections come out really naturally. Sometimes they take time, sometimes it's a one-off piece and that's all okay. The marketing of it, it's good if you have a collection and a body of work with a theme, then you can speak to that.
But if you have a one-off piece, you can speak to that as well. Giving yourself that flexibility of seeing where you are in your journey and adapting your marketing messaging and just even practices to that is so, it's so smart, it's so intelligent, because you're not having to fit, like they say, the square peg in a round hole or whatever, round peg in a square hole. I don't know, can you talk to us about that and expand on those points that you were trying to make?
Kristin:
Yeah, I think so. One thing that came to mind when you were saying the one-offs, because sometimes I do a one-off that just doesn't, like maybe I'll put it on my website and offer it for sale and maybe it won't sell. Then sometimes I'm grateful for that because it sparks they're around and I see them and I'm like, "Oh." that's what's happening right now in my studio. Other times, I'll have these pieces, I'm like, "Gosh, I love this." It was an idea and it's done. I did two paintings and it's done. That's actually where it's fun to explore different ways of getting your work out there. I have a local gallery that I use.
I have my email list, I have a regional gallery that's all internet based. Sometimes they'll have opportunities that just, they'll do a call for a show and I'm like, "Oh my God, these would be perfect for it." Then, they have a place to live. Sometimes it's just being aware of the opportunities that are out there and being like, "I have the perfect piece for that." Then that makes me feel good that they get to live life, even if it doesn't always fit perfectly in this box of internet art sales. Which for me, it's still only a percentage of what I do. I really end up leveraging my galleries a lot and I'm grateful for them for that reason.
Mariana:
Yeah, it's wonderful that you have these really great gallery partnerships that really meet you where you are and respect you as an artist and respect your vision and aren't pushing you to be this or be that. You can create the way that you naturally create, and then seek those opportunities and know what is for what area instead of trying to make something that is going to sell in this space. Because it's a dance, right?
Kristin:
Mm-hmm.
Mariana:
You do want to make money. You don't want to have an expensive hobby, but also you want to be in integrity with yourself and create the art that your curiosity is leading you to create.
Kristin:
To be honest, I never know if something will sell. Just because it's sold well once does not mean it will sell well again. I'm learning that the hard way. It's so unglamorous, but keeping a very tight grass on my budget. Honestly, right now, I've been able to save up to four or five months of all my expenses between paying myself and paying for the studio. My goal is to save up to a year. That way, I would have a year's worth of expenses. That way there's a lot of space for the ebbs and flows and often plan a year out. I think that would be wonderful. But that's hard to do. It's very hard to do.
Mariana:
Yeah. Because you have to balance it with paying yourself and living in the now and not taking away too much.
Kristin:
Yes. Yeah, yeah.
Mariana:
But just enough. But that's so smart and that's self-care at the deepest level, I think, because it's not easy. It's not, "Oh, I'm going to get a manicure or bubble bath." That's easy. Anybody can do that. I really believe that the truest version of self-care is not straightforward. It's not super simple. It may cost effort, but in the long run, it's going to pay off. When you're planting those seeds that you get to harvest later, that is golden. You can never start early enough. I'm so glad to hear you say that. That's so inspiring. When we worked together, initially, you were a self-taught artist or that's what you were-
Kristin:
Yeah.
Mariana:
... saying, although I know you learned art from other people and you had mentorship and things like that.
Kristin:
Self-guided.
Mariana:
Self-guided, yes.
Kristin:
Self-guided.
Mariana:
Tell me about your journey in terms of the artistic part of it.
Kristin:
Sure. Like I think probably almost anyone you'll talk to, I've always been an artist. The more I dig into that, the more I know that's true, the more I believe that the artist's voice was valid at eight, it was valid at 15, it was valid 23, it was valid at 34 or however old I am now, but I did have a, I like to say self-guided art education, because I've had so many books and mentors along the way. When I was in the Navy, it was for one thing, I did have this goal one day of doing this book and this body of work, which I vastly underestimated how much time it would take.
But so one thing that really just kept me happy, it was something I could work on with relatively little space at the time. Now it takes up tons of space, but at the time, relatively little space, that was nice. The Navy lifestyle was hard. This was something that just kind of helped me be happy When I wasn't at sea. I ended up, I'm not sure how much you should share. I got to this place where I definitely felt stuck and I had just an opportunity within my career where I had more normal hours. My husband had deployed during that time. I ended up finding an artist that was local and asked him to teach me. This was before YouTube is what it is, so it was me in his studio once a week and I learned a lot.
That was where I feel like I really just got confidence I needed to just paint. We would paint a still life from life in three hours. I was expected to do the same thing throughout the week and come up with a new painting. It was two paintings a week. That's where I learned to paint direct. That's where I learned to paint fast. That's where I learned to paint oil. That was in 2014. Then after that, it was just, I felt like I had the confidence to just continue my journey and continue learning. Then it wasn't until 2019, 2020, I had joined this little critique group of other artists. I was just curious about this other world of art, like a mocha. I'm like, "Huh, that doesn't look like what I make. I don't really understand it. I want to learn more." There's this critique group that was that flavor of artists. I joined and I wanted the mentor that was the most off the wall artist.
She was so cool, Lauren. She made giant belly button inspired sculptures. It's all about motherhood. They're really, really cool. She was the one that was like, "You know, that's what MFAs are for, is to ask some of these questions." I was like, "Huh." I did some research and it turns out there's a really awesome low residency program six minutes from my house. I'm not kidding. It was a great program. It was right down the street. Most of it would be online except for the summers. 2020 was happening, so that summer actually only had one summer in person. The rest of it was all online.
From 2020 to 2022, I worked through my MFA and that's where I actually got to learn more of the theory and understand modern art more and appreciate it for the first time, which I really hadn't appreciated. I wanted to appreciate it, I just didn't know how. I can't say that I'm self-taught anymore, because I did go to art school and then in a funny plot twist, I'm now teaching at an art school, which is the most, it's hilarious. I'm like, "I didn't even go to art school myself for this way." But I'm teaching drawing at that same school right now, adjunct. It's so much fun. The kids are great.
Mariana:
That's awesome. Did the fact that you were a self-guided artist, before you started your MFA, how did that affect, if it did, the way that you showed up for your business and as an artist?
Kristin:
I definitely had imposter syndrome. I felt like, "Who am I to make this work and just show up in this way at all?" But I also knew at this point, one really great thing about the Navy, well, for better or for worse, you end up changing your jobs a lot. Every nine to 12 months, you'll change a role. In the six years I was in, I had gotten a ton of different types of jobs. I kind of learned that I didn't like any of them, at least for the next phase of life. They were very fulfilling and enjoyable at the time, but I knew I wanted to be a mother. I knew art was here to stay. So when I had gotten out of the Navy, I'm not sure if I'm even going to answer this question, but I'm on this track, so I'm going to say it.
Mariana:
We're here with you.
Kristin:
I wasn't expecting to get out of the Navy, but when I had my daughter, I kind of just realized, "This lifestyle is not what I want to raise my kids with." I just didn't know it, until I was holding. It was one of those. I had quit while on maternity leave. I had plans to go to MIT. I stopped that, all these things. The weekend we got out of the Navy, my husband and I got out at the same time. It's the weekend I hung up my uniform. We flooded during Hurricane Irma and it was this perfect storm of just literally of an identity change from leaving the military, which was this kind consuming for 10 years.
All of a sudden, I'm a new mom. I was pregnant with my son, so I was hormonal. Then, we were living in this flood zone. We were there for all of it. There was a lot. Then, I had a civilian job. It was the one thing I hadn't tried yet. It was sales, like direct sales in the medical field. Turns out, I hate that too. It was just a couple of months in, I hit rock bottom, so I started to paint again. Despite the fact that I had imposter syndrome, despite the fact that I had this belief that I couldn't actually be an artist if I didn't go to art school.
I was like, "Well unfortunately, there's nothing left for me in this world. This is all I... I have to make this work." There was this desperation, because I can't be a whole human being without art. Now looking back, I'm like the success was in making the work, but the business allows me to keep making work. I'm sure I could have found a job that I loved and still made work, but at the time, I thought that was it, that was the only thing I could do. I was hungry just to like, "I have to make this work." I had booked a show at a local community center, and I did, from what I feel like is the first body work I've ever done, that I really felt like I was using my voice and there were these giant paintings of trees.
I remember it occurred to me, in that process, I was like, "Oh my gosh, no one gave me permission to take up this much space." That's why they're big to this day. They're about a lot of things, but one of the things they're about is taking up space in the world. I had unrealistic expectations about that show, but it was a huge personal success to finish it. That was, I think, the official start of the business. I think I found you shortly after that show to actually make a place for these things.
Mariana:
Yeah. I love those trees. They're magnificent. But I want to go back. What were your expectations and where did they come from?
Kristin:
They came from Instagram.
Mariana:
Oh, wow. Surprised.
Kristin:
I was making all these changes in 2017 to 2018, which I feel like is the height of when artists on Instagram would sell out of collections. I was seeing this happen and it was giving me so much hope and so much encouragement. I knew that you have to build a collector base, but I didn't know what I didn't know. I thought that's what just happened. When it didn't happen for me, I was crushed. I felt shame. I felt like the work probably wasn't good. I didn't realize that that's extremely unrealistic. It's amazing that it happens. I'm so glad that artists get to experience that. I have a side story that I finally did experience that at one point, which was really cool, but it does not make a successful collection. It's okay.
Mariana:
Yeah, no, I totally hear you. It's like I was there to witness that. A lot of people say, "Oh, I sold out in one hour," or this, and... If I had been creating art at that point, which I wasn't, thankfully, I think it would've set the bar so high that I might have not even tried to attempt it if I didn't have the right mindset, which you kind of either have it at the beginning of your journey of saying, "I'm just creating this, it's going to take time. It's okay if nobody buys a painting the moment that I put it on Instagram," or you learn it after the fact. Looking back in retrospect, you're like, "Oh my gosh, I tried so hard and that wasn't happening, but I just kept going anyway."
Kristin:
Yeah. From that particular series, I have one painting left and the last couple only sold this year. It took four years for some of those pieces to sell. I still love them. I actually had them in my house on purpose. I still enjoy being around them. They're not bad paintings just because it took them a while. They're big, they're expensive, and that's okay. I read the book, Ninth Street Women. Have you ever read that book?
Mariana:
I started to, I have not continued. I had to return it to the library before I was done with it.
Kristin:
[inaudible]-
Mariana:
... had got through, so a few chapters in the beginning.
Kristin:
It's like 800 pages. I just remember one part of that, they were talking about Pollock and how he had sold out of a show, the opening, and then the next month he didn't, or whatever it was, the next one, a couple of months later, he sold one or didn't sell anything. I was like, "That actually is, like the selling out thing is unrealistic." The one or two is actually a lot more realistic. It's helpful to know that even Pollock at the height of his career was still experiencing that unpredictability. That's okay.
Mariana:
Yeah, it's okay. There's something to be said about just being a self-representing artist or having that be such a big part of your business is to just sell your own art on your website or wherever and not having a team of people who are supporting you in terms of writing emails, updating your website, updating product listings, photographing your work, writing about the work, pricing it.
Kristin:
A lot.
Mariana:
It's a lot. I think by the time you're ready to market it, some of that steam has kind of...
Kristin:
I'm done.
Mariana:
Yeah, you're kind of done and you haven't really even started talking about it so much.
Kristin:
Yeah, that's for sure.
Mariana:
But sometimes what we see is not the full story, especially on Instagram, which is, I think it's Shanna Skidmore who says, "The reel behind the highlight reel." We don't get to see the reel behind the highlight reel. We see the highlight reels. I'm loving that I have you here, because you shared something really important and you just kind of touched on it, that you actually did sell out your collection.
Kristin:
I did.
Mariana:
Tell me about that experience and then also tell me about the wisdom that came with that.
Kristin:
A couple of weeks ago, I joined a collective called Well and Wonder and it's online. I watched them for about two years and I just loved the way they talked about the art and the artists. I started to realize that mattered to me a lot. I joined, and one thing they do a couple of times a year is show a group show. You can do your personal series and you can also submit to group shows. I had submitted seven, I think, pieces to a floral show. These were special to me on one hand, because they're a continuation of a series I started and kind of at the height of 2019. I was getting a ton of commission requests. I was feeling really bitter and kind of prostituted out, if that makes sense. Is that okay to say?
So this whole series was born from this urge to see me. I just want the space to create in a way that I see things and they're very expressive. There's a lot of line work. They have just developed. Every year or so, I kind of return to that idea and I try something new. This was a floral version of that idea. Honestly, I had done them two months earlier. I barely talked about it. I probably posted three or four times just because I was like, sometimes I have my act together. I had it done in time, I kind of planned it out and I was in the middle of all of this life stuff and Well and Wonder put out this show. Then, I came back and they had sold out in 40 minutes and I was shocked. I was not expecting that at all. I was so excited. But I also was like, "Wow, for how many years I had used that as a metric of success of whatever and I'm so glad-"
Mariana:
A validation.
Kristin:
A validation. Yes, I'm a valid artist now that I'm sold out.
Mariana:
Yeah.
Kristin:
I'm so glad that it took four years for that to happen for the first time, because I had worked through so many of just taking myself down notches because of my expectations. By the time that happened I was like, "The success already happened. I already made a body of work that was cohesive and I was excited about and I got my images on time and it was great." It wasn't in the commercial outcome. That, I had no control over, and it already satisfied me as an artist. I think Emily Jeffords had talked about that, the successes is in making, first and foremost, and that's just stuck with me. But the one thing that was nice, I was like, "Well, but that was fun. It was fun to get the workout. It was fun to get out of my closet and just ship it out all in one day." That was so much fun. But that's all it was, was fun.
Mariana:
Yeah. Yeah, it's almost like you didn't need it almost at that moment. It could have gone the way it has gone in the past and you would've still been happy. But it was a nice surprise and probably like, "Ooh."
Kristin:
Yeah.
Mariana:
Okay, but tell me what happened next. Because I haven't heard this, so I want to know.
Kristin:
About two weeks later I had a personal series scheduled and these were some I've been so excited about. It's a similar line of work but on oceans. I've returned to this one a lot and they've done really well in the past. I was expecting them to do pretty well and they didn't. I sold one out of 15 and that's all I still sold. I was like, again, the irony is like I wasn't expecting to sell any. Now, I'm really glad I sold out just because it helped the budget. That was an unexpected influx of cash and then all of a sudden what I was expecting didn't happen.
But again, that was all it was. That turned into a financial puzzle and a storage puzzle. I have to now figure out what to do, give them some time and then I'll probably just figure out where I need to put them later. I love them. I still love them. I just don't know if it's reading well online. Again, it's not like the pieces are bad, it's just sometimes they don't land. Sometimes the audience, it's just a bad week. It was Mother's Day week. It's possible, it just wasn't on people's minds. I was like, "And that's okay too." I was like, "I have to tell Mariana this. She'll think it's hilarious."
Mariana:
I do. I do think it's so hilarious. I mean, you've also told me something, like there's this push and pull between marketing and being an artist and being an entrepreneur and trying to bridge those two things together, because that, you want to be able to create, because that is how you exist as a human being. You are an artist. If you don't have the support that you need in order to create, then you can't do it anymore. Then, you do have to worry about surviving.
Kristin:
Exactly.
Mariana:
Right?
Kristin:
Selling is a good thing, because it lets you keep making, but that's kind of why I have to circle back always to that boring budget, because it's okay. If it takes these eight months now to sell or a year and a half to sell, I have enough cushion at this point, that's fine. I do need them to sell eventually, I spent all this time making them, but paper frames.
Mariana:
Of course.
Kristin:
But it's okay to have some breathing space. I'm starting to realize it's pretty normal. The sellout thing is unusual, while fun.
Mariana:
It is fun and unusual. It's so refreshing to hear the story from you, because I have this kind of urge to tell people, "It's not all bright and selling out, it is sometimes a patient game." And you're offsetting it by working and focusing on your budget and sticking to it and trying to save up for those up to a year, so that you're accounting for those ebbs and flows like this last show that you had where you only sold one painting. That is so smart. This is you really thinking about, "Okay, creating art and being an artist is my lifeline. I know the market can ebb and flow. I know cash in comes in, cash goes out. I know there's hot seasons and cold seasons," and you are slowly building a foundation to support you throughout all of it.
Kristin:
Yeah. Again, it's not sexy at all, but this is the first summer I've gone in and I can actually look at the numbers. I keep a pretty ruthless track of where my recurring expenses are. If I do HoneyBook, I know when it'll be what month. I keep track of all that, actually look at it, "Okay, if I sell nothing for the next four months, I will be okay." That's really freeing. I also know, I will still sell some stuff. It's just the cold season. Well not in Florida, but on the market. It's cold.
Mariana:
Never in Florida.
Kristin:
But also, it's just nice to have a little bit of freedom and there's things that I have at my disposal, if I need to make up, because six days ends up being drier than I expected and too many things are slower than I think, I can still try to leverage some other things. I try not to cut my own pay, I pay myself. That's one thing I try not to do. But I also am very reasonable when I pay myself, I come on purpose, I look at what I have and I kind of divide it by three. I'm like, "Okay, as long as it stays, as long as I can keep at least three months on hand." Sometimes I'll do it if I know it is kind of entering a cold season. But usually, I try not to.
Mariana:
Oh, and I can imagine how that keeps the anxiety at bay-
Kristin:
Yeah.
Mariana:
... of yeah, you know how much time you have. You're not second guessing every decision. You can be really strategic about what you can not only create, but how you're going to show up and market that work. Maybe there's something that you can do that, "Hey, this is what I'm going to do to keep the lights on and I can do this as a fallback."
Kristin:
Yeah.
Mariana:
But you pull that when you need to and you know what that is. That's so great. I also wanted to just ask you, so now that you've been through it all almost, well we can't say that, right? You're not done yet. You're young.
Kristin:
Been through a lot though.
Mariana:
Yeah, you've been through a lot. You have a really wide breadth of experience and you have this experience in your masters where you were in a community with other experienced artists as well. I want to know, what does success look to you now as an artist?
Kristin:
Oh, for me?
Mariana:
Yeah.
Kristin:
For me, success looks like, number one, the freedom to make what I want to make within reason. Maybe some projects take a little more planning and budgeting, but the freedom to make what I want to make with an audience that's excited to see it, even if it's not necessarily with sales, but I need that dialogue. I also want to be able to support the percentage that my husband and I have agreed upon to live the lifestyle that we want to live. Which again, in some ways that lifestyle is compared to many maybe standards of living, we have some comforts that we would like prefer not to, but we're also trying to be practical too.
But as long as I can continue to support what we need in that area and then have the freedom to make, I am happy. Then at this point also having the space to pay it forward. Because teaching adjunct's is not a high paying endeavor, but it's very rewarding to spend the time with people. I see that as just the fact that I have the margin now to give so much of my week to them also feels like success. That like, "It's okay, I can spend time. I don't have to spend every minute of my life trying to make paintings that will sell." I can have this space and that space is huge. Space is space. There it is. Space and freedom.
Mariana:
Yeah. Space and freedom. I love that. It feels open and like you can breathe with that version of success and it's your own, nobody's telling you. It has nothing to do with the outcome of how fast you sell out of your collection. Really says. I love that.
Kristin:
Yeah, for sure. It has nothing to do with it. But I mean I mentioned before, some of those trees took four years to sell and one of my favorite ones had lived above our bed for that whole time. It was finally someone who had seen my work in a coffee shop before that even. She just had followed me and she was like finally got to a place where it made sense. I was like, that sale is, she did a studio visit, we got to talk about it.
I was like, "That felt so good," to actually get to enjoy a short relationship with her and to put the painting in her car as she drove away. It was worth the wait. It was a lovely transaction where I felt like I got something back in return beyond just the money. We got to have a relationship and connect over a piece, which was the best. That's all I hoped for as an artist.
Mariana:
Yeah. You feel seen and appreciated and like, oh, all this effort and waiting and worry maybe-
Kristin:
Yeah.
Mariana:
... it was meant for this person. Sometimes we don't realize that with the artist's sales cycle, it can be long, because people move, like you said, she might have not had the space, but now, she moved and you're top of mind. If you had just shut down and not kept talking about your art, she might have forgotten about you. If you didn't have that online space for her to find you, she might have just kind of went and looked for that somewhere else. It's important to plant those little seeds that maybe you launch your website and you don't sell a painting right when you launch it.
But it's okay, because now, you have that space to do that and to contain and later you can build up to that. Same thing with your gallery relationships and with the personal relationships with your collectors. I happen to be a collector of yours and I love your paintings. I know I wanted to collect from you, because I love you so much and we have that relationship that it makes this painting so special. I just wanted to throw that in there, because it's one of my favorites.
Kristin:
Oh, thank you. I mean, to that point though, I think art is different than a lot of other things. There is an emotional attachment to it. I think what we don't see when someone maybe sells out, it's rarely about the work itself. Usually beneath that action or that outcome is an iceberg of relationships that have been built. Which is why I think with the Instagram era of 2018, if they started soon enough, I think that does help. Because there were relationships there. I think there was just this mass influx, me included, where it was just a lot harder I think to connect on that level.
Now, I don't know, maybe other people forget it for me. Now, I think of Instagram as a place where my people already are. I get to hang out and share things, but that's more what's becoming for me, which is fun. Just a place to continue that conversation. But any of those decisions aren't going to be fast. A lot of things have to line up between the work being ready and them being ready and them resonating. I'm starting to realize I was expecting way too much out of the business. It was providing at a very great pace. Just what I was expecting to get in return was just unrealistic.
Mariana:
Yeah. You don't know that until you have that time to look back and you can see trends, because it's impossible to really get perspective when you're in it. Especially if you're stressed out and worried about it, you don't realize it necessarily without someone else telling you it's a seasonal thing. It's important to do things in a smart way, in a measured way and to stick with it. Because sometimes, there is a hump of time where you have to be building and building and building and just putting it out there before you get to harvest.
Kristin:
Absolutely.
Mariana:
That's realistic and it's valid to have a business like that, especially with art and other goods that are very unique.
Kristin:
Absolutely.
Mariana:
Yes. Tell me, Kristin, what are you excited about these days that you've put out there? Because I know you have all these offers and things that you do, but what is exciting to you right now in this season?
Kristin:
Okay, well, as you mentioned before, the book that took five years is officially published June 13th. I have emotionally, when I sent the last draft, the publisher was like, I was like, "Whew, we did it." We've not talked about that, but it's cool to see it out in the world. That's been really exciting. Then at the museum, I'm currently showing at, that same body of work, well a few pieces from it. I get to go back up and teach a workshop to a paint and sip night and then a family workshop.
It's really cool to have that museum setting to interact with the public in a really personal way. I was up before the opening in April and it was just like, I felt so full by the end of it, because it was just real human beings. The art's not for sale, it's just part of a show. It was just talking about work. There weren't any sales conversations. I was paid for the work. It was acquired by the museum, which was so cool. Which also-
Mariana:
Wow.
Kristin:
Yeah. Which takes the freedom away, so I can just, not freedom away. It takes the pressure off, so now I can just enjoy those conversations. That was very creatively fulfilling. That's going to continue into the fall. Then I have my own practice, which is always my source of fun, except that we're in the middle of a move. I just packed up my studio, except for my little mobile studio and it made me cry just.
I'm probably going to sweat soon. I'm like, "I can't believe I'm leaving this space. It served me so well, so I'm grateful for it." We're going to be in an Airbnb for four months, before we can move into the next studio. But constraints can be good. Sometimes constraints force us to be creative in different ways.
Mariana:
Yes. That's very self-coached.
Kristin:
But I'm very excited to have the space that I will eventually, I get to take over most of the garage, so yes.
Mariana:
Nice.
Kristin:
That's the big stuff. Then, teaching. Yeah, I really enjoy teaching and finding, we didn't talk too much about it, but I have an adjunct and then I have that other website you help me with. That's just a place where I'm treating it almost like my art practice as well, where I'm like, "I just want to share ways, things that have helped me in a very accessible way," be a skill share blog. Something that doesn't cost a lot, to just share and whatever happens if it happens, but I just want to be a place of generosity because I know how it felt. Most of the content's about painting, but other things too.
Mariana:
Well a lot of the people who are listening right now are artists. Can you tell them how they can learn from you and get some-
Kristin:
Oh, sure.
Mariana:
Some of your good stuff.
Kristin:
Unless you're a student at JU, obviously that's different. But the website where I'm catching all my teaching is called The Artist Wharf. The idea, we came up with the name as a, so T-H-E-A-R-T-I-S-T-W-H-A-R-F dot-com. A wharf is where a ship would come to refuel. I think of an art practice like that. Being in the Navy, it kind of was perfect. But a ship goes off, it has its adventures and then it comes back and it gets refueled, it stores offloads, the yucky stuff. I kind of see this as a place for that. It's very slow moving. We made the website in 2020, so very slow moving.
But it's a place where I've made an oil painting class that's just a standalone that kind of gives the basics of oil painting and the process that I use often. I did my first skill share class this year. I kind of like loosening up and letting go of perfectionism in painting, which is something that I've really had fun with and people ask about a lot. I've been using it to write blogs. I definitely want to do some series coming up. Well, maybe when I'm in the Airbnb, and only on my laptop, that's probably a good time to write.
Mariana:
Yeah, good idea.
Kristin:
I definitely want to do one on painting people quickly. Because one of the ways that I have a lot of stability financially is live oil painting and I still do it, been doing it for four years. That's its own conversation. It's wonderful.
Mariana:
Maybe you'll come back, you'll come back and we can talk about it, because that is a whole adventure in and of itself.
Kristin:
It is.
Mariana:
It's a different thing.
Kristin:
It's its own beast, but it's stability, it's challenges. It also turns into collectors sometimes too, which is kind of cool. I've been thinking of doing some classes geared towards painting directly. Especially people who are like, "How do you paint people fast?" I think that we could have some fun there too. So The Artist Wharf is where I've been catching some of those ideas as they come.
Mariana:
Yeah. Of course, in the show notes, I will have all of Kristin's links.
Kristin:
All the links.
Mariana:
All of the links to all of the things for Kristin Cronic, who is a dear friend.
Kristin:
Can you believe I didn't know I was ADHD until last year? Looking back, I'm like, "It's so obvious."
Mariana:
Yeah. Oh, my gosh. That neurodivergence, there's so much more education now. I think that has come out recently and I think a lot of people are benefiting from that. Like, "Oh, it's a thing. I'm not alone. It's called this." Even though here, I always say, "At Mariana Durst studio, we don't like those labels and niches." But for some things, that's helpful, because then you can seek support in the way that you need it.
Kristin:
Yeah. Harness it when the super power comes out and take that medication when it doesn't.
Mariana:
No shame in that. Get all the support that you need in whatever shape that means for you. That is so important. Well, Kristin, you are such a ray of sunshine. I hope this is not the only time that we have you here, or I have you here.
Kristin:
That's sweet.
Mariana:
Who's we? It's just me. That I have you here on the podcast. Thank you so much for sharing these lessons that you've learned with us and with everything that you're doing. It's so inspiring to see how being an artist in this day and age looks.
Kristin:
Thank you for helping make spaces for me to live online. I know I'm putting in a plug for Mariana, but I get compliments all the time for my websites and they're like, "I love the way it makes me feel and the ease." The technical part, I feel like you don't even realize is efficient, because that's the part you don't see. But they're like, "The way it's all put together makes me so happy." I'm always like, "I can't take credit for that. That was my designer. She's wonderful." So, thank you.
Mariana:
That's so sweet. Thank you. This episode, brought to you by me via Kristin. All right, well, thank you so much, Kristin. I love you so much.
Kristin:
Thank you for having me.
Mariana:
Bye.
Kristin:
Bye.
Mariana:
Today's episode was brought to you by Mariana Durst Studio's Prolific and Profitable Artist Quiz, a quick, quick way to assess your marketing prowess, learn your superpowers, and get a personalized plan to overcome, overwhelm and get your art seen and sold. Your art visibility plan awaits at marianadurststudio.com/quiz. Thanks for listening to The Liberated Artist Podcast. Be sure to visit liberatedartistpodcast.com for show notes, bonus materials, and to subscribe to get new episodes dropped straight into your pretty little inbox when they're published.
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