Do you walk in cold or email first? I did the worst thing and it worked??
Okay so I want to settle something because I genuinely cannot tell if I got lucky or if this is just how it goes.
I walked into a gallery in my neighborhood with like four paintings under my arm. No appointment. I'd bought a coffee from the place next door to look like I had a reason to be there, walked past twice, then went in and asked the girl at the desk if I could talk to whoever looked at new work. My hands were literally shaking. And I'd been emailing galleries for like six months before that and gotten nothing but the "keep you in mind" thing we all know and love.
The walk-in got me a real conversation. The emails got me silence. Which makes no sense to me because I did everything "right" with the emails, proper PDF, nice cover letter, all of it.
So which one actually works for you?? Do you email first and wait, or do you just show up? And be honest, did you ever do the walk-in and get completely shut down, because I'm half convinced I got lucky and next time someone's gonna be mean to me about it.
Tell me your method, I need to know if I should be braver or more polite 🙏
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The two walks past before going in is the funniest part, like casing the place. I get it though.
My honest take is it's neither luck nor a system, it's that the walk-in forces an actual conversation and email just doesn't. You can't give a face the "we'll keep you in mind" line to its face, so they either look at your work or say no, and either way you get information. Six months of emails gave you nothing to work with, one anxious coffee run gave you something.
I don't think it scales though. But as a first move when the emails go nowhere? joder, yes. I'd rather have the awkward ten minutes than another silent inbox.
What actually happened after, they look at the four paintings or send you somewhere?