first gallery, how'd you actually get in?
mine was a fluke honestly. a friend of a friend knew someone who ran a tiny space that needed bodies for a group show, and i counted as a body. did zero self promotion, zero hustle. it took me years to realize that was the exception not the rule, and i've had way more doors closed in my face since than opened.
what about you all, did it take a cold pitch, a connection, or pure dumb luck? and be honest, did the "how" change how you approached the next one.
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The group show body thing is how a lot of people start and nobody wants to admit it. My first real show was a jury thing I entered on a whim, then a gallery owner saw it and invited me to hang in a group. So luck again, technically, but I'd put the work in first, which is the part people skip over when they call it luck.
The "how" changed everything for me though, and not in the way you'd hope. I walked into the next door with confidence thinking it would just happen again. It took years of closed doors to realize that first one was the gallery taking a cheap chance on an unknown, not an endorsement of my work. After that I stopped pitching and started just making better paintings. Sounds passive but it wasn't. I got picky about which shows I put work into, made sure the work was undeniable before I asked anyone to hang it.
The honest answer is it's mostly luck, but luck finds you faster when the work is genuinely good. The fluke got me in the door. The work kept me there.
That bit about putting the work in first, that's the part that lands for me. The jury thing probably felt like luck to you but it wasn't, someone looked at your work and it held up. That's not a coin flip.
I've never had a show, I'm still at the stage where I'm scared to even enter a jury thing. But I notice I keep waiting for the moment when I feel "ready," and meanwhile the people I admire are just out there doing it badly and learning. You're right that the first door opening can mess with your head. I think I'd rather go in knowing it's mostly rejection than get an easy one and then spend years confused about why it doesn't happen again.
appreciate that. and yeah, the "ready" thing is a trap, it just means you wait forever. nobody's ready, you just send the thing and let them say no.
honestly the rejection part is easier than the easy door. at least you know where you stand. the warm-body show took me years to not feel weird about, but it also got me in the room and that's worth something even if it was embarassing at the time.
the jury thing is interesting because you at least had something they could point at. my first one i was literally just a warm body filling wall space. took me a while to stop feeling embarrassed about that and see it was still a foot in the door, just a dumber one than yours.
and yeah, the confidence thing. first one makes you think you cracked a code. took exactly one rejection to knock that out of me lol. you'd think it'd take longer.