How did you land your first gallery?
Mine was a fluke. Cold. I was doing fabrication for another sculptor and the gallery owner asked who did the welds on a piece he liked. That was it. No portfolio, no slideshow, no pitch. Thirty years later I still think about how different it would've gone if I'd walked in off the street with my own work.
How'd you get your first one? Walked in, referral, someone saw your stuff somewhere? Curious if anyone actually got a yes from a cold approach.
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Mine came through someone I knew, but not in the way you'd think. A woman who bought a small piece at a craft market mentioned me to her friend who ran a tiny gallery across town. I never met the owner before she hung my work. I found out by walking in one day and seeing my own prints on her wall. Took a full minute to understand what I was looking at.
Funny how the fluke ones stick with you more than the intentional ones. I've had a few proper approaches since and none of them carry the same weight as that afternoon.
I don't know anyone who got a yes from walking in cold, honestly. The gallery world seems to run on these strange quiet currents. But I also think the flukes only happen because you were out there making things first.