The gallery contract nobody reads until it's too late
Y'all ever sign a gallery contract and find something in it later that made your stomach drop? I got one sittin' in front of me right now, pretty standard-looking thing, and then way down at the bottom it says they keep 60% on any piece I sell to somebody they "introduced me to", forever. Even if I leave the gallery. Even if I run into that collector at the grocery store five years from now.
I know I ought to have a lawyer read it before I sign. But I'm curious what you all found in a contract that made you stop and say wait a minute. Or what you wish you'd caught before you put your name on the line.
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the "introduced me to" clause is wild bc it's so vague it basically means anyone they've ever mentioned in your presence. i had a gallery try something similar but it was 40% on any sale to a collector they "connected me with", i asked them to define that in writing and suddenly it meant "anyone who walked into the gallery while your work was up" which lmao no.
what got me was the reproduction rights buried in the fine print. tiny paragraph that said they could use images of my work "in any medium for promotional purposes", which turned out to mean they licensed a photo of one of my paintings to a rental furniture company's catalog without telling me. no payment, no credit even. when i asked they said it was "promotional" bc the catalog featured the gallery. i was 25 and didn't fight it and i'm still mad.
get a lawyer. or at minimum send it to a friend who's been through it. most of these clauses are negotiable but they bank on you feeling like you can't push back.
Girl, you are telling me. "Anyone who walked into the gallery while your work was up"??? That's not a connection, that's a room full of people. I'd have laughed too, but it ain't funny when they really put that in front of you.