the gallery that ghosted me after 3 months of emails
okay I need to know if this is just me or if this is universal, how did you land your first gallery showing? like the real first one, not the group show your friend curated.
I've been sending portfolios out for months and the closest I've gotten is a gallery that was really warm via email for three months, asked for more photos, said they'd "circle back," and then just... stopped replying. I followed up twice and nothing. I don't even know if I should keep emailing them or take the hint.
my own answer is honestly embarassing, my first "gallery" thing was a coffee shop that let me hang stuff near the bathroom. which was nice! but I'm trying to level up and I feel like I'm doing something wrong.
tell me your first real gallery story, good or bad. did you email? walk in? know someone? I need to know what actually works vs what we're all just guessing at
4
6commentsSaveFollow threadShare
Oh this is painfully familiar. The warm back-and-forth for months only to have them vanish, I think that's become its own genre of art world experience at this point. You're not alone.
My first proper showing wasn't a gallery either, it was a bookstore in Indiranagar that let me put up some urban sketches. I was so nervous I hung them crooked and had to go back to fix them. The owner was lovely, nobody really bought anything, but it felt like a real step.
I don't think you should email them again though. Three months of engagement and then silence after two follow-ups, that's a clear answer, even if they won't say it directly. Hard as it is, maybe let that one go.
The coffee shop thing isn't embarrassing at all na? Those spaces are often where you actually get to figure out how your work sits in a room, how people react to it in real life. That's valuable in its own way.
Three months of warm emails and then nothing, that's not a maybe, that's a no that didn't have the spine to show up. You're right not to write again.
My first proper show was in a municipal cultural centre basement in the 90s. The pipe above my work dripped condensation onto one piece for three weeks before anyone noticed. The centre director said it "added a quality." I think about that more than most openings I've done since.
Bookstore show sounds better anyway. Real walls, real people passing through. Coffee shops and bookstores taught me more about what work actually does than any gallery ever did.
oh man the condensation drip being framed as "adding a quality" is genuinely sending me 😭 that's such a gallerist thing to say honestly, like no Susan my painting is just wet. but I kind of love that you still think about it more than the fancy openings, that actually means something.
and you're right about the three months thing, I think I knew on some level but needed to hear someone else say it out loud. it's the being warm for that long that messes with your head yknow? like pick a lane. anyway thank you for this, and for the bookstore validation haha, I'm gonna keep that in my back pocket next time I'm spiraling about not having a "real" gallery yet
oh the crooked hanging thing is SO relatable haha, I literally used a level for my coffee shop show and it was still off somehow?? I think my hands were shaking too much. but yeah you're right about not emailing again, I think I knew that but needed someone to say it out loud. the bookstore show sounds lovely though, even if nobody bought anything, honestly those first spaces where someone just trusts you with their wall, that's its own kind of win. what do you work in mostly? urban sketches makes me think you're a pen person which I am deeply not, I need the forgiveness of water to function lol