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gallery strung me along for 14 months. two studio visits, three follow-up emails, lots of "we love where this is going" and then a form letter in april that said they were going in a different direction. i almost deleted it but i kept it bc it's kind of a perfect artifact. 14 months of polite nothing compressed into three sentences. the funny part is i know exactly what happened. they liked the work fine but i don't fit their roster. i'm mid-career, self-taught, not a grad show story, not a young thing they can grow. i'm the "interesting but not for us" shelf. and honestly i respect that more than the vague reasons. just say it. the thing that actually got me was how long i held my schedule open around their timeline. didn't apply to other shows bc i thought something was brewing. that's the part i'm still a little mad about. nobody tells you that waiting is a real cost, not just wasted time. anyway. if you're a working artist and a gallery is being warm but unspecific, get a timeline in writing. i wish i had.

Guy messaged me yesterday, real polite, "could I commission something small?" and I was like sure! love that. Then he sent me a paragraph. A full paragraph. He wants a 60x80cm painting (small?? that's huge), of his dog, in a specific palette he described down to the hex codes, framed, delivered, in time for his wife's birthday which is in three weeks. And the kicker, after all that, "obviously I was thinking a few hundred, that's fair right." I did the math on the hours alone and I almost laughed out loud. That's about minimum wage before materials. And he's framed it as this flattering opportunity, like I should be grateful he's picked ME. I told him my rate for that size and timeline and he went quiet. Haven't heard back. Cool. Cool cool cool. I think the thing that gets me is people genuinely don't see the labor. They see watercolor, they think it's quick, it's just water, right? They don't know the paper prep and the masking and the waiting for layers to dry and the redoing the whole wash when it blooms wrong at the last second. My partner watched me spend four hours on an 8 inch square today and was like "babe are you okay" and I was like no but the light on the jug is FINALLY doing what I want. Anyway. If one more person asks me to do it "as a favour" I'm going to paint them a single potato and charge them for the privilege.

okay I need to know if this is just me or if this is like, a rite of passage. I spent FOUR MONTHS talking to a gallery last year. Emails back and forth, sent them a whole portfolio, they loved it, we talked about a show timeline, I got my hopes way up. Then nothing. I followed up twice, polite, casual, and just got radio silence. Not even a "we went another direction." Just disappeared into the void. I was so embarrassed I didn't tell anyone for months lol like I'd been scammed by a situationship. Has this happened to you? What's the longest a gallery has strung you along before ghosting? Or did you ever get a follow-up years later that made it make sense? I need solidarity here 😭

ok so I'll go first because I'm still a little embarrassed about it. I emailed a gallery last spring, small space, really lovely website, and the person replied within a day which should've been my first clue because nobody replies that fast unless they're selling something. They wanted $400 to "hold a spot" in their summer group show. And I sat there with my card out, actually typing the number in, and my partner looked over my shoulder and went "Dani. no." and I closed the tab. Still think about it. the other one was a space that kept saying "we'd love to have you, we just need to finalize the calendar" for like five months. five months!! and I kept sending new work like a golden retriever bringing back a stick. so yeah, what's the red flag YOU saw and talked yourself out of? the contract thing, the weirdly pushy timeline, the "we just need a small fee for the catalog." tell me yours so I feel less like a person who almost paid $400 to be in a group show in a strip mall 😭

A small thing I keep turning over. I had a studio visit last spring with a gallery I genuinely liked, two people, very kind, spent almost an hour. At the end one of them said they'd like to "see more work." No timeline, no follow-up date, nothing. I sent a link ten days later and heard nothing for two months, then a very warm email that also said nothing. I still don't know if I did the wrong thing by not pushing harder, or if "see more work" is just how it goes. So, the question: when a gallery says that to you, what do you actually do next? Do you send more, do you wait, do you ask them straight out what they mean? Also curious whether anyone has had that sentence turn into a real show, because I would like to believe it does.

Okay question for anyone who's done the gallery hunt: what's the most bizarre timeline you've had with one? I'll go first. I walked into a small gallery in my city two years ago with a portfolio, got a very polite "we'll keep you in mind" and figured that was that. Then SIX MONTHS later the owner emails me out of nowhere saying they remembered my work and wanted to see new pieces. I was so confused I almost didn't reply because I thought it was spam haha. It didn't end up going anywhere big but it taught me that "no" or silence isn't always a no, it's just... not a yes yet? But also I've had the reverse where someone seemed super keen, we had two meetings, and then they ghosted me so hard I wondered if I imagined the whole thing. Have you ever had a gallery come back around way later? Or is the initial silence pretty much always the actual answer and I'm just reading too much into one lucky email 😅

Had a gallery talk me into a pretty big commission a few years back. Sign nothing, deposits are the insurance. Then they started asking to push the timeline up, wanted progress photos every week, then they wanted to "review" the design as we went. That's not a commission, that's a job. I walked. What's the red flag that made you pull out of a gallery before it cost you?

Had a gallery years back that wanted first look at everything I made. Said no showing anywhere else, no selling direct, no side commissions. Shook on it. Then they took eighteen months to sell one piece and got quiet every time I asked for a timeline. Never again without a contract. If they won't put it on paper, they don't mean it. Anyone else get burned on a handshake deal with a gallery? Or am I the only one old-fashioned enough to have thought a handshake meant something.

ok so I finally got a "we'd love to work with you" from a gallery I'd been chasing for months. did the whole song and dance, sent the portfolio package, agreed on a timeline, everything felt like it was happening. and then... nothing. just radio silence. they stopped replying to emails. I sent a polite check-in two weeks later, nothing. another one a month later, nothing. still have no idea what happened. I keep going back and forth between "maybe they just got swamped" and "I definitely did something wrong and I don't even know what." has this happened to anyone else?? did they ever resurface or did you just write it off? I need to know if this is just how it goes sometimes or if I'm the only one sitting here like 👁️👄👁️ staring at my sent folder

i had a small gallery take a piece of mine for a group show a few years back. the director was genuinely into it, talked about it in a way that made me think she actually saw what i was doing. then the sale happened and it was chaos. she underpriced it, forgot to tell me the buyer's timeline, and i found out the piece sold when the buyer emailed ME asking when they could pick it up. i got paid eventually, and i was honestly just glad someone wanted the thing. but it made me wonder how common that is. like does a good gallery relationship ever come without some kind of fumble on their end? what's your worst (or best) story of a gallery loving your work but dropping the ball on the actual selling part?

Hey everyone! Okay so I'm still pretty new to this whole gallery thing and trying to get a feel for timelines. Like, after you started seriously submitting or approaching galleries, how long did it actually take you to get that first real 'yes' or even a solid offer? Was it like months, a year, longer?? I'm trying to manage my expectations haha. My first approach felt like a total shot in the dark and I'm still waiting to hear back, so just curious about what others' experiences have been! 🙂