I am back from a few days of very reduced activity, while I was seeing of J (who returned to blowing glass in California).
I finally launched into productivity over the past 2 hours and listed a new drawing on Ebay for the Penny Drawings Sale where I try and list at least one drawing per day starting with #1 at 1 penny and increasing the price per listing by an additional penny. I am at last up to drawing #61 and just noticed how one of the items has attracted quite a few bids.
It is such a nice compliment when complete strangers bid on something that I have made. Of course I have sold photographs as well as drawings anywhere between £150 - £850 but those sales overall didn't match my production costs. So while it sounds glamorous it still left me with a loss. (That never fails to puzzle me... I also wonder how does one keep buyers coming? At that price range?)
Anyhow what I find very special about the Ebay buyers is that they could be absolutely anybody. Over the past days I had a little time to think about this and I realized that the Ebay buyers are actually the audience that I originally was most interested in when I decided to move into the arts. I had this idealistic optimism and wanted to make Art for People. I didn't want to 'dumb' anything down, nor did I want to pander to demand either (not along the line of the media ratings system anyway) but I did want to create situations. Art works, performances and drawings that had complexity, validity and value without alienating Jane Doe or Joe Blogs, whoever they may be...
But I had to admit that the Ebay action is taking an extraordinary amount of my time and I can't tell if people appreciate it when they receive something that I may have spent 15 or 60 minutes making. (I am trying ahrd to avoid listing anything more precious than works that I made in or under around an hour.) So when somebody receives a drawing that I really did spend 60 minutes on then I hope they understand that the item is hand made , that imperfection is part of the very nature of Art, that what I send I sent the best I could and made the best I could within the limitations of time and investment.
For example: The sturdy card that I send with most drawings to protect the drawings would often cost me more than the money the ebay bidder spent on their drawing in the first place.. I happen to have a lot of card in stock.. Should I really spend it on this project that will make me an average of 50 pence per hour income...? Probably not..
But mad as I am I am persevering and hope that I will be able to keep on top of posting the drawings in a timely fashion over the coming days.. It would really upset me if I got a bad feedback for the efforts.. So I am continuously nervous, keeping an eye on the feedbacks...
I hope it all goes smoothly.
I would like to list my little men paintings on ebay, too and see if I can get £35 for them. I just really doubt it, but they have sold for £75 in the past and it would seem plain crazy to sell for less than half price now.. wouldn't it???
