3 Awesome Ways to Share Your Artwork on The Internet

Hey Creative Friend, in this post, I’ll show you three awesome ways you can share your artwork on the internet. And I’ll take you behind the scenes to see how I’ve made it work for me. Let’s go!!!

Art has been around for as long as humans have been around. That hasn’t changed. What has changed is the way we consume art.

Historically, art has primarily been consumed in person – by going to art centers, theaters, galleries, and seeing them displayed in both private and public locations. And there are a lot of benefits for that in-person interaction with art.

A recent TIME magazine article discussed the effects of seeing art in person. Two people who hadn’t seen art for two years due to the pandemic, write about their story when they saw art again. The article explores how research shows that we experience unique physiological and psychological chain reactions which make us happy anytime we see art in person. 

Even with advancements in technology and the ability to create great virtual exhibition experiences, there’s no doubt that when people see art in person they report a better experience than when they see it on computer screens.

However, the internet is here and it’s here to stay. It has a wide audience of people all across the world who may never encounter your art in person except through the internet. And now more than ever, because of the pandemic, we’ve all seen this play out. People are consuming information online at a rate greater than we’ve ever known.

So, what does that mean for an artist who wants to share your work with the world? Do you only focus on in-person activities because that’s where the biggest impact is made on viewers?

No. You do both.

You don’t ignore in-person events because of the prevalence of art online. Nor do you ignore opportunities to put your artwork on the Internet to give them a chance to shine.

Here are different ways you can embrace use of the internet:

1. Have Your Own Website

Now more than ever you need your own website. A website serves as your online home. A place to go and a place your friends stop by to check on you. It’s also the place where strangers who’re interested in learning more about you, get the story you want them to get, not the story someone else tells them. You also use your website to showcase your artwork on the Internet. 

Finally, your website ties everything together for you. When you have an in-person exhibition for example, you post about it on your website to give your followers more details. It’s the way you tie your online presence with your real life events.

To prove that point, my number one source of contacts is hands-down my website.

2. Use Social Media to Share Your Artwork on The Internet

There are so many social media platforms. It can be difficult to wrap your hands around all of them. I don’t advice you to use them all at the same time. My suggestion is to try a number of them and figure out which ones really resonate with you. Where do you feel comfortable showing up as your authentic self? More importantly, where is your audience. Are they on your platform of choice?

Personally, I’ve tried both Facebook and Instagram and I like Instagram far better than Facebook. For me, it’s not only that my Instagram allows me to share my artwork on the internet. I find that I’m able to better connect with people who’re really passionate about art on my Instagram than on my Facebook. However, it took me a long time to get traction on Instagram. I almost gave up on the platform. I’m so glad I didn’t. Now, I get a lot of inquiries about my business right on Instagram.

3. Pinterest isn’t Dead: Share Your Art There

I decided to separate Pinterest because technically it’s not social media.

Pinterest is a search engine, just like Google is. It’s not only for saving your favorite recipes or home decor ideas. Because of the visual nature of Pinterest, you can post your art photos on Pinterest and tag them with relevant information. This way when someone searches for that information, your artwork is likely to come up.

The other nice thing with Pinterest is that unlike social media where your posts scroll away with time, on Pinterest, because it’s a search engine, your image can show up years later when someone searches for information that matches your image.

One of my most popular posts on my Pinterest is when I wrote about marbling on fabrics. In the last 30 days alone, that post has had close to 15K views on my Pinterest. Imagine that. I made that post in 2016. Just as an old post on Pinterest can remain relevant, a new post can too. My next best post on my Pinterest is a post I made only last week about my piece “The Gele Skyscraper”. Within that short time, it’s already had over 10K views.

So, you see what I mean?  

You can totally use Pinterest to get eyeballs onto your work. It’s not even about the number of followers you have. It’s about the number of people who’re searching for the information you’ve got and how well you present that information.

Total transparency here… (I’ll show you my dashboard) I have just a little over 600 followers on my Pinterest. That’s it. But I get over 95K views every month and Pinterest estimates my audience size as close to 70K.

The other thing about Pinterest is that it’ll send viewers to your website (yep, your number 1 location on the internet) if they click on the image. There’s so much potential with Pinterest. I could do so much better if I spent a little more time on Pinterest. And so can you.

So, there you have it. Three of the ways, I share my artwork on the internet. There are many ways to do this.  At this point in my art career, these are the three that have been most successful for me.

I hope this helps you get a jumpstart (or improve) how you share your artwork on the internet.

Question: Do you have an internet strategy? If yes, what has it been? If No, why not? Catch you in the comments section below.

Warmest Regards,

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Also published on Medium.