Artist’s Daybook: Friday
Day five in a series of five
A record of my daily practice
My first art-related decision of the day is what to wear.
A day in the studio means clothes for layering with my Carhart overalls. Then I have my going out in public clothes, which are different from my working on the computer at home clothes. Or do I need a combination cold/computer outfit? Based on my calendar, today will be a combination day with an afternoon change to going out in public clothes.
There's always one day of the week when I'm tired and lack motivation. Usually, it's a Thursday, which is why we eat take-out pizza for dinner. This week, it's today.
I start with Instagram and create a carousel post of images from my week to entice subscribers to my mailing list. It hasn't been going too well lately, and all those unfollows are hard to watch. I try to remember that it's better to have fewer dedicated followers than many unengaged ones. The analytics on Kit (my email platform) show my efforts have gained me only two new subscribers, despite the hundreds of clicks back to my website. That's never the result I hope for, but maybe those are my engaged followers—and if so, that's amazing. Additionally, having hundreds of people visit my website each day is something to be proud of.
Still a quiet week for emails, but a good one comes in for a collaboration with another artist about vintage photographs.
*****
I'm typing the first entry—the Monday Daybook. It's going to take me forever since I'm polishing and revising from my handwritten notes. Like with all my art, I'm committing time and effort to produce work with no guarantee that it will be well-received or sold.
Writing is not quick—why did I think these Daybooks would be? This project, which began as a casual recording of my thoughts and accomplishments over five days, has evolved into something more, something that's almost unwieldy. The Monday entry takes me two hours to write. I haven't created a casual post but a long-form essay.
What to do:
Give up
Write shorter versions—all bullet points instead of paragraphs?
Turn it into a summary of main points of the entire week in one post instead of five
Write one long blog and summarize them in a newsletter
Release five blog posts—one each day next week. Gives me more time to write them, figure out images, etc.
These remind me of Anne Truitt's Daybooks, although hers are stunningly insightful.
I ask Claude (AI) for some help with my finished draft. I write them in first person, but while revising them, I think I switch tenses. He proves my theory correct with a handful of suggested edits. Yes, I could do this myself, but I'm tired. I copy and paste his version and then check that his edits make sense. Word count for Monday's post is almost 1,000 words. What have I gotten myself into with this idea?
My lunchtime reading is a New York Times article about the increasing number of people taking part in the No-Buy movement in anticipation of the new tariffs raising prices. How will this unstable financial environment affect my art business? Will people stop buying art? Will they skip taking art classes?
In the living room, I find a new piece I'd forgotten about. Now I need to photograph this one and list it on Artwork Archive.
Going into the studio starts a routine:
Turn on the overhead lights
Plug in the Christmas lights
Light a stick of incense (Nag Champa)
Connect the Bluetooth speaker to my phone and open an audiobook
Turn on the task lights on my table
Get to work
Also, a temperature check, which today sends me back upstairs for my battery-powered heated socks and jacket.
I have fifteen pieces, in various sizes, completed over the last three months, that have to be sealed and prepared for sale. My biggest fears here are with dust stuck in varnish and brush marks. I'm trying not to look closely at them in case that makes me want to revise them more. At some point, they need to be finished.
Worries: gloss medium that dries into milky puddles, too much medium left on the edges that dries into ridges, the threads that I leave on fabric needing to be sealed into a nice arrangement. I love watching the colors pop back to life when the gloss is applied.
On my calendar this week, under 'social media,' I have scheduled a Reel about using an unexpected material. One of many AI-generated prompts from a social media calendar I developed months ago and always forget to use.
I visit the estate sale pile on my living room floor and take out the top magazine, which is heavily mouse-damaged. At my desk, I set up my phone on the Canvas Lamp I use for filming. I don't feel like recording the entire creation of this collage, so I film only a few minutes and mash it together using the new Edits app from Instagram. I like this Reel and the collage.
I post the Reel and see how useless captions are. Only the first sentence is partially visible when watching the Reel, and if the video features light colors, the caption can't be read at all because the text is too light. I have to rethink my Reels—add a call to action in the Reel text? Stop making them (I only do one a week)? I'm not much for making entertaining Reels and those are the kind that get views. I make videos that appeal to other artists. Are there Reels that appeal to galleries and collectors?
Time to photograph the last three pieces. They are all small enough to stand on my coffee table, in the room with the best light. I like the interior background I get when shooting them here, and the close-up, cropped version is better than what happens when I shoot them from above, with them flat on the carpet.
One hour left until the bus. I could gloss coat the last three pieces, read, start typing more of these notes, write a reflective summary of my week, update Artwork Archive with the final three, create some new Pins, weed the garden, or move the estate sale papers off the living room floor!
Dear reader, I do not move the papers off the floor.
The Bullet Points:
Experiencing a low-motivation day while trying to balance various art and marketing tasks
Confronting disappointing social media results: many unfollows and only two new subscribers despite hundreds of website clicks
Realizing the Daybook project has unexpectedly evolved from casual notes into time-consuming 1,000-word essays
Questioning the sustainability of the Daybook format and considering alternative approaches
Worrying about how economic uncertainty and the "No-Buy movement" might impact the art business
Preparing fifteen completed art pieces for sale while managing anxieties about the varnishing process
Struggling with the effectiveness of Instagram Reels as an artist creating content for other artists rather than mass entertainment
Did you miss a day?