Social Media Tips For Photo Galleries
Written by Sara TrulaThere’s been a great discussion on the Facebook Flak Photo Network about how Social Media has changed things for photographers, if it has done so.
It draws from this post by Joerg Colberg on Conscientious, arguing that social media benefits the marketing-savvy of photographers, to the detriment of those lacking business skills, or those who feel socially awkward.
The Flak Photo Network discussion expanded the discussion to consider other ways social media can change things, with an interesting post by Aaron Hobson, suggesting that photographers should look to galleries to promote their work well online when deciding which galleries to work with. He was talking about commercial galleries, but it reminded me of comments I’d made recently about how all galleries (including public institutions) could take advantage of social media to expand their remit to more strongly support unknown artists. Here’s what I said:
“On a related point to Aaron’s, does anyone think galleries/orgs can and should do more to promote work online that may be beyond their offline remit or scope? I’m thinking here of how Troika Editions have been using their website to feature work by photogs they like and meet at portfolio reviews but can’t necessarily offer shows to. I think all the galleries (incl public institutions) are really sleeping on an opportunity here to promote really ’emerging’ artists through their online presence, in a way that doesn’t require the full risk of endorsing them in a gallery show, but that could really help the artist to gain credibility, exposure, and to secure immediate funding to develop their practice.”
Doing this would make galleries seem like they think about more than just what exhibitions they have lined up – the impression most galleries give us with their current broadcast-mentality use of social media. They’d feel more “on the pulse” and “cutting edge” as they like to say. And they might just help to influence what work we’ll consider classic twenty years’ from now, by doing so.