If you’re an artist you’ll need a bio sooner or later - whether that’s for an interview, your website or making your BRUSHWRK profile. Make sure to keep reading until the end for example artist bios…
BRUSHWRK's latest exhibition, 'YES!'
What is BRUSHWRK?
Want to start selling your art and making an income from your practice? Welcome to BRUSHWRK!
We are an all-in-one app for buying and selling art and community fixing everything wrong with the traditional art industry. We help independent artists showcase their incredible work and make a living off their art, and we help art lovers support independent artists.
The art world can be elitist. We want to help creatives from all backgrounds to showcase, sell and get their work off the ground and break in. Our goal is to make the art industry as accessible as possible - just think that fashion has Depop, music has Soundcloud and BRUSHWRK is for art.
Galleries and curators charge artists 40-50% just to show their work. This forces artists to raise prices if they want to make any real money which in turn makes art more expensive. We only charge a 5% fee on pieces sold.
Sign up to the (free) BRUSHWRK app to start buying and selling art today…
Your guide to writing the best artist bio:
Write in the 3rd person
When writing your bio, make sure to always refer to yourself by name or pronouns, rather than in the first person. For example, ‘Hannah Smith is a multimedia artist… She looks to history to inform her practice… Her background in sculpture lends to…’
Be specific
What kind of art do you make? If you’re a multifaceted artist, what mediums do you work in?
Academics, training and awards
You may be tempted to include every qualification, course, accolade and award in your artist bio, but it’s important to highlight a few achievements and instead leave the full list to your CV. Many artists choose to have their CV linked on their website.
Include your social media handles
Make sure to include your social media handles in your artist bio, even if you just mention your Instagram username briefly: ‘Hannah Smith, @hannahsmithart, is a multimedia artist…’.
Mix up your terminology
Make sure not to say ‘art’ or ‘artist’ too many times in your bio. Instead use terms like ‘My practice as a sculptor has…’
Keep it concise
Your bio should be no longer than a long paragraph. This is where linking your social media/website is important - readers are directed to another platform to learn more about you and your work.
Example artist bio from our recent interview with Leo Costelloe:
‘Leo Costelloe (@leocostelloe) is an Irish-Australian artist living and working in London. Their work in glass, metal and silversmithing explores the transient and sentimental nature of objects. Drawing inspiration from popular culture, spiritual practice and personal experience, Costelloe creates sculptural works that situate themselves in a liminal space somewhere between beauty and banality.’
Another example from the BRUSHWRK community:
'Qingqing Liu, @weeekdu, is a Chinese artist now based in London. She graduated from Royal College of Art (Contemporary Art Practice, 2021) . Her works across moving image, performance, installation and text. She likes to play with and create surreal scenarios, that locate traditional oriental worldviews, in the space of neon sci-fi aesthetics. The animistic concern of definitional dynamic between the animate and inanimate is a constant theme in her practice. Through fantasizing about the tender sweetness and extreme cruelty of feminist environments, her work celebrates the joy of being born out of the darkness, and explores the transcendental material that gives illusion to everything; in both physical and virtual worlds.'
What’s not to love? Sign up to the BRUSHWRK app today to start selling your work and making an income from your practice and make sure to follow our Instagram for updates on exhibitions, artist open calls and more...
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