Miles Art information
Information to pass on concerning the topic of Miles art
This is where I can offer updates on what I am up to, deals on art for sale, 'how to,' related articles video links. A gathering place for those interested in the topic of art. This is supplemental to my blogs, where you can comment, but there is less room and space. I send out a mailer that can have a link to 'here,' for those interested in more information than a short blurb in the mailer.
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Recent Art News
July 2023
Summer in Alaska going fast kind of odd weather garden a challenge this year. Got new used boat for fossil hunting. Always new ideas in art. Right now old fossil artist handles for knives as old as he last ice age, and using copper bronze for blades. Doing casting in place stones so gem stones get cast right in the metal. New story necklaces more high end with special story written out and hand made jewelry box that acts as a display. It's a new idea. I wrote a couple of songs using large band up on you tube. Song
Secrets to hand craft while keeping a low price. I create in Alaska, one of the highest cos of living places in the world. It is therefore challenging to compete with China. If you are also in such a situation, think if what it would be hard for China to do. Like, what materials are local to me that China would not likely get.
For me, local Alaska rocks not on the commercial market some with no name I can call “Nenana River Rock” who else has it? If you had a million dollars, where would you get it? Me. Have some process to create on the cutting edge, or not known, or difficult to mass produce or figure out how it got done. For example I harden my own steel using a torch and not a kiln, hand done, can not be mass done in volume. I hand hammer copper in the steel. Who else even knows how? Obviously not done in China so I can get more money, be competitive. I can keep costs down by creating up to a dozen items at the same time. I love everything through all the stages together, so for example I do not have to change sanding belts or drill bits as often. I mass polish in a tumbler- not polish by hand. There are was to cast or stamp some parts I need, my design but reproduced by the dozen, not mass produced in a factory but say, hand cast or hand stamped with a custom stamp. When I buy raw material, I buy way more then I need for huge discounts and offer surplus raw to other artists I know who need what I need. I am now their source and can even trade for their labor. Example, in Tucson I buy display raw, like nice flat crystals. I then trade these displays with a custom glass bead maker I know, for beads I can use in the necklace for my custom pendant. Beads could be $50 each for best high end. I trade a $50 crystal I paid $10 for. That’s fine, her $50 bead cost her $5 to make (plus time of course) Now the cost of my total finished product can be competitive.
Since I have invested in far more material then I can use right now while ‘at the source,’ I now have lots of raw material to choose from when I wish to get creative. I also am more adaptable. For example it appears to me there are more people in financial trouble, so many who have hours cut, or now need to work maybe being supported by a spouse, think, “I will get into crafts in my spare time and make extra money!” I now find I can make more money selling craft material to wanna-be- get quick- new -to -crafting. Even sell information. If say, the art is not selling as well. This income can pay the bills and support my own creative time. It beats having to get a separate unrelated real job to supplement my income. Other serious arts can do the same.
Example.. I have a lot of customers buying mammoth fossil ivory knife scales one at a time to fill one order they have, paying me retail. Say $75. I suggest they buy a pound of raw fossil and make their own knife scale sets. Or buy 10 sets at about half price. Not enough money? So buy the pound for $75 and make about 5 sets for the price of one. Or better, fly to Tucson, write it off as a business trip, enjoy Tucson, buy your years worth of knife material. I can sometimes sell 20 pounds, you pick it out of a totes of 500 pounds, choose what you want, weigh it yourself and pay me, as low as $30 a pound. Now such a knife maker can offer killer deals no one else can offer. His handle material cost $5 not $75.
The same can be said for almost any raw material you would use in your own art work. Few artists are also good with business, and stores know this and when they buy from artists, they make the profits and the artist often gets slave labor wages. So the above ideas is one answer to how to ‘get ahead’ in the art business. If as a buyer reading this you are shocked! I say art is magic! The word magic is often followed by ‘trick.’ Once you know the secrets to magic it is no longer magic. Is that a bummer or not? I see man customers who like to feel they got one over on the seller with a killer deal and paid for slave labor. The creator worked for them, and bows in thanks. Revealing trade secrets is a toss up.
Give your own artistic gift ability some thought as to how it can be ‘yours,’ and yours alone. And how to save time without a huge sacrifice on creativity.