We recently connected with Bianca Turner and have shared our conversation below.
Bianca , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Day to day the world can seem like a tough place, but there’s also so much kindness in the world and we think talking about that kindness helps spread it and make the world a nicer, kinder place. Can you share a story of a time when someone did something really kind for you?
Over 22 years ago, my significant other brought home a small painting kit. It contained 3 wrapped canvases, a few brushes and a few tubes of acrylic paint. I didn’t even know what acrylic paint was or how to hold a paint brush in my hand. However, without even asking if the kit was for me, I started to use it. I found a calmness and happiness that was flowing through my veins like I have never felt before, in my life. In one evening I painted on all three canvases and then I continued to move the brushes on shoes boxes and other cartons I found in the house. My partner didn’t say anything….just stayed there, watching me, observing me. Second day, when I arrived home from work, after a stressful day, I found another bag full of art supplies. I continued to paint. For awhile, it was like a beautiful game: when I was arriving home I was finding art supplies hidden in the house and I was just having fun “splashing paint on the canvases”. One Sunday morning, during a beautiful summer day, when I woke up, I found a note on my pillow. It said “follow the daisies”. Everything that was surrounding me was gorgeous: the beautiful Laurel Canyon where we used to live was full of flowers, the nature was glorious, the sunrays were playing on the floor….and a row of yellow daisies that were on the ground guided me from the bedroom to the outside patio. There I found an easel that was already installed, all the art supplies that I needed and a larger note that had a happy face drawn on it and the words : “GET TO WORK MISS PICASSA!” Since then I haven’t stopped painting. Since then, I found happiness.
Bianca , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
Until now I didn’t share with my public how I started to paint. But in the previous question I just answered how this beautiful journey has begun. I was fortunate to find someone who discovered my passion and to allow me to cultivate it. When I had enough inventory of works I decided that it was the time to take them out of my studio. It took me almost seven years to have the courage to show my art to the world. Having a background in economics, my instinct told me to start creating a marketing campaign for myself. Therefore, I learned how to build an artist website, I made business cards and I started to check the art market all over in Los Angeles area but also on the internet. Little by little I’ve learned more and more about what tools are useful for artists to promote their art and since then, I’ve never stopped learning. By putting my art online, galleries started to discover it and thus I was invited to showcase my work in various group exhibitions. Seven years ago I started to focus more and more on the artistic career and at some point I’ve discovered that a lot of artists, either they were self-taught (as myself) or graduates from a visual arts university, had no access to the marketing tools that I was using for promoting myself. That’s when I found the niche in the market and I started to write the book “The Business of Art” (lectures and seminars). Currently, not only that I am an internationally recognized artist, but I also introduced my book to the art students. I am very happy that I can inspire them with my life story and my lectures, and that I can prove to them that the “myth of the starving artist” doesn’t exist.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
I am a very disciplined person and it doesn’t matter how many times I fall down; I always find the power to stand up on my own, without anyone’s help. Is it hard? YES! Is it tiring? YES! But I always tell myself to never ever give up. I have many days when I am in the doldrums or with no hope regarding my artistic career. I think, every artist deals with the issues of not being sure about his/her artistic abilities or gets disappointed that so many times in the art word we have to deal with the nepotism, with the concept that if you don’t have connections you don’t make it. However, I always tell myself that if I create good, original and genuine art I will be okay. Every week I respond to call for artists. In the past I was submitting to over 50 calls for artists just to receive one acceptance letter. Now, I mostly get admitted to call for artists because I know where to apply, what to avoid, how to ignore a “No” and not to be bothered anymore by the fact that a lot of art curators or galleries do not have the courtesy to even send a rejection email to the artist who takes from his/her valuable creative time to respond to Call for Artists. The first impression that someone has about me, as an artist goes both ways – we, as artists can have negative impressions about the art curators or the galleries who lack the manners of responding to us because the respect is reciprocal.
How did you build your audience on social media?
This is one of my favorite chapters that I talked about it in my book “The Business of Art”. For me, the social media was very lucrative and brought me a lot of business. However, you have to know how to use this free PR tool on your advantage. Being professional, courteous, polite, humble and following the community standards always helps. I mostly use Instagram. Although it is a platform where the algorithm changes pretty often, I think it is a good thing because it protects us from scammers, it makes us learn new things and it constantly improves its way of promoting the artists. The key is to be actively involved on Instagram, to post daily, to interact with other artists and galleries, to thank your followers for being there for you, to follow the rules and to always post something of good quality.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.biancaturner.art/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/biancaturnerart/