We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Emily Gilman Beezley a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Emily, appreciate you joining us today. Did you always know you wanted to pursue a creative or artistic career? When did you first know?

Always, I’m an artist – it’s been my superpower from being accepted to the honors art program at I.S.145 in Jackson Heights NY to being admitted to the H.S. of Art and Design and from there, studying watercolor, printmaking and oil painting at Colgate University, the École des Beaux-Arts in Dijon, France, the Art Student’s League of New York and Parsons School of Design.

Even so, as a shy and introverted young adult, I did not have the confidence to pursue art professionally, nor did I want to depend on anyone other than myself financially. I discovered I had a knack for programming which led to a career in Financial Services technology. I was fortunate to find satisfaction in my corporate work but always I felt something was missing and if I’m honest with myself, I spent years suppressing my ‘inner artist’. Eventually the compensation I was earning came at too great a cost -scant time to create and not living my authentic self.

On the bright side, now that I’m a full-time artist, I am able to leverage my corporate technology skills to run my art business as a business from maintaining my online gallery, responding to RFQs and RFPs for public art, delivering projects on time and on budget and running sales and marketing campaigns. I’m also fortunate to have a large number of colleagues who are now customers. In fact, many of my early sales came from my business network which was a huge boost.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Making the leap to being a full-time artist meant quitting my stable corporate job. It felt like jumping off a cliff but I finally had the courage to do it in 2018 and since then have never looked back. My studio practice is to explore a theme leading to a cohesive body of work. One of my first series that I continue to work on is the “Ballet Rehearsal”, twenty plus figurative oil paintings that came about when my daughter started taking ballet lessons. Each painting tells a story, conveying the emotions of young dancers wearing their beautiful costumes for the first time. One of the most complex is “Studio Reflection”. Grounded by ballet barres, five mirror panels both crop and duplicate the reflected elements of the composition.

“Dream Waves” is another series based on a recurring dream I have of epic waves, no doubt inspired by my passion for body surfing. Working in oils, monotypes and mixed media on paper, each feature a huge stylized wave. Other series are inspired by travel with Arizona, Colorado and Maine heading up the list with their unique vistas that continually surprise and delight me.

Currently I am working on the “Pedestal” series of mixed media oil on canvas paintings that communicate correlations between women’s clothing and objectification. My construct is to depict women’s attire that carry symbolic societal meaning by ‘dressing up’ vases. Vases are ornamental objects meant to be displayed. They are decorative works of art viewed from multiple angles and are often modeled after female bodies. Each painting in the series portrays a vase stripped down to its elemental shape, a 2-dimensional figure that can be appreciated in one glance ‘clothed’ in a stereotypical garment. Fifteen and counting, artworks in the series include “Bikini”, “Wedding”, “Corset” and “Stilettos”.

I continually assess my trajectory as an artist. I’ve achieved success that is objectively quantifiable including juried show awards, public art commissions, art sales and client testimonials. As great as these are, what really stands out is when my art makes a difference. I’ve had people share with me how my art helps them with their healing process over the loss of a loved one. I’ve also created art that raises awareness for social causes such as green infrastructure and environmental justice. These are the wins that keep me moving forward.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

I am fortunate in that I never lack ideas for new projects. My outlook in life has always been one of problem-solving and creative solutions and I apply this to my art. A drawback is that I don’t have one consistent style or brand which is confusing to customers and galleries. I paint what moves me in the moment. This sometimes translates to a new direction and other times refers back to an earlier body of work. So can my art be classified as photo-realistic figurative, expressionist narrative, experimental mixed media or contemporary abstract? Yup!

For this reason, I’ve taken on the hardest and most unpleasant part of being an artist which is marketing and selling my art. This means I spend as much time placing my art as I do creating it. I’ve also pivoted quite a bit towards lump sum public art commissions. Last year my artwork was selected for the platform shelters and electrical box at a local rail station. “Ocean Dreaming”, one of the images used for the platform shelters, was also selected for a digital installation at Newark Airport. So in this way I can continue to monetize my art even after it’s sold.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

For visual artists just starting out I recommend creating an inventory of your art. There is software you can purchase that does this or it can be as simple as a spreadsheet of the artwork’s title, date, dimensions, exhibit information and customer information when it’s sold. I also keep a 2 or 3 sentence blurb about the artwork that speeds up the application process for art shows. All of this should be held on an open platform (not on your hard drive).

Most important is having professional photo images of your art. When I started my art business, I focused solely on originals. Now, much of my revenue comes from prints and merchandise. In hindsight, I wish I had better quality images of some of my earlier works. Photos of your artwork are also essential for your website and every artist should have an online presence. There are tons of resources for artists to explore the different platform options to host your website including some specifically built for artists.

The biggest resource you have is yourself and your resiliency to continually evolve as an artist and as an entrepreneur. Technology and social media are driving changes in the art market with COVID triggering even greater acceleration. It can be overwhelming keeping up with all of this so my last bit of advice is to give yourself a break and remind yourself of why your art matters.

Contact Info:

• Website: emilygilmanbeezley.com
• Instagram: @egilmanart
• Facebook: @egilbeez
• Linkedin: emily-beezley-988660
• Twitter: @egilbeez
• Youtube: @emilygilmanbeezley7757

Image Credits
Emily Gilman Beezley