We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Newt Grover a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Newt , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?

Earning money off your creative work is hard it requires learning your craft and dedicating your life to your craft. It requires you to develop some business acumen such as sales ability, budgeting and the general things that every business owner deals with. Creatives tend to not think of their jobs as running a business. We just make stuff, but this mindset is wrong. You need to run your art studio like a business. It is easy to create stuff. It is hard to sell the stuff you create. You have to know how to work with people. Most of my art is collaborative so that means I need assistants and staff who actually want to work with me on glass art. I originally came from jewelry and neon art and that was a solitary pursuit. Now that I am in glass art it requires working with a team on larger projects. Knowing how to work with people also means knowing how to work with clients. This means you must figure out what a client wants and how you can do it. You have to figure out a price that keeps your client happy and your business running.

I like most artists struggled in the beginning learning how to price my art. I would constantly underprice my work to the point it was losing me money. Once I started to take into account the cost of my time as well as my materials it really helped me improve my bottom line. I look at a project and I base the price on what I have priced similar things in the past, how big is the project, and how many people I need on a project. Pricing is the biggest struggle for artists. Most pro artists will create things people like. They won’t always sell it for the right price.

I knew I was earning a living off my work when I was in high school. I was making money creating silver and turquoise jewelry. I was making money off my art at a very young age, but making money off glass art was more of a challenge. I had to learn a whole new skill and completely evolve my art style. It took two years before I ever made money off my glass art. There was never a hard movement where I realized I made money off glass art. After a couple of years, all my customers just started asking for glass art and I phased out all my other projects.

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.

I am a glass artist and owner of the studio Newt Glass in Scottsdale Arizona. We specialize in crafting hand-blown glass chandeliers and custom glass art. I got into art because I was obsessed with fire and art. I wanted to find something that merged those two things together. My mother said I was a well-directed pryomaniac. I started in Jewelry with small little torches, then moved to neon sign art. I liked Neon because it had like scientific process to it, but I got out of that industry because I became bored with just making neon signs. I found my true artistic. passion late in my career. I had not done blown glass until I was 40. I saw a show on Chihuly Glass and I became obsessed with wanting to learn glass art. I told my wife I had to do this so I changed my art career again. Glass art is only limited by my imagination and technical skill. I get to come up with crazy ideas, pitch them to clients, and I get to make money off my wild ideas. It is the perfect medium for creativity while still having a large client base to grow your business.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

When I get done with a project I see the face of my client the first time they see a project. Those facial expressions tell me everything I want to know. Making art that someone can love everyday is more rewarding than the money.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

There are so many people out there who are devoid of artistic sense, but the ones who get it truly understand. People who have artwork in their homes do so consciously so that work is important to them. I think artists need to communicate better the importance of art in the world. Even many artists don’t express this enough. Our country is pretty good regarding aesthetics and art, but we aren’t very good at educating people at a young age about how artistic our country is. How aesthetic design plays a role in our everyday life. Artists need to be willing to make their art accessible and easy to enjoy. Artists should be willing to explain there work to your average person if needed. The thing that made a major difference in my career was a project I did at the El Paso Children’s Hospital. Before that job, I was making art for myself this job showed me that I needed to share my work more to because it had value to people that weren’t your typical art lovers.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.newtglass.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/newtglass/?hl=en

Image Credits
Newt Glass