Pay to show in galleries? When to make that choice if at all....

Hi all, I've come to a point that I'm now trying to progress to the next
stage on the opportunities I have had of showing my work and I'm wondering
if "vanity galleries" are the new reality for emerging artists in New York
City. To make matters worse I've been investigating this and found this
article: http://www.artschools.com/articles/new-york/ . I know it was
written a while back but I'm running in to this phenomenon. I've been
researching and finding galleries to send slides to and seem to get instant
responses from galleries that end up being pay to show without any
indication on their website about this.

But more important then this to me is that I'm starting to wonder if this is
the new reality of getting first shows, specifically in New York. One
gallery even buttered me up with a positive critique that seemed to ring
true about my work until I realized that anyone would want to hear it and
figured it a generic reply. They then offered me a place in an up coming
show in early fall, but in the details I realized it would cost me $2400
(basic representation fee) for the four week show.

I'm early in to the process of trying to get shown in New York, so I don't
feel desperate enough to try this, but I can see a breaking point
months/years down the road where someone might be convinced this is the only
way to "break in" to the NYC gallery game.

Have any of you experienced this or known people to decide on this approach?
It just seems too smarmy to me, for people to be feeding off a group that
tend to need reinforcement and acceptance for what they do (and tend to
barely be making it monetarily as well). But then again, from what I read in
that article, I can sort of understand since galleries are not cheap to run
and new artist tend to not sell well (and mostly not at all).

I don't want this to turn in to the "evil gallery empire" sort of debate
please. Either you wish to play the game or you don't. Right now I'm
choosing to give it a spin. When it comes down to it, it has nothing to do
with making work or art/life pursuits and I realize that. But deep down
inside most of us, we do believe our work should be up in the Whitney ;)

-Chris
www.chrisportfolio.com
Received on Thu Feb 5 22:56:57 2004