Artist bios are hard to write! But you have to do i

What We Learned from Writing 7,000 Artist Bios

Communication is increasingly being reduced to 140 characters, emojis, and voice memos. Despite this, clear prose remains a powerful sales and branding tool within the art world, and beyond.

Artsy has created over 7,000 artist bios, and over the years we’ve learned a few things about what our audience of collectors and art lovers finds valuable when discovering new art. Since Artsy’s partners can now add their own artist bios, we decided to take this opportunity to invite Jessica Backus, the Director of Artsy Learning and The Art Genome Project, to share some insights into what makes for a compelling bio and how to eloquently summarize an artist’s practice in 120 words. 

If you have—or are planning to include—artist biographies on your website, this article was written for you. Read on for our best practices, mistakes to avoid, and a few SEO tips for your gallery’s artist bios.

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Artist Statement: Stephanie Syjuco

Stephanie Syjuco was born in Manila, Philippines, in 1974. Syjuco works in photography, sculpture, and installation, moving from handmade and craft-inspired mediums to digital editing. Her work explores the tension between the authentic and the counterfeit, challenging deep-seated assumptions about history, race, and labor.

Syjuco’s installations frequently invite viewers to be active participants, from crocheting counterfeit designer handbags to purchasing items at an alternative gift shop within a museum, in order to investigate global consumerism, capitalism and its effects on artists. Through photographic portraits composed in the studio, Syjuco further explores economies of labor and value, with a political dimension inspired by colonialist ethnographic photography, her identity as an immigrant, and media-filtered protest imagery.

Stephanie Syjuco received her BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute and MFA from Stanford University. Her awards and residencies include the Guggenheim Fellowship (2014), Artadia Fellowship Residency Award at the International Studio and Curatorial Program (2010), Joan Mitchell Painters & Sculptors Award (2009), and Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (1997). She has had major exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art (2018); the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2018, 2017, 2011, 2000); Havana Biennial (2015); Asian Art Biennial (2015); Z33 Space for Contemporary Art (2012); ZKM Center for Art and Media Technology (2011); MoMA P.S.1 (2009, 2006); and Whitney Museum of American Art (2005). Syjuco is a long-time educator and currently an assistant professor of sculpture at the University of California, Berkeley. She lives and works in Oakland, California.

https://art21.org/artist/stephanie-syjuco/

Artists Statements, resumes and professional practices.

Here are the standards and guidelines for an MFA according to the College Art Association.

Here are guidelines for artist resumes. 

Guidelines for artists statements  from Getting Your S*** Together
Please read the link

What Is an Artist’s Statement?

1. A general introduction to your work, a body of work, or a specific project.
2. It should open with the work’s basic ideas in an overview of two or three sentences or a short paragraph.
3. The second paragraph should go into detail about how these issues or ideas are presented in the work.
4. If writing a full-page statement, you can include some of the following points:
   • Why you have created the work and its history.
   • Your overall vision.
   • What you expect from your audience and how they will react.
   • How your current work relates to your previous work.
   • Where your work fits in with current contemporary art.
   • How your work fits in with the history of art practice.
   • How your work fits into a group exhibition, or a series of projects you have done.
   • Sources and inspiration for your images.
   • Artists you have been influenced by or how your work relates to other artists’ work. Other influences.
   • How this work fits into a series or longer body of work.
   • How a certain technique is important to the work.
   • Your philosophy of art making or of the work’s origin.
5. The final paragraph should recapitulate the most important points in the statement.

What an Artist’s Statement is NOT:

1. Pomposity, writing a statement about your role in the world.
2. Grandiose and empty expressions and clichés about your work and views.
3. Technical and full of jargon.
4. Long dissertations or explanations.
5. Discourses on the materials and techniques you have employed.
6. Poems or prosy writing.
7. Folksy anecdotes about some important event in your life.
8. Nothing about your childhood or family unless it is very relevant to your work.
9. Not a brag fest or a press release.

Types of Artist’s Statements You Might Need.

1. Full-Page Statement: This statement you will use most often; it speaks generally about your work, the methods you may have used, the history of your work, etc. It may also include specific examples of your current work or project.
2. Short Statement: A shorter statement that includes the above in an abbreviated way, or is specific to the project at hand.
3. Short Project Statement: A very short statement about the specific project you are presenting.
4. Bio: Often a short description of your career as an artist and your major accomplishments.