It’s always been a pet peeve of mine when I read gallery names that describe themselves as “such and such gallery of FINE ARTS.”  Perhaps I’m a bit dense, but my understanding has always been that the term “FINE ARTS” refers to the arts:  dance, music, painting, etc.  So unless a gallery exhibits dance, music, and poetry in addition to visual art etc, it is a gallery of fine art NOT fine arts.  When I see such names, I always picture a hillbilly walking through the gallery gawking, “Gawd . . . look at all these pretty fine arts on the wall.”  It’s logical isn’t it?  “Arts” seems like it would be the plural of “art.” If one painting is “art” then multiple paintings must be “arts” right?

Now that I’ve thoroughly offended everyone, I’ll come to the point.  And it is a practical point.  When you create a domain name such as YourNameFineArt.com, DON’T add an “s” and make it “YourNameFineArts.com.”  This is more than just a pet peeve or opinion.  I guarantee you people will forget to add the “s” to the end of the domain. 

When I registered “webartsites.com” I had not yet learned this lesson.   I am constantly losing web site visitors to a French site “webartsite.com.”  I was so tired of trying to explain to people how to spell my domain (“don’t forget to add the s!”) that I re-branded the entire site “FineArtViews.com”, which as you may have noted ALSO has an S; however, I also own “FineArtView.com.”  So the problem is solved.

The bottom line is this:

1.      Don’t use YourNameFineArts.com as your domain
2.      If you MUST use YourNameFineArts.com as your domain, be sure to ALSO register YourNameFineArt.com and point it to the same web site, so you catch people who forget the final “s”
3.      If you have an unusual name with a common misspelling, consider registering an additional domain with the misspelling.

Sincerely,

Clint Watson
Software Craftsman and Art Fanatic

PS:  Perhaps I should have also registered “FineArtsViews.com” . . . after all some of my site visitors might want to look at several of the “arts” displayed.

Artists should register at least two domain names.  I’ve given this serious thought and concluded that proper domain names are essential to your online marketing strategy.  Here are Clint Watson’s domain name rules for artists.

1.  Register Only .com domains
If you register .biz, .org, .net or any other extensions besides .com, people will forget and will use the .com extension anyway.  An exception:  if someone else grabbed YourName.com before you, then go ahead and get yourname.net.

 2.  Don’t use hyphens, dashes, numbers or abbreviations.
These are too confusing and people forget them anyway.

3.  Register YourName.com
Your domain name should be your name.  If you attend a gallery opening and meet a potential collector you want an easy to remember domain name. The prospect already has your name.  It’s a piece of cake to tell him to visit your web site if you can say, “It’s just MyName.com.”  If the person is interested in your artwork, he will remember your name.  If your name is also your web site address, he will automatically remember your web site.  The other important reason for registering your own name is to improve your search engine ranking.  If someone types “Clint Watson” into Google, my site will likely be the number one result if my domain is “ClintWatson.com.”  (And actually it is number one although I was forced to register the nasty .net extension).  The search engine benefit is especially true if you’ve done your other search engine strategies correctly.

4.  Register YourNameFineArt.com
If you can’t get YourName.com, then YourNameFineArt.com is a good second choice.  It retains your name in the address, so you will still enjoy the search engine benefits as outlined above.  Plus it has the added benefit of having “Fine Art” in the address.  As an artist, those are also terms that you would like search engines to associate with you.  YourNameFineArt.com was originally my first choice for domain names for artists; however, it is a more cumbersome to tell people in a social setting (which should be one of your primary marketing strategies.)  You’ll always be reminding people not to forget to add “FineArt” to the end of your name, that’s why you should register YourName.com too. 

5.  Register any other name you wish
I personally believe in using yourname.com as an artist, but if you have some other branded trademark or a dba that you feel is important to use, then register a third name.

There you have it, Clint Watson’s domain name rules for artists.  Sure, registering more than one domain name costs a bit more money, but domain names are dirt cheap these days.  Plus, if you host your web site with one of my services, FineArtStudioOnline.com or MyStudioSite.com, we pay for one of your domain names anyway.

That’s my view, I’d love to hear yours.

Sincerely,
 

Clint Watson
Software Craftsman and Art Fanatic

The Storyteller by Andy Thomas, Oil, 30 x 36

"...is there anything better than a campfire
on a moonlit evening and a good story?"


 I originally penned the following commentary as the forward to Andy's Book The Artful Journey.

“What kind of painter is Andy Thomas?”

I asked myself this perplexing question the first time I saw the artwork of Andy Thomas.  Indeed, most people viewing Andy’s artwork for the first time wonder the same thing.  In answering this question, I’ve found that many people try to mentally categorize artists into discrete little classifications.  Think about some of the terms you may have heard to describe artists: “Western” painters, “landscape” painters, “portraitists”, “plein-air” painters, “wildlife” artists, and “impressionists.”  An indefinite number of such categories exists.  However, Andy is an artist who defies classification and as such, some people find it difficult to answer the question, “What kind of painter is Andy Thomas?”  I have unraveled the mystery and I will give you the deceptively simple answer to this question.

The first time I viewed Andy’s artwork, I had never heard of him.  Andy has sent a slide portfolio for my business partners and I to review for possible inclusion of his paintings in an invitational exhibition that our gallery was hosting.  As we projected the images of his artworks, I became more and more excited because each painting was so interesting and beautifully executed.  From composition and brushwork to content and color, Andy obviously “had the chops.”  He was one of the most technically proficient artists I had ever seen.  But what really struck me most about Andy’s paintings was the extreme variety – each one was so unique.  No two were alike, one was a western, and another was a historical maritime battle.  Some were tightly rendered, while others were beautiful, loose impressionism.  It didn’t appear that Andy’s paintings had any common themes.  I found this quite unusual; after all, most artists I’d encountered had some commonality joining their paintings – most artists fit into a neat classification.  But as I said, Andy seemed to defy classification.  Nevertheless, as we came to the last slide, I didn’t want it to end.  I wanted to see more.  Andy definitely had my attention and my interest, and I knew that we had discovered a very special artist.  Needless to say, we accepted Andy into the invitational exhibition and within five minutes of viewing his slides, I called Andy to find out more about him and his enticing artwork.

It’s very rare that I get as excited about an artist’s work as I did about Andy’s that day.  As I reflected upon my excitement, I began to wonder why was I so excited about Andy’s work?  After all, I’d seen a lot of great artwork over the years.  In considering this question, I realized that the extreme variety of Andy’s artwork was one of the most exciting aspects.  Here was an artist who seemingly could paint nearly all subjects and all styles.  But again I wondered, “What kind of painter is Andy Thomas?”  I knew that there must be some common thread; I just wanted to figure out what that common thread was.

I went back and projected the slides again, and I found that I kept stopping to view a painting titled Storyteller.  It was my favorite painting in the group.  It depicted a gathering of cowboys around a campfire at dusk.  One of the cowboys (obviously the title character) was telling a story to the others.  As I viewed this painting, I realized that it held the answer to understanding the enigma of Andy Thomas!  I had found the common thread…Andy Thomas is a Storyteller.

All of the paintings told a story.  Now the wide diversity of subjects made sense!  One was a story of a pirate enjoying his treasures, another was the story of ballerinas preparing for a performance, and of course, the maritime battle was Andy’s depiction of a true historical story.  After all, what kind of storyteller would tell the same story over and over?  Andy employed varied styles of painting to enhance the emotion of each particular story.  He painted the ballerinas in a soft and impressionistic manner thereby imparting a feeling of spontaneity and movement.  By contrast, he rendered the maritime battle in a tight and detailed style, giving the viewer the feeling of military precision. 

The more I thought about Andy’s works, I began to realize that their storytelling or narrative quality is exactly what made them so exciting.  In fact, I have come to believe that the ability to paint with this narrative quality is what separates mere painters from true artists.  I feel that a painter is someone who can render a subject and make it look realistic to the viewer, but a true artist can say something with the same scene.  In other words, the true artist, like Andy, can tell a story with his artwork.  To put it simply, the work of a painter shows the viewer what he painted, but the work of an artist shows the viewer why he painted. 

After realizing that, visually through his paintings, Andy is a storyteller, it didn’t surprise me to learn that Andy also composes written stories, some fictional and some historical, to accompany most of his paintings.  People viewing Andy’s artwork find these written stories extremely interesting and they help viewers gain a deeper understanding of Andy’s artwork.  In talking with Andy, I also learned that his story….the story of his life…is also quite interesting, but I’ll save that topic for another time.

So the answer to the question, “What kind of artist is Andy Thomas?” is simple.  Andy Thomas is a storyteller and as such, he is in excellent company.  I pose the question, “Isn’t all great art narrative?”  Think about great operas, the Bible, great literature, classical music, and the works of the old masters.  They all tell stories.  In telling stories, Andy is the greatest kind of artist, and he depicts the most important kinds of subjects: the struggles and achievements of humanity.

Although The Artful Journey is about the artwork of Andy Thomas, it’s also about the stories of Andy Thomas.  In my opinion, Andy is one of the master artists and master storytellers of our time.  So as you enjoy his artwork or his book, sit back in your favorite chair, get relaxed and enjoy the artwork of Andy Thomas…the Storyteller.

Sincerely,

Clint Watson
Software Craftsman and Art Fanatic

PS:  We have a special $10 discount on Andy's book for FineArtViews.com members, visit the following link if you are interested in ordering it:
http://www.fineartviews.com/4/lp_116/skin_/pg_productdetail.html/sr_2

Race Horse by Andy Thoms	Cowboy Jig by Andy Thomas