Then I went outside of my booth and say EVERYONE had a little orange dot!
I didn't get a prize - nor have I to date, and I've been in 7 judged shows since.
Now that I'm paying attention, I do notice quite a few people shmoozing with the judge in their booth.... talking up their art, explaining the process (etc). I'm wondering what y'all have to say about that - is that a smart thing to do? - or does it annoy the judge?
Kathy Rose
Replies
Rejuvenating a two year old thread, interesting in that I missed this first time around. I've always taken the position that I want to win the award for the most sales.
I don't believe in schmoozing, but now that I think of it, the three or four times I took the initiative to describe my technique to the judges, I did win awards.
Larry Berman
http://BermanGraphics.com
412-401-8100
Hi....As a former director of a show, I was once asked to judge a show. I have to say that if a show asked 1 person to judge a show and be responsible for the prize money, most likely it's going to come down to what that particular judge likes, one's knowledge of a medium, etc. etc. There are so many factors involved. But the bottomline is, the judge has to respond on an emotional level, for them to remember you and be awarded. I think the basic responsibility goes back to the show itself.....did the show choose wisely. They are putting their trust in one person to represent them and the judge is always going to go for the kind of art he/she likes, respects, understands. I can't remember it's been so long ago if I got smoozed, but it would not have made a bit of difference to me if I thought the art creative, different, worthly et.c I do remember getting rudely insulted by one of the artist's...."oh, it''s you, I didn't recognize you" and continued on to give the reason. So smoozing would have been far more pleasant than being insulted. I still gave the work it's due look. But if the festival itself chooses a singular judge (and I think it's a mistake) you're going to get one person's personal preference for art...and it's impossible for it to be any other way. For example...I don't care for what I call "city art".....dripping negative colors in some horrid abstract way that the artist gives some obscure meaning of deep pain to.....I see an artist that needs a vacation. It's an individual thing. Artists need to show what they did and created out of love..if there's love in it , it's well done, and you happen to get the right judge, you might get a ribbon. As a fellow artist, I say, I would care far more about the buying audience and if they loved it enough to break open the wallet, and take it home to live with it. The ribbon can be great art combined with a lot of good luck.
Finding objective judges who are qualified to do the job can be a tall order if you live in a smaller town. If I find local judges, local artists who don't win awards will quite often tell me that "I took classes with them years ago and neither one of them ever liked me," or something similar. If I find out-of-town judges, they all want to know, "Where did they come from? Why not someone from around here?" If they win awards, they are delighted, if they don't, it's because the judges didn't come into their booths.
There is no way to make everyone happy, but I tell all of my participating artists that if they feel the judges passed them by without proper consideration, to let me know and I will try to send them back to chat with them. The last thing I want or need is a bunch of artists who feel disempowered and disrespected, because they won't come back next year. No show can survive that kind of turnover.
All the shows I've been in, the assistant who walks with the judge places the little colored sticker on the booth ID card. This allows the judge to stand in the middle of the roadway - not even entering the booth. Not good.
I appreciate what Barbara said about how she does things in her shows. In my way of thinking you WANT the artists to feel respected. I do understand how time consuming it is for a judge to go through 100 booths.... what a task.
In the last two shows, the judges acted with so very little regard for the time and effort the artist puts into their work. At one show, the judge didn't even slow down to really see my work - and criticized the booth next to me as she walked by. The show after that, the judge didn't even enter the booths I watched her judge. I'm sure she went into some.... I watched her score about 10 different tents as she walked. She just paused long enough to make a check mark on her sheet.... indicating that they had been "judged"!
This has been a tough fall for me in shows. I know I'm not the only one.... but when you add a judge who doesn't appear to show respect - it makes it even worse.
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