Amy Furgiuele's Page

Welcome to ArtFairInsiders.com, Amy. I'm pleased to see you here and look forward to having you as part of our community.

When you have a chance, please add a photo to your profile and stop by the "Discussions" area to introduce yourself to the rest of us. We all look forward to your participation here. Also visit the "member map" and add your location. We have a lot to offer one another, experienced and newbie alike. Let's make this a dynamic site!

Best wishes,
Connie Mettler

p.s. The best way to make this system easy to use is to click on the "Follow-Email me" link at the bottom of each Forum discussion that interests you. That way the system will email you automatically whenever anyone responds. It's a great time-saver.

Amy, thanks for asking and the kind words...however, I don't know much about either of these events and would suggest you ask the question in the forum where you should find people who can be more helpful. Alternatively, have you joined the Chicago area group (bottom of the page in "groups)...ask there also.

 

From my limited experience I would go to Deerfield...good organizer and an affluent area. But we did use to show in Naperville, nice place and decent buying at the fall Riverwalk show. Try asking some of the other people also...or reach out to members like Linnea Lahlum who lives in this area. Good luck.

Hi Amy, 

I don't know anything about Naperville other than it is supposed to be one of the best places to live in the US.  As for Deerfield, Patti Stern has done it (last year in fact) and she can give you the kind of info that an artist would know.   I go every year because parking is easy, it is one of the first shows of the season and I usually find something to buy.  It isn't in my top ten favorites which is why I think Patti can give you a better idea even though her medium is different from yours.  She may also know Naperville.  Hope this helps.  Good luck and maybe I will see you this summer.

I did Deerfield a few years ago. Since it’s very close to where I live, the year before I’d gone to check it out. I talked to several artists I knew and they were having a decent show. Not great, but decent. So I did it the next year. But that year the promoter greatly expanded the show, and moved it from a compact and visible parking lot to one long street nearby, that runs along the commuter rail tracks. Visibility was much less in that position, as it was “end-on” to the adjacent busy shopping street. Between the expanded number of artists and the reduced visibility, attendance and sales suffered.

 

My sales were poor, and artists I talked to, several of which had done the show for several years, were very angry. I think it can be an okay show, IF the size stays small, back at original levels. I’d have to verify the number of artists before considering it again, and make comparisons with the number of artists in prior years. People were pretty vocal, if she had any sense at all, she’d have brought the number back down. This was probably her best show, and she shot it in the foot.

 

Naperville I did years ago, several times. I did pretty well. But it used to be the second week of July. This year, for the first time, it is being held the first week of June. Not sure why. The first week of June has too many shows in the Chicago area as it is, notably 57^th Street. But come to think of it, Naperville people would probably not go all that way anyway. It’s in a very nice setting, sharing the grounds of a living history museum. I don’t know anyone who has done it recently enough to speak about sales.

 

Hope this is helpful.

Amy,

Thanks for the encouraging comment. Well said! I have been doing some of my best work since I started linking up on this site. Rather amazing how interacting with brilliant people stirs your brain! LOL

I raise a hypothetical glass to all of our future artistic efforts: May they be Bold, Beautiful and bring us Bounty!

Ciao,

Linda

Amy,

I'll see you there at Deerfield!