Goal Setting
Kate Renee
January is always a great month to focus on goal setting, revisiting
dreams and starting new projects! It’s important to identify what you want to
do before you begin working towards that goal, so sitting down and considering your
goals is the first step to begin achieving them.
As an artist myself, I am obsessed with discovering hidden dreams,
setting goals and blogging about it the process. This past July, I did an
intensive seven day session of goal setting which I called my Seven Days of
Strategic Planning (http://thesuctioncup.com/2012/seven-days-of-strategic-planning-recapa/).
During this week, I created a master list of personal dreams, wishes, hopes and
career goals that I wanted to accomplish in my life time. It is an ever
changing document that I allow myself to add and remove goals as my desires
change. After organizing my huge list, I
came up with categories of goals artists should consider when goal setting to
better plan out every aspect of their career.
This is a list of 30 goal categories that I created to begin thinking
about different aspects of my life and my career that I need to set goals in. I
included fun categories, like travel and arts awards; important arts categories,
like grants and finances; and the boring must-haves too, like inventory and
time management.
Consider goal setting throughout your entire life; your arts career
and life are symbiotic so why not consider both your personal and career goals
when you plan? Have you always wanted to walk on hot coals or try skydiving?
Add it to your goals! Go through each category and take a personal inventory.
Push yourself to think of you biggest hopes and dreams. Putting it in writing
is also important. For each category there are a couple of questions to help
get you on the track to setting some of your own goals. Each category then has
two goal idea examples to demonstrate short and long term goals for each
category.
Goal Categories:
1. Portfolio: Do you have a portfolio? What
needs to be updated in your portfolio?
Goal
Idea: Update artist statement, create a comprehensive career portfolio
2. Studio Space and Living: What type of work space and
living space do you need? Is your studio space conducive to your work?
Goal
Idea: Move studio into the dining room for more room, move into the Northern
Warehouse artist studios
3. Galleries
and Exhibitions: What is your dream gallery or space to exhibit in? Do you
want to curate your own show?
Goal
Idea: Participate in two group exhibitions this year, plan and implement a solo
exhibition
4. Social Networking and Computer: Do you
have the proper software to best utilize your technology? What social networks
can you add or remove to better your participation online?
Goal
Idea: Have 300 fans on Facebook arts page, organize your computer and back up
all of your arts documents and images
5. Events and Participation: What places and spaces have you always wanted to visit but
have never been to? How do you wish to increase your participation in the arts
community? Have you volunteered lately?
Goal
Idea: Head to a local arts museum and draw three times in the next year,
participate in Art –a-Whirl or the St. Paul Art Crawl
6. Marketing: How do your viewers remember you
and your artwork? How do you reach new audiences?
Goal
Idea: Redesign business cards, create a custom set of pens with your name and
website on them
7. Design and Merchandise: What can you do to make you work
more marketable? What are some design changes you can make to your brand?
Goal
Idea: Make prints of work, a website
redesign
8. Jobs and Career Development: What can you do to push your career into the next step?
How are you creative at your job?
Goal
Idea: Take a workshop on artist resumes, get a full time arts job
9. Non-Profits and Boards: Do you want to participate in a
non-profit? What non-profits and missions do you want to align yourself with?
Goal
Idea: Volunteer with a local non-profit, become a board member
10. Documentation and Journaling: How do you document your process
and ideas? Do you have good documentation images of your artwork in large and
small file sizes?
Goal
Idea: Journal daily, copyright artwork
11. New Projects: What
is a new medium you want to try or rediscover? What is a project that has been on the side that you want to
begin?
Goal
Idea: Pick up pottery again, learn how to screen print
12. Press and Publications: How can you begin publishing your own content? What type of
press would you like to be published in?
Goal
Idea: Begin a newsletter, Write a press release and send it to your local paper
13. Community: How
do you want to make an impression in the arts and the wider community? How can
you make an impact or send a message with your art?
Right: American Ipod Pot Left: Minoan
Octopus Pot, Kate Renee, 2008
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Goal
Idea: Leave your business cards
around local coffee shops, apply to the Community Supported Art (CSA)
14. Education, Skills, and
Teaching: What
skills do you need to improve to tackle an important goal? What are some local
classes and workshops that I can attend to learn more?
Goal
Idea: Attend the Giant Steps 2013
conference, teach a class or a workshop to other artists
15. Life Choices: What can you do to make yourself
happier? What can you try to challenge yourself?
Goal
Idea: Expand my food and music
tastes, work on saying no and setting boundaries
16. Appearance: What about
yourself would you change and not change?
Goal Idea: Try dying my
hair a new color, dress professional for arts events
17. Exercise: What do you do to stay moving and
healthy?
Goal
Idea: Stretch in the morning, take a
weekly aerobics class
18. Reading and Writing: How often do you read arts
literature? Are your writing skills strong?
Goal
Idea: Read The Artist Way by Julia Cameron, start a local artists book club
19. Social and Speaking: How do you react to large crowds and social situations? What skills
and tips can you learn and apply to your public speaking?
Goal
Idea: Introduce yourself to one person art each opening, participate on an arts
discussion panel
20. Grants and Finances: What grant foundations align with your creative work? How do you
manage your career and life finances?
Goal
Idea: Save all of my arts and supplies receipts, set up an accounting system
21. Studio Furniture and Materials: What tools do you use daily? What item would save time and
frustration in the studio?
Goal
Idea: Purchase a new cutting mat, invest in a new easel
22. Residencies: What
is a residency program that interests you? Where are you interested in traveling
to?
Goal
Idea: Attend an artist retreat, apply to the Vermont Studio Center Residency
Program
23. Travel: Are
you interested in discovering your family history? What is your dream vacation?
Where would you take an arts focused vacation?
Goal
Idea: Take a weekend vacation up north, travel to France to see the Louvre
24. Collections: Which gallery or museum would you
like to see your work in? What
pieces would you like to add to your own collection?
Goal
Idea: Own a fellow artist’s piece of art, have art in the Weisman Museum’s
permanent collection
25. Collaborations: Who would be your dream artist to
collaborate with? How can you collaborate with your viewers and patrons through
your artwork?
Goal
Idea: Create a work of art with my artist friends, Create a piece to be
published alongside the written work of a known writer
26. Awards and Contests: What award would be great on your resume? What contest do you want to
participate in?
Goal
Idea: Receive honorable mention in a group exhibition, receive a cash reward
for a juried art show
27. Current Body of Work: What ideas, plans, and goals do
you have for your current work? What is the next step you could take to push it
forward?
Goal
Idea: Work on a small side project, complete my larger series of paintings
28. Time Management: Where
are you loosing time? How much studio time can you commit to during the week?
Are you doing too much or not enough?
Goal
idea: Work on arts business activities during lunch break at work, get better
rest at night so I can be ready for studio time in the morning
29. Inventory and Organization: How do you store and categorize your artwork? Where do you
keep and sort your arts paperwork?
Goal
Idea: Organize my file cabinet, create a master inventory of my entire body of
work
30. Commissions: How
many people approach your for custom creations? What would your ideal
commissioner look like?
Goal
Idea: Create a small jewelry piece, be commissioned to create another pair of
custom painted wedding shoes
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Accomplishing Your Goals
There
are many different strategies for assisting with achieving your goals. Here are
a few ideas to try out!
Celebrating the Successes and the Steps: Don’t cross out your goals when you are done, celebrate
them and respect your accomplishments! Write the date next to it if you keep
your goals in a list. Or have a separate journal where you record your accomplishments
and successes. You can burnout easily by trying to tick off goal after goal
without realizing how much you have come along the way. If you are attempting to
tackle a huge long term goal, separate it into smaller steps and celebrate
accomplishing each step along the way. It will make the journey more enjoyable
and seem more doable!
Sharing:
Sharing is crucial! Sharing your goals with other people helps to keep you
accountable. When I began my mentorship program with WARM this past December, I
bought my list of goals with to share with the group. I love to set goals and
analyze my dreams so I shocked everyone when I brought a 14 page packet of
goals.
Making Goals into Art: Find ways to solidify your goals into fruition. In
my personal quest towards reaching my goals, I have been creating works of art
that encompass my goals. My recent project was making vision boards. Creating
works of art or a way to keep your goals in front of you is a great visual
reminder.
Wording:
You can also make your goals more achievable by how you structure the wording
of your goals. By changing your goal
from: I am going to hand make a vision board out of collected and cut imagery
and photographs.
…to a more specific goal: I
am going to hand make three vision boards out of collected and cut imagery and
photographs by the end of July 2013 so I can begin to apply my vision board to
my career, makes you more likely to achieve your goal.
Passion, Career
Vision Board, Kate Renee, 2013
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Retiring
Goals: If you find yourself
looking at your list of goals and realizing your dreams and priorities have
changed, retire your old goals. Recognize and respect that at one point they
were important and full of potential. Don’t just cross off or throw out old
goals. You can simply make a list of goals that you are retiring, or have a
small ritual to release these old dreams like burning them, or making a piece
of artwork to commemorate it.
Where do you go from here? Have fun! Set your critic aside and ask yourself
what you really want to do in your career and in life. Throw in some fun goals
and some easy goals to make the journey enjoyable along the way. Feel free to
comment and share your own goals for 2013 below!
KATE RENEE
Kate
Renee lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Kate graduated from the
University of Minnesota with a BA in fine arts, art history, and a minor in
design, and has worked with various galleries and museums in the Twin Cities including
the Katherine E. Nash Gallery, Larson Art Gallery, American Swedish Institute
and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. She designed the Solo Exhibition Program
at Altered Esthetics.
Kate
is building a national and international reputation with exhibitions throughout
the United States. In 2013, Kate began a two year mentorship through the
Women’s Art Resources of Minnesota alongside artist and mentor Jill Waterhouse.
She was awarded a Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative grant. Kate is a
frequent blogger on her artist development site www.thesuctioncup.com and also guest
blogs on sites including Local Artist Interviews. You can see Kate’s work on
her website:
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