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„Survival Kit for Artists”
Saturday 26 February, 12 am
Euro-Bulgarian Cultural Centre
After the workshops and its Christmas Art Fair Project АВС is now
coming to a close with the publication of the Survival Kit for Artists which
comprises a booklet and a CD-ROM to be offered in a designer box at
bookstores as of March 2005.
Project ABC is a Bulgarian-Dutch initiative where each letter stands
for respectively Art, Bulgaria and Commerce. Or if you want to
demystify it even further – Project ABC tried to fill the gaps in
the training of Bulgarian artists by teaching basic survival skills for
a market economy. Moreover, without claiming to be the universal cure,
Project ABC tried to equip its participants with the major
prerequisites needed to cope
successfully on the market.
The two “terms” of the training took part in November 2003
and July 2004. The syllabus was developed by a team of ten or so
Bulgarian and Dutch tutors with either an active artistic or curatorial
background or extensive experienced in marketing theory, teaching and
consultancy. One of the major aspects of these workshops was the
presence of artists on the team – they continuously made sure
that anything mentioned in the sessions was in one or another way
relevant to the people it was designed for – Bulgarian art
practitioners.
A total of 84 artists and art-related professionals from all over the
country took part in these one-week training sessions. Another 7
participants stepped in as apprentice trainers and after the workshops
held over 20 presentations country-wide where they discussed aspects of
the syllabus with local groups, galleries and media.
The book is divided into
11 chapters which follow the structure of the workshops. Each of the
topics have been illustrated with a brief text by some Bulgarian or
Dutch trainer. Vessela Radoeva, Paula Kowenhoven, Freek Bloemers,
Krassimir Detchev, Emil Markov, Rene Beekman and Stanislava Stancheva
emphasize highlights from their presentations in the pages of the book.
And in addition. there are hundreds of pages on each topic in the
CD-ROM, along with free, legal software.
All texts in the CD-ROM have
been published with the consent of their authors or taken from public
websites dedicated to developing artists’ business skills. The
collection really proves one thing – wherever the artist may be,
it would always take them basic marketing experience if they want to
make a living on their art rather than turn it into a hobby to be
practiced on and off, in between their “real, paying jobs”.
The topics discussed at the workshops were mainly practice based
– project writing, management, PR, marketing, fundraising, legal
matters, taxation, networking, teambuilding, international cultural
relations.
By this publication we hope that this information will reach many more
people. We believe it may be of use to senior students who are due to
finish their education without the slightest clue what happens next
– where they should go, who they should get appointments with,
how they may price their work. It may be equally useful to those who
have long made art their fulltime occupation.
The sketches in the book are by ABC participant Anna Simeonova, also
author of the booklet cover. Designer of the box cover and overall kit
is artist Alexander Alexiev.
Project ABC was supported by the Dutch foreign ministry’s MATRA
programme, the STOEP Foundation for East European Projects, the Dutch
Union of Artists and Media Professionals and the Prince Berhnard
Culture Fund for East European Projects
In the end of 2004 several Project ABC participants founded the
Bulgarian foundation GMT+2, Publisher of Survival Kit for Artists.
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