LibGuides: Writing Resource Center: Artist Statement

Writing Resource Center

The Writing Resource Center (WRC) is a fantastic service that is available to help students improve their writing, including Artist Statements.

Our peer tutors can help you with spelling, grammar, punctuation, and other editing. They can also help you brainstorm if you get stuck and give you feedback on how your artist statement sounds.

You can drop by the WRC any time it's open or you can make an appointment online.

Websites

How to Write and Use an Artist's Statement
From Molly Gordon
Abundant Artist
By artist Hannah Piper Burns. Burns breaks down the artist statement in 5 simple rules.
Your Artist Statement: Explaining the Unexplainable
Art Business article explaining WHY you need to write an artist statement.

Artist Statement Presentation

Artist Statements

Understand what the statement will be used for. Is it about your general work, a specific project or series, a biography, or an explanation of a specific piece?
Avoid:
- Empty expressions and cliches
- Too many wordy and meaningless sentences or too much technical vocabulary
- Over-explaining
- Talking too much about your process or materials
- Telling stories about yourself or your personal background unless it’s very relevant to your work
- Bragging
- Redundancy
Ask yourself a lot of questions about your work and why you do what you do.
Write in first person and try not to exceed one page. It’s not a dissertation.
Be honest!
For more info check out our very own library website and don’t hesitate to ask your professors! Most, if not all of them, have written one themselves!

Recommended Material

Writing the Artist Statement by Ariane Goodwin
ISBN: 0741408430
Publication Date: 2002-01-01
As an artist, do you know how to present your work with clarity, confidence and professional credibility? Writing the Artist Statement: Revealing the True Spirit of Your Work guides artists, of all genres, on how to smoke out the relevant ideas they already possess about their art. Because the good news is, in spite of self-conscious objections about writing, artists can recover their own words. Using clear and accessible language, Writing the Artist Statement invites you to build a psychological bridge between ART AND AUDIENCE by tapping into the exact words that will portray the singular spirit of your work

Example Statement

Artist Statement Drea Example