Nitty Gritty

Got a big following but no one's buying? I'm flying solo today to break down the difference between building an audience of peers and one of buyers, and why your approach to content makes all the difference when it comes to selling art online.

I get into why attention doesn't equal intent, how "process content" can bring about students instead of collectors, and why clarity (not virality) is what actually sells your work. I also share the exact question I ask myself when I'm stuck on how to present my art online, and why confidence in your work matters just as much as the work itself.

If your engagement's high but your sales aren't, this one's for you.
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This week Flick joins me in Copenhagen for a chat with artist Arne Ohlsen.

Arne started his art practice in Australia while working as a carpenter, painting on wooden offcuts because canvas was out of reach. He gained momentum quickly, exhibited at several shows, and moved into a full-time creative practice before returning to Europe, where the work turned darker, leaning into identity, isolation, power and struggle.

We talk about the real differences between making art in Australia and Europe, whether struggle actually produces more emotionally powerful work, and what happens to a practice when the desire to sell starts shaping what gets made. We get into his decision to keep carpentry alongside his art career, the pull between experimentation and building a recognisable style, and why his version of success isn't commercial art stardom but a nice studio in a warm climate.

Arne also opens up about his discomfort with being seen, how comparison in the art world knocked his confidence, and the challenge every working artist faces: promoting your work without becoming a version of yourself that doesn't feel real.

Find Arne on Instagram here!
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Should your work look like an extension of you? This week, I sit down in Lisbon with Ukrainian-born, Portugal-based textile artist Bombony. Best known for her geometric textile works, Bombony draws on her background in architecture to create intuitive compositions that balance structure and softness, allowing meaning to reveal itself over time.

As a single mother and full-time artist, she's built a sustainable creative practice spanning painting, textiles and sculpture, finding the intersection between fine art and interior design as a way to create on her own terms.

In this conversation, we explore the relationship between artist and artwork, the tension between image and identity in a male-dominated art world, how motherhood sharpened rather than limited her practice, and the role of cultural displacement in shaping an artistic voice.

Find Bombony on Instagram here or visit her website here.
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This week we’re getting a crash course in Marketing 101 with the person who markets me — Felicity “Flick” Brown, my marketing and brand strategist, plus basically 55 other jobs in one.

For the past 18 months, Flick has helped me scale my art business, and now we’re finally sitting down to unpack exactly how we got here — from landing on my new marketing plan to all the trial and error attempts we made along the way.

We get into the purchasing funnel and why selling high-value art is a much longer game than a simple impulse buy. We talk vanity metrics, why ‘how-to’ content might not be converting the way you think, and how world-building and storytelling can actually help you sell.

Flick explains why the why behind a piece can matter more than the how, whether artists should embrace being elusive or build a front-facing persona, and why sometimes you just have to try on different content styles until you find what actually fits.

If you're a working artist trying to figure out how to actually market your art career and sell your work, this one's for you.
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Nitty Gritty is on tour with me while I move around Europe and this week I'm in London with oil painter Adam Baker.

In his practice, Adam focuses on intimate, imagined snapshots of queer life and love, drawing on personal experience to build fictionalised narratives that speak to the emotional complexity of contemporary queer identity.

Baker often investigates the contradictions of connection — how queer spaces can feel electric with possibility yet, simultaneously, deeply isolating. Through merging figures, geometric structures and atmospheric environments, he subverts traditional depictions of masculinity, revealing the vulnerability, strength and fluidity inherent within queer relationships.

Both being emotional lil human beans, we talked about the woes and throws of allowing feeling to drive your creative practice. When art from the heart becomes something slowly killing you — substance abuse and pain as a necessary medium — what happens to you as a person? Do we need all of this suffering to make good work, or is just being human enough?

Find Adam on Instagram here and on his website here!

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