Get Free Art at an Art Festival
Who can resist art festivals? The open market environment brings out all kinds of artists and art communities with their easels and tents ready to sell their wares. Although most of us can enjoy and appreciate the skill involved with artistic endeavors, not many of us can afford to buy a $500 painting or $300 metal sculpture. Don’t despair. You can still leave the grassy grounds of your favorite art gathering with something to remember it by. If you want some free art from your favorite festival, here’s get it.
Instructions
Get Free Art at an Art Festival
1. Get the promotional poster. Larger art festivals will offer a promotional poster to participants for free in the visitor or information booth. Usually these posters are pieces of art in and of themselves, so a simple frame will give you something to hang on the wall and enjoy. Collect them every year and start a display grouping.
2. Pick up business cards. Artists often use a piece of their own artwork as part of their business card or promotional post card. By picking up the ones that interest you the most, you have the makings for a free magnet art piece. Simply take the postcard or business card home and glue it to some magnet paper (or use those promotional magnets from banks and credit cards) and you have some free art for your fridge.
3. Take some photographs. Dont photograph artists' work, but really the festival atmosphere itself is a work of art. Anyone with a digital camera can capture the colors and textures of a crowd of people at an art show and frame it as artwork for their living room. A nice matte and frame will enhance colors captured in your picture.
4. Buy in bulk. If you are thinking of buying some hand-thrown pottery dishes or a series of photographs by one artist, use your philanthropy as a means of getting a discount or free piece with your large purchase. Most artists appreciate your business, and having their art exposed to others is often worth the price of a dinner plate or small photograph so don’t be afraid to ask for a freebie.
5. Do it yourself. If you are artistically talented or creatively crafty, you can get ideas from art festivals, even if you are unable to reproduce the work in its entirety. Whether it’s a collage technique you hadn’t thought of before, or a sewing project you can put your own spin on, getting inspired at the art festival is worth the price of the ticket and gets you home with some free ideas.
6. Barter. If you have something the artist may need, such as rare fabric or hard-to-find items that they use in their collage work, make a deal. You may not walk out with any art, but you can arrange for a trade off of materials for finished product. Many artists don’t have a lot of money for materials, so if you can make them a deal, they may bite at the chance to beef up their art supplies.
