This course will take you through a survey to determine just how much you know about the business aspects of being an artist. It will give you a good idea just how much you need to learn, or the satisfaction that you already know what you need to know.

The second part will take you through 10 steps to getting your sh*t together. If you complete these 10 steps, you are well on your way to being ready to engage with the art world and having a handle on just what else you need to figure out.

So come on this journey and see just how much you have your sh*t together!

This course will require approximately 1-1.5 hours of your time, but you can always save your place and return at your convenience.

Course Instructor:
Karen Atkinson is a media, installation and public artist, independent curator, collaborator, and has published and guest edited a number of publications. She has exhibited and curated internationally including South Africa, Australia, Europe, Mexico, Canada, and throughout the USA, and exhibited in the Fifth Havana Biennial in Cuba. She was a co-founding director of Side Street Projects in 1991, a non profit artist-run organization in Los Angeles which is still up and thriving today. She has been a faculty member at CalArts since 1988. She is a past board president of NAAO, the National Association of Artists’ Organizations. She has served on the board of directors of LACPS, Side Street Projects, Installation and serves on many Advisory Boards of arts organizations. Atkinson currently teaches classes and workshops titled “Getting Your Sh*t Together” and has created software for visual artists of the same title. Her company GYST Ink, is an artist run company for artists. She also co-edits the blog. www.gyst-ink.com

Money, Money Money! According to our research, many artists feel uncomfortable with money: talking about it, asking for it, including it in the conversation around their art.

Get over it! Producing art is generally not inexpensive. We as artists need money to survive and to make our art. But many of us don’t always have full-time, salaried jobs or trust funds. So, how do we go about paying for the work that we want to produce? We fundraise!

This course will require approximately 1-2 hours of your time, but you can always save your place and return at your convenience.

This course was developed as a collaborative effort of the Fractured Atlas staff.

Maybe you’ve written fundraising letters in the past and weren’t happy with the results. Or, maybe you’re just getting started on your very first fundraising letter. Whatever your experience, this course will provide you with the basic structure for a good fundraising letter, writing tips, ideas for packaging your letter, and tools for tracking the results. (This course will contain ideas for both email and paper fundraising letters, and some discussion of the differences between those two.)

We highly recommend taking the Fundraising: Demystified course prior to taking this course, or that you have some general sense of the fundraising scene before you actually begin the fundraising process.

This course will take approximately 1-2 hours of your time, but you are free to move at your own pace – start and stop as you please!

Thanks for making art in the world, and I hope these tips help fuel your next Big Idea!

Course Instructor: Theron Shaw has worked in non-profit administration and fundraising since 1995, with wide-ranging experience in the fields of arts, education, environment and social services. His background includes experience with grantwriting, direct mail campaigns, capital campaigns, nonprofit management, and major donor campaigns. As a fundraiser, Theron’s consulting work focuses on creating inspiring, fun, and effective fundraising campaigns that achieve clients’ financial goals and strengthen their organizations. In addition to his consulting practice, Theron serves as Director of Development for InterPlay, an Oakland-based community arts organization that promotes community-building, peace-making, and social change through InterPlay’s techniques of improvised storytelling, movement, and dance. He has designed and led a three-year, $1 million capacity-building campaign, the largest fundraising effort in InterPlay’s twenty-year history. He has recently relocated his consulting practice and residence to Seattle, WA. Theron has a Master’s degree in Public Affairs from the Hubert Humphrey Institute at the University of Minnesota. Theron is also an avid sailor, outdoorsman, musician, and performer. His favorite instrument so far is the huaca, a three-chambered ceramic ocarina designed by Sharon Rowell. He lives with his wife Elizabeth in Seattle, WA.