How to Write an Artist Statement for Your College Application

 

If you have a child/ student applying to study art, it’s likely that they’re being asked to submit an artist statement. This is an assignment that stops most students in their tracks, and many parents aren’t sure how to help them get started, however it doesn’t have to be that hard. Let’s look at some examples and walk through a few steps to get you started writing your artist statement.

 

How to write an artist statement

 

Goal of an artist statement: To help the viewer better understand and relate to the piece of artwork. An artist tells your story. It explains why you create, how you work, and where your ideas come from.

Length: An artist statement shouldn’t be longer than a page, as they are usually hung on the wall, and most people won’t stand around and read more than a page.

Sample artist statements

 

Artist: Megan Auman: ( find more at meganauman.com)

I’m Megan Auman, artist, maker, and educator.  I’m drawn to enthusiastic brushstrokes, strong colors, and bold contrast.  I create abstract paintings that stand out but are also beautiful and easy to live with.

I grew up in an art-loving home with an artist mother and an entrepreneurial father.  I spent my high school years happily covered in paint, but decided to spend my time in art school studying jewelry and metals.  After receiving a BFA and MFA in metalsmithing and jewelry, I launched my eponymous jewelry line.

 

After nearly a decade away from painting, I returned to my paints and brushes following my mother’s death from cancer in 2012.  Painting became a way to reconnect with an art form my mother and I shared, work through my grief, and express myself without words.  My current work explores color, form, and expressive brushstrokes.  I love playing with paint to create bold statements on canvas.  Returning to painting has been a return to an important part of who I am – someone who might just be happiest when I’m covered in paint.

I currently split my time between painting, designing jewelry, and mentoring creative entrepreneurs through my website Designing an MBA.

I live and work in Jonestown, PA, a small town 90 miles west of Philly, in the foothills of the Appalachian mountains.  When I’m not working, I love traveling (I have to get my city fix on a regular basis), reading, drinking good beer, browsing Pinterest, and spending time with my husband and Grizzly, our 90 pound mutt.

 

Write your own artist statement.

You don’t need to have an answer to every one of the questions below. If there’s one that you really aren’t sure what to write, skip it and move onto the next. 

Who are you?  ( tell about your background, what makes you , you?)

 

 

Where do you like to make your work? ( do you have a special place in your house, outdoors, do you only draw when you’re at a coffee shop….)

 

 

What got you started?

 

 

Paint a picture of what in your life brought you to create what your audience is looking at.  ( meaning tell the story behind the piece, what inspired or influenced you)

 

 

• Discuss your thought process behind making the piece, what were you thinking about?

 

 

• What did you learn?

 

 

• How did you get from problem to solution?  ( maybe you problem was that you needed to do a self-portrait and you’d never done one before, what did you have to overcome in order to be comfortable creating a self portrait)

 

 

• Discuss how you want the audience to relate to the work, or what you want them to learn/feel/do from looking  the piece.

 

 

• what tools/ materials do you use to create your work  ( and where do you purchase them, the more specific the more interesting the story)

 

 

• Do you have any specific routine that you follow every time that you create. For example, I’m usually watching a TV series , so I might mention that I watched season 2 episode 1-15 of Orange is the New Black, while creating a body of work. Maybe you have certain music that you always listen to, or a drink that you always have. ( this information helps to make the statement more like a story, and helps the audience to relate to and connect to the work. )

 

 

This site can be fun and helpful in getting started: http://www.500letters.org/form_15.php

 

Now take your answers and turn them into a completed artist statement.

Take your answers, and think of each as a paragraph, add some additional text to connect them.

If you need help editing your writing, check out the videos below for FREE and helpful writing tools.

The other tool that I love is the Hemmingway Editor.

Hemmingway was known for writing short and concise sentences. ( Have you heard of 6 word stories?) The Hemmingway Editor will help you with sentence structure and length.

My final writing tip is to explore talk to text.

Do you have students that STRUGGLE with writing? Maybe they can’t seem to get their thoughts down on paper in a coherent fashion. Maybe their handwriting is a disaster, or maybe they just broke the hand that they use to write. Using a speech to text tool is a great adaptation for all of the above. There are a lot of options out there so feel free to explore what works best for you and your students. Here’s one that I’m loving and some ways that I”m using it.