Your Value Proposition

What value are you offering to the person looking at your portfolio? Your About Me page needs to connect to this person and offer something of value immediately!

Things people do not hire you for:

• Your grandmother gave you a watercolor set when you were six
• You are a creative person, and drawing satisfies your need to create
• You’re cool
• You’re friendly
• You’re pretty
• etc

Reasons people do hire you:

• Problems – they have a Problem, and you can solve it
• Friction – their process/organization has some sort of Friction, and you can smooth it out
• Pain – they have “Pain,” and you can take their pain away

“Problems,” “Friction,” and “Pain” are all different ways of saying the same thing: they have a need, and they believe – you persuade them – that you can fill their need.

Sample Needs You Might Fill

• An Art Gallery needs work to show. Every art gallery has a stack of artists & works just begging to be shown. So the simple fact that you made stuff isn’t enough to solve their problem. If you’ve taken the time to understand what galleries in your space (eg “Emerging West Coast Abstract Painters”, etc) are thinking about and looking for, then your portfolio, and your About Page, can describe how your work uniquely fills their exhibition needs.
• A Sports Bar needs an Identity System: a logo, branding materials, advertising media, website, food & drink menus, etc. The owner of the sports bar may or may not know that they need an Identity System. When you chat them up while you’re having lunch at their place, it’s up to you to describe what you can do for them and how it can bring in new customers and help existing customers order more food, drink, parties, and so on.
• An Animation Studio needs a furniture animator. Awesome as your graduation from the LBSU SOA is (and it really is awesome! Take a moment to appreciate what you’ve achieved, then get back to work! 🙂 Realistically, there are many recent graduates who have qualifications similar to yours. Your “About Me” page is a place to distinguish yourself by describing your process, showing them how you think, and detailing the research that goes into the works you illustrate.
• etc

Use your About Me page not to tell them your life story but to show them how you think. Art Gallery, Animation Studio, Ad Agency, Photography Studio, whoever is visiting your site, share your process of creation with them and how you help them achieve their goals. Remember, they don’t hire you because you’re cool or clever. They hire you because they believe that you can take their pain away!

Sample Opening Paragraph

As a Graphic Designer my mission is to help you communicate with your clients. My process begins with research, understanding who you’re talking to, what their needs are, and what visual language they respond to. From there I sketch out ideas, and consider graphic elements like typography and color palete that best speak to your clients.

Value before History

You can talk about your artist’s journey, family influences, and so on if you want to. Just be sure they’re not first. Start with your Value Proposition – why should this person choose you? Then, later, toward the bottom of your About Page, you can get into more personal things.

Inverted Triangle

In journalism, they use an “Inverted triangle” when writing stories. Most people won’t read the whole article. So a journalist has to get the “5 W’s”:

• Who
• What
• When
• Where
• Why
• How

right up front. Then, as the article goes along, it can go into greater detail for the subset of readers who want that much information. Your About Me page should be similar. Get your Value Proposition, what you’re offering, and how you can solve their problems right up top! Then, later, you can discuss more personal aspects of your career.

Don’t bury the lede

Also, in Journalism, the “lede” is the first or “lead” sentence in an article. And there’s a famous saying, “Don’t bury the lede.” It goes with the Inverted Triangle idea of getting the most important stuff out first. It means you shouldn’t start your story with superfluous things and only later get to the lede! Say the most important thing first!

Don’t spend the first paragraph telling me what Vladimir Putin was wearing today and only in the second paragraph tell me that Russia invaded Ukraine today!

Clear, Concise & Direct Writing

At the university, we often use more complex “Academic” writing. For most of us, more casual and direct writing is probably better.

• Short Sentences
• Short Words
• Skip Qualifying Adverbs
• Clarity
• Directness

The 4 C’s

• Confident
• Clear
• Concise
• Compelling

The first drafts of things I write are filled with adverbs. Qualifying words. Hedging my bets. Covering my ass. When I read it, it reads slowly because there are so many qualifications. So much finessing of ideas. I’ve qualified whatever I was trying to say into oblivion!

Lifeguard Speak

Jason, the lifeguard, tells me that when kids are running at the pool, the wrong thing to say is,

Don’t run!

This doesn’t work so well because even though it’s only two words, it’s still complicated. First, the kid has to visualize running and then think about not doing that or doing something else.

Jason says what you should yell at the kids is,

Walk!

This is much simpler!

Bye-bye Adverbs

Adverbs (a word or an expression that modifies a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a determiner, a clause, a preposition, or a sentence) add nuance to our ideas. But they also make sentences more complicated and make us sound less confident:

Less Helpful

• My work mostly explores X…

More Direct

• My work explores X…

Have the courage to get rid of adverbs like “mostly.” Don’t tell me all the reasons why what you’re saying isn’t exactly what you’re saying. Just say it!

Web tools like Grammarly can help with this. One cool app that helps is “Hemingway.” Try pasting your text there and see what it offers:

• https://hemingwayapp.com

Point of View: 1st Person

Sometimes, we’re inclined to write in 3rd person because we think it sounds more professional.

• In his oeuvre, Mr. Zucman explores the intersection of art and identity.

I find 3rd person unnecessarily distancing. I encourage you to write in 1st person. Be casual. Be vernacular. Just talk to people. Plain. Simple.

• Hi, I’m Glenn. In my work, I’ve been thinking about how we express our multiple identities.

Object: 2nd Person

A 1st Person POV is more direct and engaging than 3rd person.

Similarly, a 2nd Person Object is more direct and engaging than 3rd person:

• I make sure the design process meets the client’s needs.
• Helping you communicate with your clients is my first priority.

Both sentences above have a 1st person POV: “I make sure” and “my first priority”. However, the top sentence has a 3rd person object, “meets the client’s needs,” which is more detached. The 2nd sentence has a 2nd person object, “Helping you communicate,” which is more direct and engaging.

Menus: Gerunds rawk!

While we’re at it, I suggest gerunds are better than nouns for your menu categories.

Noun Categories

Glenn Zucman
Contemporary Art
Home • Paintings • Drawings • Prints • About • Contact

Gerund Categories

Glenn Zucman
Contemporary Art
Home • Painting • Drawing • Printmaking • About • Contact

When I use a category like “Paintings,” a plural noun, I’m saying that there is a thing called a painting. I’ve made a bunch of them, and if you click this link, you can look at the objects I have made.

Instead, “Painting” is a gerund (a noun-verb). With a category like “Painting,” I’m now saying that painting is a thing that I do, a form of art that I practice, and if you click this link, you can explore my painting practice.

It’s a small point. But for me, “explore a form of art that I practice” is more compelling than “see a bunch of sample objects I have made.” So, I suggest gerunds over plural nouns for portfolio/website categories.

Help with Artist’s Statements

Here are some samples and tools to help with writing Artist’s Statements:

• How to write an Artist Statement – Agora Gallery
• How to write an Artist Statement – WikiHow
• Artist Statement Guidelines – gyst-ink.com
• Your Artist Statement – artbusiness.com
• Artist’s Statement – Wikipedia
• 8 Artist Statements we love – theArtLeague.org

Additional “About” elements

In addition to “About Me” and “About My Work,” there are a few other things you should have on your website About Me page:

• Contact info (or a link to a separate Contact page)
• Link to your CV or Resume You can use a downloadable PDF of your CV/Resume if you like, but the content should also be available right on the web page without having to download anything.
• Terms of Use (Copyright or Creative Commons)
• Credits/Thanks – if others helped you with your work or presentation, or if you’re using others’ materials on your site, your About page is a place where you can add acknowledgments and thanks.

About Me Page & Canvas URL

• Post your About text on your About Page.
• Paste the URL for this page in the URL box on Canvas