Long Beach State

Long Beach State University is a wonderful campus filled with so many academic, recreation, and social facilities. The School of Art is rich with people, equipment, galleries, and everything needed to create and consider works of art in many media. We have so much on campus that you might never leave campus!

The World

Nonetheless, the reality is that your career will be built and lived off-campus. It’s important to get out there and engage with the “real world” beyond Long Beach State.

Networking Events

Networking events, like:

• Conferences
• Exhibitions
• Art Professional Group Meetups
• Open Studios
• Art Galleries & Museums
• & more

are priceless opportunities to build relationships with both emerging art peers, and senior professionals who can help advance your career.

This semester I’m asking you to go to at least 2 off-campus networking events. One ever week would be even better! But at least go to 1 event by Week 7 and another by Week 14.

F2F or Online Event?

As a busy, and perhaps transportation challenged, student, you may ask, do I have to go to an F2F event? Or can I attend a Virtual Event?

Pre-Pandemic Meetups

I’ve been to events at most of the organizations listed on our “Conferences, Events & Galleries” page. Here’s a typical example:

The Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles (SILA) hosts a guest speaker at MOCA-LA at the Pacific Design Center (PDC). There’s a cocktail reception from 6-7 p.m., and the talk begins at 7 p.m. I show up at about 6 p.m. and start chatting with people. I meet a variety of people, including many who would be hard to get access to otherwise. Also, in these social settings, the trade secrets, career tips, pricing advice, and more that can be so elusive are freely offered by the people you speak to.

At 7 p.m., I’m in the middle of a great conversation with someone, and we don’t even go inside to listen to the speaker. The speaker is great! But the truth is, we all came to network. To meet people. To interact. Emerging artists want to build careers, mid-career artists are looking for assistants, and senior peeps are sussing out new talent. I don’t mean to say that it’s an instant career gold mine. It’s still going to take time, patience, effort, and persistence. But it’s super valuable.

Finally, halfway through the speaker’s talk, we go inside. We missed half the talk not because it wasn’t good but because we had more powerful things to do outside networking.

Pandemic-era Meetups

When the pandemic started, most of these groups switched to Zoom talks. And they couldn’t have been more different than the F2F talks.

The F2F talks were all about networking. And, oh yeah, I guess there’s a speaker.

When they moved to Zoom, nobody tried or wanted to network. Almost everyone turned their camera off and just listened to the speaker. Very little interaction. No drinks. No trade secrets. No handing them the amazingly clever origami self-promotion piece you made.

One VR conference I went to was sadly comical. It was a photography event and they had “Virtual Tables” sponsored by different camera companies. So Glenn was seated at the “Sony Table,” Jessie at the “Canon Table,” and Fransicso at the “Nikon Table.” The organizers went to the trouble to make these virtual tables with eight guests at each.

A really nice try. But no one would turn their cameras or microphones on. Our half-hour of table discussion before the next speaker amounted to near nothing. Contrast that with the amazing power of those F2F meetups!

Value for Your Career?

I’m not here to force you to do anything. If you can’t make it off campus and into the real world for whatever reasons, then cool, attend a VR event.

On the other hand, honestly, the two off-campus networking events I’m asking you to attend aren’t nearly enough. If you’re burning to make an art career happen, to let nothing stop you, you should be heading out to conferences, talks, openings, screenings, and more, every single week.

A great portfolio and no one to show it to is as useless as tons of contacts and nothing to show them. If you can spend half your time building a portfolio and half building a professional network that can help with the connections you need, I think that balance will take you the furthest.

Biden > Harris

When Joe Biden announced that he would not seek the Democratic party’s nomination for a second term, there was much discussion of how a new candidate would be chosen. People talked about six or more candidates appearing at dozens of town hall meetings and debates. About them all speaking at the convention and making their case to the four-and-a-half-thousand delegates.

That talk lasted for about one day. Because within 36 hours of Biden’s announcement, Kamala Harris had already secured enough delegates to give her the nomination. In the end, 4,563 delegates (99% of all delegates) voted for Harris.

How did Harris lock in 4,563 convention delegate votes in 36 hours?

• By making 100 phone calls.

Why did 100 powerful Democratic party leaders say “Yes” when Harris asked them for their vote and the votes of all the delegates they controlled?

• Because she wasn’t cold-calling 100 strangers. She was calling people she’d known for years. People she’d shared cocktails with at fundraisers. People she’d had dinner with at events across the country. People she’d traveled with on congressional delegations across the globe.

Kamala Harris, like successful people in every field, including art, has been building her professional network for years. Sometimes we wonder if politicians spend so much time networking, do they have any time left to make people’s lives better? Good question, but they definitely get the networking part.

As artists, we’re great at the substance part. But so many of us fall short on the equally important professional network building.

Generational Differences

Boomers and Gen X are more likely to make phone calls or meetup for lunch. Millennials and Gen Z are more likely to send a text or DM. All these communication tools are valuable and all of them should be a part of your career strategy.

You are a digital native, I wasn’t. If you weren’t already an introverted artist, the pandemic made all of us a little rusty in our interpersonal skills. Plus if you add up all the things you need to spend time on, it’s more than 24 hours a day! I get that it’s hard to get out there.

Social media can help. A lot! Still, I don’t see how to build an arts career without getting out into the world and meeting people.

Events List

If all else fails, you can visit an Art Gallery or Museum. But it’s far better to go to something focused on your career:

• Animator — go to Anime Expo!
• Make overlays for streamers — go to TwitchCon
• Graphic Designer — go to AdobeMax
• Illustrator — attend an SILA (Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles) event
• And so on.

Our Conference & Events Calendar has a list of events in Los Angeles. I’ll try to add many more. If you know of one, please add it as a comment on that page!

Student Volunteers

Many conferences have student pricing that is much lower.

Many conferences, including expensive ones, use Student Volunteers to help run the conference. This is a priceless opportunity! You work some hours and then get to attend the rest of the conference for free. Plus, working the conference you’ll meet other emerging artist peers who are great to network with as well as seasoned professionals that you might not have access to otherwise.

Student Volunteers typically have to apply early. Look for events in the next year that you might be interested in and apply now.

At The Event

You can listen to speakers, look at art, learn professional practices and do many other things at these events. But don’t let all the art & information distract you! Your mission is to meet people!

Business Cards

With other young artists you might exchange contact info phone-to-phone. But for older artists it can’t hurt to have cards to give them. Better yet, think about making a small creative piece that you can give them. An origami experience! A tiny zine of your work! Something memorable.

Connect, Connect, Connect

Other emerging artists like yourself are great contacts for collaboration and support. Older, more established artists might have great advice and career connections.

Pick 6!

If you’re an introvert like me, pushing yourself to talk to strangers can be challenging. Do your best not to fade into the wallpaper! Conferences, exhibits & events not only bring lots of artists together, but they put people in a sharing and connecting mindset. At these events you can talk to people that are otherwise hard to connect to.

Do your best to introduce yourself to at least 6 people at the event. Learn about them. Don’t be in a rush to show them your work. Instead, be a great listener and learn about them. Exchange contact info.

Blog Post & Canvas URL

Make a new Page or Blog Post on Your Portfolio Website. Write:

1. The Name of what you went to
2. The website URL for the event, conference, gallery, etc
3. The names of the people you talked to
4. Any comments about the experience
5. What you’d do differently at the next conference
6. Paste the URL for this page in the URL box on Canvas