Jocelyn McAuley on wed 29 jun 05
Hello all,
I'm working with a gallery who is looking at changing to a nonprofit
status. I'm hoping Clayart can help me in my quest to educate myself on
this process...
What sort of impact would a change of this sort have on artists who
exhibit in this space?
thanks,
Jocelyn in bright and sunny Eugene
--
food: http://www.BrowniePointsBlog.com
art: http://www.LucentArts.com
Patricia Dailey on thu 30 jun 05
Hi,
I exhibit at a local non profit gallery. There are websites you can google looking up 501 c and
non profit for the technical issues. Overall its a great opportunity to exhibit for very low cost, and
there is a sense of freedom that you can experiment with new ideas and work, as the expenditures
are considerably less than what you would normally pay in a regular gallery.
Individual artists can also apply for grants under the non profit status, and exhibit at the non
profit gallery. If grant writing isn't a skill set that is found in the organization, you can usually hire
people to help with that. Our non profit has two galleries a museum gallery and an exhibiting
members gallery. There is usually a fair amount of work involved in terms of volunteering if the
non profit isn't able to acquire sufficient funding either from grants, or art work sold. Our gallery
also has a cooperative gallery in which artists jointly pay for rent, utilities,etc. Overall the funding
for the exhibiting spaces comes either from exhibition fees, (tax deductible to the artist)
donations, sales or grants.
Non profits are required to do charitable endeavors. For a gallery this may mean showing having
exhibits for children, unusual presentations, low cost to artist presentations, etc. Our mission
statement is to give low cost exhibition spaces to emerging artists, and other opportunities for
unusual art venues. For example, we had Tibetan monks do a sand mandala in our museum space
a few years ago. We've also had exhibits of art work of local children's pottery masks. Recently
we had a terrific exhibit of local artists who had hand drawn canvases of the history of working in
the region.
Usually artists man the gallery and this gives people an opportunity to meet the
artist in the buying process. Sometimes galleries hire someone to do all the organization and
basically run the non profit. This actually means that more money is needed to afford the person
who is hired. The cost/ benefit ratio is variable here. With small budgets, people end up doing a
lot of volunteer work, and that can be a time sink.
Some other cons include that the more members in the gallery, the more difficult that individual
style differences can become. This includes personality issues, as well a clashing art work. Our
exhibiting members gallery usually runs about 15- 22 members at a time, and that seems to be
about the limit for a cohesive presentation/ and comfort level for group process.
Hope this helps, feel free to email me off line.
Patricia
Jocelyn McAuley on thu 30 jun 05
Thanks for the responses.
Here's some further information about the situation...
Our gallery is already run by volunteers and fortunately we have a
lawyer and accountant who will be working with us.
I'm specifically asking about the impact this change will have on
artists who exhibit in the gallery as I'm trying to be a representative
of artists' needs in this process. If this change is going to bring
about more paperwork or bring about some sort of particular issues for
those exhibiting and selling work in the gallery I want to be able to
bring that up now.
Thanks to those who have takent he time to contact me!
Viva la Clayart!
Jocelyn, whose can't believe this is 4thof July weekend coming up!
Jocelyn McAuley wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I'm working with a gallery who is looking at changing to a nonprofit
> status. I'm hoping Clayart can help me in my quest to educate myself on
> this process...
>
> What sort of impact would a change of this sort have on artists who
> exhibit in this space?
>
--
food: http://www.BrowniePointsBlog.com
art: http://www.LucentArts.com
Kathi LeSueur on thu 30 jun 05
Jocelyn McAuley wrote:
> Thanks for the responses.
>
> Here's some further information about the situation...
> Our gallery is already run by volunteers and fortunately we have a
> lawyer and accountant who will be working with us.
>
> I'm specifically asking about the impact this change will have on
> artists who exhibit in the gallery as I'm trying to be a representative
> of artists' needs in this process. If this change is going to bring
> about more paperwork or bring about some sort of particular issues for
> those exhibiting and selling work in the gallery I want to be able to
> bring that up now.
I'm wondering what reason there is for becoming a non-profit. If it's
only to avoid taxes it's an expensive way to do it. Other than that, the
only problems I've ever had getting paid were wholesale sales to
non-profits. They have high turnover. Invoices get lost because the
volunteers have no stake in the economic viability of the gallery and,
therefore, tend to be careless. And, they seem to have the attitude that
if you want to get paid you are some how taking money from this "very
worthy enterprise and its programs". I know there are non-profit
galleries that are well run. One is in my hometown. But, personally, I
avoid selling to them.
Kathi
laffnbearclay on thu 30 jun 05
I believe the Foothills Art Center is a non-profit facility (if I =
remember correctly, I haven't been involved there since 1994 when we =
left Colorado.
It is a teaching facility which hosts many shows during the year, Rocky =
Mountain Water Color,
Colorado Clay, the Oscar of Clay shows.
I remember when they had an art exhibit, paintings etc. They have a =
huge, successful Christmas show/sale.
We could not sell the work for the artist, however, we could give the =
artists name and phone number. Can't ever figure out what IRS wants.
The Appalachian Arts Center (not to be confused with Vince's facility) =
used to be the Community Craft Co-op in Norris, Tennessee. It is also a =
teaching facility and one of the oldest craft facilities in Tennessee, =
teaching old time crafts. Quite a few years ago they had to make their =
co-op sales room a "not for profit" facility. People selling out of it =
have to work 4 hours a month, the shop gets 20% unless they changed it =
since I left in 1999. During my time as President of the Co-op I tried =
to find out what "not for profit" means, not even the IRS could explain, =
yet they were the ones that told us years and years ago that it had to =
be "not for profit", can't ever figure out what IRS wants, wonder if =
they can?
=20
What does the gallery in Smithville fall under Vince?
http://www.foothillsartcenter.org/kids_art.html
http://www.appalachianarts.net/
Karin Hurt
LHC, AZ
----- Original Message -----=20
From: Kathi LeSueur=20
To: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG=20
Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2005 11:22 AM
Subject: Re: nonprofit galleries and artists
Jocelyn McAuley wrote:
> Thanks for the responses.
>
> Here's some further information about the situation...
> Our gallery is already run by volunteers and fortunately we have a
> lawyer and accountant who will be working with us.
>
> I'm specifically asking about the impact this change will have on
> artists who exhibit in the gallery as I'm trying to be a =
representative
> of artists' needs in this process. If this change is going to bring
> about more paperwork or bring about some sort of particular issues =
for
> those exhibiting and selling work in the gallery I want to be able =
to
> bring that up now.
I'm wondering what reason there is for becoming a non-profit. If it's
only to avoid taxes it's an expensive way to do it. Other than that, =
the
only problems I've ever had getting paid were wholesale sales to
non-profits. They have high turnover. Invoices get lost because the
volunteers have no stake in the economic viability of the gallery and,
therefore, tend to be careless. And, they seem to have the attitude =
that
if you want to get paid you are some how taking money from this "very
worthy enterprise and its programs". I know there are non-profit
galleries that are well run. One is in my hometown. But, personally, I
avoid selling to them.
Kathi
=
_________________________________________________________________________=
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Send postings to clayart@lsv.ceramics.org
You may look at the archives for the list or change your subscription
settings from http://www.ceramics.org/clayart/
Moderator of the list is Mel Jacobson who may be reached at =
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Jennifer Boyer on fri 1 jul 05
Hi all,
As far as I know, a 501c-3 can not have primarily a sales mission. It
must mainly be a teaching organization with sales on the side to help
with expenses. I have known several nonprofits that went out of
business when they didn't keep up the fund raising side of things.
Their teaching facilities were not in the black and when they tried to
cover expenses by sales from the galleries they went under. That
formula is fraught with problems.... hopefully you will have someone
around who knows how to write a grant application...
Jennifer
On Jun 30, 2005, at 2:22 PM, Kathi LeSueur wrote:
> Jocelyn McAuley wrote:
>
>> Thanks for the responses.
>>
>> Here's some further information about the situation...
>> Our gallery is already run by volunteers and fortunately we have a
>> lawyer and accountant who will be working with us.
>>
>> I'm specifically asking about the impact this change will have on
>> artists who exhibit in the gallery as I'm trying to be a
>> representative
>> of artists' needs in this process. If this change is going to bring
>> about more paperwork or bring about some sort of particular issues for
>> those exhibiting and selling work in the gallery I want to be able to
>> bring that up now.
>
>
>
> I'm wondering what reason there is for becoming a non-profit. If it's
> only to avoid taxes it's an expensive way to do it. Other than that,
> the
> only problems I've ever had getting paid were wholesale sales to
> non-profits. They have high turnover. Invoices get lost because the
> volunteers have no stake in the economic viability of the gallery and,
************************
Jennifer Boyer
Thistle Hill Pottery
Montpelier, VT
http://thistlehillpottery.com
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