Graduate Sophie Giblin of The Kollecktiv Gallery to give talk at Making Your Way In The Arts.
03 Jun 2014
Sophie Giblin graduated in 2013 and was announced 2014’s Most Outstanding Social Entrepreneur of the South East for creating Kollektiv; A gallery which transforms empty high street shops into spaces to exhibit local emerging artist’s work.
Before her Making Your Way In The Arts talk, about entrepreneurship training, crowd funding and filling empty shops, Sophie spoke to us to give us an insight into the Kollektiv Gallery, and starting your own arts business.
Can you explain the concept behind the Kollektiv Gallery?
Kollektiv Gallery is a place to learn and practice entrepreneurship. I take on local emerging artists and get them to fund a project themselves, respond to a brief and work collaboratively. The artists also have to find, rent and move into an empty high street shop and transform the space to exhibit work to sell their art, along side giving workshops to the public too.
What have been the main challenges in setting up the Kollektiv Gallery?
I started Kollektiv knowing almost nothing about funding. A pretty nerve racking problem because we definitely needed the money to open our first gallery. I decided to fund our first gallery through Kickstarter; it was the best thing I could have ever done. There’s no funding application, it was about making a video and getting all the artists involved to donate a piece of art for pledgers to buy.
Do you have any tips for young artists wanting to set up their own business?
Begin, take the first risk and get started; tonight, this afternoon, right now. The best thing you can do is make your idea physical and get started on a prototype as soon as you can. Also, tap into the University’s business advisors at Beepurple, they’re there to help organise and give you direction when you’re feeling a bit lost!
What are the main online tools artist need to master to help set up their own business?
You need a website along with the appropriate social media tools. Twitter is very powerful and if you want to come across professionally, get a friend to make you a good simple website.
What is the future for the Kollektiv Gallery?
Kollektiv will carry on opening pop-up galleries in empty spaces. I’m now planning to take the scheme on the road with me. In a few years, we'll be looking for a permanent space to operate from too.
You can see Sophie speak at the Starting out after Uni - The Kollektiv Gallery event for Making Your Way in the Arts. 10 June 12.30pm, Grand Parade
Tickets: Book your FREE TICKETS now via our online store.
MY-What?
Making Your Way in the Arts (MYWITA) is a series of professional practice events for the creative industries, hosted by the Faculty of Arts and University of Brighton Careers Service during the annual Graduate Degree Show exhibition. Previous MYWITA events have included portfolio workshops, sessions on applying for arts funding, advice on presenting yourself, and guides to selling your work. View this year's full programme here: arts.brighton.ac.uk/mywita
