Whether you’re thinking about selling ready-made art or doing art commissions, figuring out how to sell art as a beginner can be an overwhelming situation. One of the questions is, and there are so many, where can you sell?
We have a list of 8 places you can sell your art as a beginner, including online and offline channels, more artistic and more commercial options, too, depending on what fits you the most.
- Online marketplaces
- POD sites
- Online art-specific marketplaces
- Social media
- Self-owned webshop
- Local shops and cafés
- Art markets
- Gallery and museum shops
1. Online marketplaces
As much as I want to advise you to buy a domain and open your own webshop (mostly to avoid platform risk), I know that many beginners are afraid to do that. (But I will advise you to do that too in point 5.)
Quite frankly, established e-commerce platforms do have their merits. A site like Etsy or Amazon Handmade is quite easy to navigate, provides a quick shop set-up, and exposes you to a big audience of potential buyers.
These marketplaces are also a great opportunity for you to taste the waters and to see what is popular. I don’t want you to aimlessly follow trends, but you can always utilise information from what you see there, and any help is appreciated when you’re a beginner, right?
By reviewing art listings on online marketplaces, you can find answers to questions like:
- What is the average price for different products and categories?
- How do other creators describe what they make on the product pages?
- Do they share links to their other channels and which ones?
- What kind of art pieces are popular at all?
For instance, the print-on-demand (POD) service, Gelato—more on these services in the next point—, identified that landscapes, animal paintings, city maps, local scenes, oil and acrylic paintings, and digital art are among the best-selling art subjects and styles. Etsy’s best-selling items currently include many digital art pieces, from colouring pages to art prints, and physical goods like necklaces, brooches, and ceramic mugs.
Take your lessons, set up your store, upload listings and wait for the sales to happen—correction: don’t just wait for the sales to happen. It might, but I suggest you build out at least one other form of communication to let people know where you sell your art.
It’s a mistake to assume that people just know what to do and where to go to buy something. Nope. It’s you. You have to tell them and show them. Multiple times before they would make even one purchase. Example: Don’t just put your Etsy shop link in your Instagram bio and almost never mention in your posts that whatever is on the image can be purchased at the link in your bio, in your Etsy shop. Most people rarely look at Instagram profiles and only encounter content in their feeds where they encounter your post, so plant the necessary information there.
Of course, there is a fine line between being effective at this and being pushy, but that is also where you can do some testing.
2. POD sites
Print-on-demand sites can be a good choice for you if you draw either on paper or digitally, and would like to sell your art as a professional print, and in some other formats, too.
POD sites are known to be the place where you can put your design on nearly every kind of object, from mugs to keychains, T-shirts, or shower curtains, allowing you to potentially earn more by tapping into these options than simply selling it as a digital download or an art print.
It’s as simple as that with POD platforms, truly: you upload your design, pick what objects you want to see it on, adjust them a little if needed for perfection, and through a couple of clicks, it’s up on the site for anyone to see and buy, whether that’s a phone case or a bath mat.
Of course, you can always do these things from the comfort of your home and by investing in the right tools, as we described in our article about the basics of printing and selling your art online, but POD sites undeniably do the heavy lifting for you when it comes to production and shipping. Naturally, you have to pay fees in exchange and there can be big differences between the platforms in this regard.
We have a quick list of POD alternatives (with free plans, too) which can be a good starting point.
3. Online art-specific marketplaces
Etsy, Amazon, and eBay are general-type online marketplaces with many product categories, but not art-specific platforms. If you’d rather look around the second category, try Fine Art America, Saatchi Art, or INPRNT.
Fine Art America and INPRNT are technically, also POD platforms, and both are well-respected artist communities. In general, art-specific marketplaces might be more valued from a certain perspective, showcasing your art to perhaps more-qualified buyers even, but their scope in terms of how big of an audience they can reach can be smaller compared to general marketplaces.
Some might say that beginners shouldn’t try art-specific marketplaces before they build a name for themselves, but I firmly believe that you can and should take any opportunity that calls to you. If you want to see if your art can stand for itself on sites like these and you have the option (Give it up for the digital age!), then do it.
As for INPRINT, it filters who gets to sell on the site via their community votes, so it’s not just a smooth ride of registering an account, but why not try your luck? Alternatively, if that’s more comforting, spend a bit more time building yourself as an artist and try INPRNT then.
On the other hand, on Saatchi Art, where you can even sell sculptures and mixed media art, it’s free to create an account, and instead of fees, they receive 60% of every artwork sold, plus handle shipping (although you pay for packaging).
With every site, you’ll find that you have to spend some money to start off, so again, I’d say that it’s best to look around, compare options and try the one that suits your beginner journey the most.
4. Social media
This sounds very vague, right? Sell on social media. I know! This topic on its own would fill dozens of articles, and then some, if we’d concentrate on each social media platform out there, but for now, I just want you to know that selling on social media is something that many creators take advantage of.
You can read our creator interviews and find that so many of them utilise at least one social channel for this purpose, and most of them don’t even use the specific platform features, like setting up a shop on Instagram.
They post about their art pieces, build awareness for their brand and small creative business, share regular shop updates (whether they use a marketplace like Etsy or their own webshop—more on that in the next point), and sometimes give a sneak peek into their processes and everyday life.
Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Twitter/X, or now Bluesky, are some of the most popular social media platforms among creators based on the type of content they can share. As you know, Instagram is mostly focused on images and videos, YouTube and TikTok are all about videos, and the relatively young Bluesky mostly resembles Twitter/X, but other content formats are slowly spreading there, too.
Look up and follow other creators on these platforms and see what they do. Try and have a feel of what it is that you could share about your art and in what way.
Most importantly, please, don’t rely on just one social media platform if you want to sell your art. It’s not that you have to be present on more than one social channel (that’s up to you and your resources), but that you should have at least one other non-social platform where you’ll be able to reach out to your followers and potential buyers, if anything happens, like if you lose access to your social profile or the entire platform gets shut down. Instead, for instance, the combination of your own website and an email list is a tried and tested method.
Read more about why I’m giving you this advice in our article about platform risk.
5. Self-owned webshop
To be honest, this would be my first suggestion if somebody came to me with the question, what do I need to do first to start selling my art. I’d say, buy a domain name, register on Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, or WooCommerce (WordPress’s ecommerce platform) and quickly set up your own webshop that will remain yours basically till the end of time (as opposed to being exposed to platform risk, like I mentioned before).
That is the strongest pro argument for having your own domain and webshop: it’s yours. Basically, nobody can take it from you and your chance to keep selling and communicating with your audience and potential buyers.
Yet, I put this lower on this list, because I know that many beginners are intimidated by the idea of this, thinking it’s a big step or that it’s too technical. I admit, it’s a tiny bit technical when it comes to linking your domain and webshop platform, but providers on both fronts are so good at guiding you through the necessary steps by now that you really shouldn’t be afraid to try. And when it comes to setting up the store, it’s just as easy as if on an online marketplace.
If you have your own webshop, there are nearly no limits to designing it and representing it in a way that presents you the best, your brand and products, what you stand for as an artist, what you want to communicate, and you may even add longer-form, informational blog posts to share your thoughts around your artists process or dedicate a few articles to positioning your products as the perfect gift for anyone and any holiday.
Since we’re talking about owning your webshop, I have to mention SEO or search engine optimization for a second. We have a “Beginner SEO for creators” course that will teach you how to generate more traffic to your webshop from Google, appearing in a good position in search and potentially earning you more sales as well. You can access the lessons on the site or via a 10-part email course by clicking on the link above.
6. Local shops and cafés
Many creators find their footing as an artist by selling their first pieces via local shops and cafés. You can find places in every town that are open to showcasing artists’ work, whether art prints, smaller sculptures, bigger paintings, and whatever they can house comfortably in their space.
Try contacting them either in person or digitally, and ask if they would be interested in putting your pieces out for visitors to see and potentially buy. The place might ask for a portion of the sales since they take part in selling it, others might just want to give you the opportunity and will let you take all of the money. The goal is to strike a deal that suits you both.
For this to work the best, make sure to have your contact information near the art pieces so people can find you outside the shop or café, too. They might want to buy something else from you in the future, plus, you never know who walks in there any minute: how about an art buyer who works for galleries? (We’ll get to galleries in a minute, too, by the way.)
One of the good things about showcasing your work in local shops and cafés is that you don’t need a big batch of art pieces right away, and so it’s a perfect way to start selling as a beginner. Some places also present works from several artists, one by each, and may tell you as well to bring in one thing, and then see how it goes from there.
Another good thing is that you can take photos and videos of your art being exhibited in these cool places and share them on social media, on your website, and any other channel you may have started using, giving you extra credentials. People will see that somebody trusted you as an artist and showcased what you created for the world to see and that kind of endorsement might just be the one to urge them to buy from you, too.
7. Art markets
Selling at an art market might be a bit more high-maintenance than the other options on the list, which is why I’m mentioning it near the end of it. First, you need enough pieces to exhibit on your stand, although it’s perfectly okay if you bring out everything you have, you’ll sell out and need to create more. That would be a very good problem to have. 😉
There’s also the process of finding the right art market, paying a fee to participate or getting a license, depending on the type of market and their requirements. We have all there is to know in our article about how to sell art locally—that should be your guide.
For now, I’d like to point out though that even if it looks complex, an art market can be a good choice once you have enough art pieces to showcase.
People who visit these markets are generally nice and very interested in art, obviously, and you can have a first-hand experience of browsing their minds, learning what they’re looking for, what is trending based on what you see purchased at other stands, and the best of all: you can get compliments for your art in no time. Even if you don’t sell much, the reassurance that there are people out there appreciating your art, is indeed a priceless feeling.
Art markets are also great for getting to know other artists. Establishing companionship with other beginners or more experienced artists can both benefit you so well in the long run. Creator communities are the source of inspiration, belonging, support and even incredibly useful information for artists and creatives of all kinds—don’t miss out on them!
8. Gallery and museum shops
There was a time when I wouldn’t have recommended the option of galleries for a beginner, until I learned about what I call a loop-hole of the situation from Dais, a UK naturalist and artist, when I interviewed her for The Creators’ Diary. She told me that she reached out to galleries quite early on, sending them pictures of their works and asking if it’s something they would be interested in selling in their gift shops as the work of a local artist.
Now, that is a smart move! Getting into galleries as a beginner, just like that! Sure, your painting won’t be hanging next to a Monet, but that would be truly impossible at the start, or ever, anyways, and I know that some artists don’t even want to walk that path—being part of an official exhibition. And whoever said that gallery and museum shops don’t count as selling your art in galleries and museums? Remember: Take your opportunities!
Whichever be the case for you, you can also contact galleries and ask them like Dais did. She currently has multiple pieces of her art and different formats available for sale in her local galleries and museum shops, from prints to postcards, and it works like a passive income for her. Sometimes it brings in a lot, especially in touristy seasons, sometimes it’s a laying-low type of situation, but the funnel to bring in some money for her is always there.
When reaching out to the galleries and museums, it’s nice if you have a social media profile, a webshop, or any other outlet you can link for the people making the decision, but don’t go and limit yourself before even trying. Don’t think you have to be a well-known up-and-coming artist to even have the “audicity” to contact these institutions. Many of them specifically like to champion local artists.
Learn from Dais who’s not a high-priced, traditionally famous artist either, yet she went and took her chance. Now, she has one more place where people can see her name and art which can bring in other opportunities for her in the future.
How to sell your first pieces of art?
There you have it, this is how you can sell your first pieces of art, via one of the above routes. Learn from experience, and perfect your own methods along the way. As with everything in life, you just have to take the first step here, too, and then… Well, keep going.
- If you need assistance, look up our Creative Business articles.
- If you need inspiration, read our Creator Interviews.
- If you need information, dive into our Creator courses.
- If you need to talk to someone, join our Creator Therapy.
And, I guess… Good luck and see you out there! 👋
Featured image by Chris Curry
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