How to support LA artists without going broke

Every winter, a series of L.A. art fairs showcase trends from around the world. Much of that art is too expensive for most of the people who live in Southern California. However, there’s a thriving art ecosystem in Southern California for original art priced at $100 or less.

It was in evidence at a pop-up this month found in a walkway between two Venice buildings.

“Depending on the place I sell, I change the pricing at times. I have to think a lot about the prices,” said Aska Irie. She stood by a table full of her art, colorful paintings about the size of a vinyl LP cover.

“Generally, if you go to a gallery, a medium piece is like $5,000, and the average person can't afford that,” said Ichiro Irie, Aska Irie’s husband.

Aska Irie applies beads by hand to her works, some of which are on offer at El Canto General in Venice.

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Julie Leopo

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LAist

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“The price of $100 is the price of a dinner, so a person from the middle class can possibly buy the art at this price point and not sweat it as much. Little by little, you see the importance of owning or purchasing art and enjoying it outside of a gallery space,” Ichiro Irie said.

There are many marketplaces like this one in Southern California, part of L.A.'s large creative economy that constantly elevates early career and up-and-coming artists. Many of them start small, offering their work for under $100; that creates a good opportunity for someone who loves art but doesn't have a lot of money to support those artists and bring art into their homes.

Yes, there is affordable art

The Venice art pop-up was organized by El Canto General, a new gallery on trendy Abbot Kinney Blvd. The priciest work in the gallery’s current exhibit sells for $12,000. But there are some pieces for $100.

“Everything has a price point. Jean Michel Basquiat paintings are selling for over a hundred million dollars now,” said Martin Durazo, a mid-career artist showing in the exhibit. His $12,000 painting in the gallery is made with candle wax, gesso, and holographic paper. He has $100 pieces on sale too.

He tries "to make work accessible to maybe the new collector or newish collector, maybe somebody who's not familiar with my work. It's kind of like a little entryway,” he said.

This strategy is just one part of his successful, decades-long art career. Durazo has shown widely in galleries in L.A., Asia and Europe. His day job is as an art teacher at Lynwood High School.

Martin Durazo's "Untitled #1" is for sale for $100.

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The audience for the art affects the price point

Artists also show and sell their work on a regular basis in cultural centers.

“I'm thankful that I do have a community that likes to invest into my work, whether it be small or big paintings,” said Manuel Antonio Reyes, a painter who grew up in L.A. and studied art at L.A. City College but did not earn a degree. He works as a bartender to pay the bills as he pursues an art career.

Artist Manuel Antonio Reyes is working as a bartender while he pursues a career as an artist.

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A painting of the Watts Towers by Reyes.

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Courtesy Manuel Antonio Reyes

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He described his patrons as people around 30 years old like him, as well as artists, musicians, other creatives and people who work in bars and breweries.

Reyes’ art depicts a wide variety of images, some distinctly Latin American. He said he once sold a painting that included images of the comedian Cantinflas and the painter Frida Kahlo for $500, his priciest sale so far. He sells quite a bit of his work these days, watercolors mostly, for $60 to $80.

He most recently showed and sold his artwork at La Plaza de Cultura y Artes in downtown L.A.

“My long-term goal as an artist would, of course, be to dedicate myself as a full-time artist ... a possible reality for me in the future in the next 15 years,” he said.

Understand what lower prices are about

Zeal Harris is a mid-career artist who describes her work as Afrofuturist-folk-chic-griot storytelling. It’s important to her to price her work at about $100.

Most of the work she sells for that price are prints. She’s also made posters for that price as well as art she creates in preparation for a piece.

“My idea is to have something for a collector" at every socio-economic status, Harris said.

A painting by Zeal Harris, who says it's important to her that some of her work can sell for around $100.

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There’s a practice among some of the artists she knows, she said, to sell each other work for $100 or less. Layaway plans and bartering are common too, she said, all intentionally outside the high priced art gallery system.

Sometimes she’ll sell art she doesn’t feel too attached to for $100 or less.

“If you know artists, you have relationships with them, then that's one thing that can happen: you can see something and really love it and want it and you barter and trade and negotiate a price that is affordable,” Harris said.

That happened recently, she said, leaving the artist and the collector happy because the collector took home a work by Harris she loved and Harris was happy someone saw something special in an experimental piece she had created.

Many early career artists don’t make it to mid-career.

“It's so hard to live [in L.A.],” which leads many artists to stop creating, said Kim Chavez, the owner of El Canto General.

If creating art and selling it at a lower price allows you as an artist to work on your craft and pay the bills, she said, more power to you. But lower prices don’t always help.

“Pricing art too low can sometimes make buyers ... question the value of the artwork. But then pricing it too high also deters new buyers, so it puts artists in a difficult place,” she said.

She noted some artists worry that if they start with low prices, it may be difficult to raise them later.

Follow along on social media

Chavez and the pop-up's other curator, Claudia Huiza, posted on Instagram and Facebook and messaged people on their contact list.

"For all pop-ups and actually for any independent merchants and especially for artists and curators trying to support them, social media is absolutely essential," Huiza said via text.

Martin Durazo, pictured with his dog, Mango, can price one piece, "Looking for Love," at $12,000, while others are listed at more approachable price points.

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"Posting in all possible platforms and especially getting posts to become viral can absolutely make an artist blow up and become more successful," Huiza said. "Many artists I know have been 'discovered' via a post on IG or FB, and blue chip galleries have begun to show them."

Gallery owner Chavez said the social media effort may look minimal because she's running the gallery by herself, which means social media outreach falls on her shoulders.

"I hope to find an intern or hire someone in the future to dedicate themselves to the gallery’s social media because it’s a powerful way for artists and galleries to share artwork with a wider audience — especially for accessible, affordable artwork," she said.

She envisions El Canto General more as a cultural center than a gallery, and a place on L.A.’s Westside where people see art by creatives from the Eastside of the city. And to get people used to seeing the value of original art, whether it's priced in the two digits or in the five.

Julie Leopo contributed to this story.