Carnegie Art Festival 2020: A Virtual Art Experience 

Carnegie Art Festival 2020
A virtual art experience hosted by the Carnegie Art Center 

The Carnegie Art Center (CAC) is proud to announce its first online art festival! As we navigate the current world of unknowns and social distancing, the staff and Board at the CAC understand many artists and craftspeople who depend on summer art festivals will be in need of a place to show and sell their work. 

The Carnegie Art Festival will be a virtual art festival to support artists and showcase the amazing talents of our arts community!  We understand nothing will truly compare to the excitement of a real art festival, but we hope you consider this alternative to showcase your work and hopefully sell it as well. 

The Carnegie Art Festival will be a website where visitors can browse work created by hundreds of artists and craftspeople from the comfort of their own home. The website will be laid out as an online gallery where visitors can easily click on images and visit artists’ websites to purchase artwork. 

Deadline to submit to the virtual festival is May 30, 2020 at 5PM. 

The virtual festival will be on view to the public from July 1- August 1, 2020. 

Eligibility & Curation:  
This virtual event is open to all artists and craftspeople who create original artwork or crafts. All artistic media is eligible. All artists and craftspeople at any level in their career are welcome. This is a curated virtual event and while every application will be reviewed and considered, the CAC reserves the right to deny an applicant if you do not fit within these guidelines. You must sell items you create. We will not accept “buy & sell” commercial vendors. You will be asked to select the category you work in (painting, sculpture, wood, paper, etc). We will use this categorization to organize the website. Visitors of the website will be able to select the category they want to view, streamlining the browsing and purchasing process. 
If you are not accepted, we will refund your admission cost, but we will keep a processing fee of $5. 

Promotions/Marketing: 
The Carnegie Art Center will promote the online festival through a series of social media platforms including Facebook and Instagram on a daily basis. We will also send direct mailings out to our members (over 200 members), email promotions (3,000 contacts) and promote through community calendars, press releases and more. We also rely on the participating artists to help promote the event and encourage people to visit the website. We can provide a media kit for artists upon request. 
The Carnegie recently completed an online sale of 5x7" artworks where we quickly raised $1,000 thanks to the generousity of our community. We believe this virtual festival will be a one stop shop for art lovers to purchase original hand crafted items and an extraordinary opportunity for artists to stay connected with a worldwide community.

How to Participate as an Artist/Craftsperson: 

• Each artist will be asked to fill out a form (see “Register Now” below).

• Each artist will be asked to pay a one time fee of $30 to participate. 

• If you have a website for your artwork, we will link your website directly to the virtual festival page so visitors can easily browse and purchase work on your site. 

• If you do not have a website for your artwork, visitors of the virtual festival will contact you via email or phone (whichever you prefer) to inquire about your work. 

• After you register and pay, you will be directed to upload an image of your work. We will use this image on the virtual festival website. The image must be at least 2mb and at least 1200 pixels per side. The accepted image will be used as it is uploaded. We will not modify or enhance submitted images.

• We will also ask you to provide 1-3 sentences that describe your work which will be included with the image on the website.

Sales: 
Each artist will handle their own sales and delivery of work through their own websites or through direct communication with buyers. The CAC will not take any percentage of sales made by the artists. The only fee you pay is the initial $30 to participate which will support the creation of this website and the Carnegie Art Center as a whole, a 501c3 non-profit organization. We put every penny back into the programming we host at the Carnegie Art Center. (We appreciate your support!)

We are looking forward to showcasing your work in this virtual art experience!