How to publish a good biography ?

© Christian Girault - DANCING BAREFOOT (AN IDEA OF PATTI SMITH) (2021)

People are communicating less and less with words and more and more with emojis and voice memos. Even so, clear prose is still a powerful tool for selling and branding in the art world and beyond. Over the years we've learned a few things about what collectors and art lovers look for in a bio and what makes a good bio and how, to sum up, an artist's work in 120 words.

Why should you write a bio?

A bio is often the first piece of information that readers and collectors have about an artist. As such, it gives you a chance to explain their work and gives collectors a reason to want to know more. Search engine optimization is also affected by bios (SEO). When showing search results, Google and other search engines give more weight to "sticky" written content, which means that readers stay on the page for a long time and keep looking around. Giving an interesting, well-written bio is a great way to make them easier to find.

These are the three most important parts of a good artist bio:

1. The bio should give an overview of the artist's work, including the medium(s), themes, techniques, and people who have inspired them.
2. The bio should start with a sentence that says as much as possible about what is most important about the artist and his or her work. Instead of starting with biographical details like where the artist went to school, grew up, etc., the first sentence should say what is most important about the artist and his or her work. For example, Elodie Martin is best known for his twisted sculptures made from scrap metal, broken, discarded auto parts, and other industrial waste.
3. Between 80 and 140 words should be in the profile. The perfect bio is about 120 words long, but a tight 80-word bio is better than a longer one with a lot of repetition and filler sentences.
   
   

Why only 120 words?

Engagement with the audience researchers at museums has found that after 150 words, visitors stop reading wall labels. For an artist, a biography is that you should leave the reader wanting more by keeping the number of words to around 120. A reader should take away at most one or two important points.

If you want to give a clearer overview of the biography, you might want to use a press release or a blog post instead.

What to think about when writing a biography?

Useful information

• What materials does the artist use?
• How does he or she dress?
• What work or works can you talk about to show how the qualities above are shown?

What is it about?

• What are some themes that the artist often uses in his or her work?
• What themes or ideas are at the heart of the works?

The history of art

• What's so important about this artist?
• What effect has this artist had on history? What kind of standard has he or she set for making art
• Which other artists have had an effect on the artist's work?
• How does this artist use a medium or media in a new way?
• Who does the artist work with or learn from?

Context

• In what kind of political or technological environment does the artist work? I.e., what events in history or politics might have had an effect on the work?

Popular culture

• What parts of popular culture or the arts does this artist use in his or her work?
• What else does this artist do in the arts or in popular culture? For example, making sets for plays, costumes, music videos, etc.

Quotes

• Can you answer any of the above questions with a short (1–2 sentence) but interesting quote from the artist?
  
  

Mistakes Made by Most Artist Biographies

Hyperbolic praise

It can be tempting to talk about how great the artist is. But we've noticed that readers don't like unproven claims about an artist's importance, like "Artist X is thought to be one of the most important artists of the post-war era" or "Artist Y is known for her beautiful work." Most people will see right through words that are made up, and they may even start to doubt the rest of your plan. The best way to get the most out of a good bio is to try to teach your reader, not to "hard-sell" them. Many studies have shown that hard selling doesn't work, especially with younger audiences, who respond best to simple, honest messages.

The long list of things that have been done

We suggest putting as little emphasis as possible on exhibition highlights and awards (readers who are interested can look at the artist's CV). Even if they are impressive, these long lists of things are boring to read in prose. They also take up valuable space that you could have used to talk about the real work of your artist

There are times when it makes sense to include a single prize or exhibition that stands out, like an artist's participation in the Venice Biennale. In this case, try to find a way to talk about the difference in a way that fits in with the rest of the text

Artistic lingo

Almost everyone dislikes academic jargon that doesn't belong and writing that pretends to be theoretical. Focus on new collectors who may not know anything about your artists instead of trying to impress other curators, academics, and galleries. People want to learn something from what you write, and the best way to do that is to use simple words. One idea per sentence is a good rule of thumb.

How to spell and use punctuation

Spelling and grammar mistakes are the fastest way to hurt the credibility of your writing. Some good things to do when writing are:

• Use a serif font, like Times New Roman, to make sure "smart" or "curly" quotes look right.
• Make sure the spell checker is on and that your language preferences are set to your language.
• Have at least one, if not two, other people read over your text.
• Don't forget to put exhibition titles (like "Blue ligne") in quotation marks and artwork titles in italics (e.g. White House, 1903)duplicating (or leaving out) the country of origin, birth year, and death year of an artist

In most art writing, the first time an artist is mentioned, the country they were born in, the year they were born, and the year they died are given. For example, Salvador Dalí was born in Spain in 1922 and died in 1988. But many online databases, store this information next to the artist's name in a field called "metadata". Look how your bio will look and leave out (or add) information as needed to make sure the formatting stays the same and to avoid too much clutter.

Let the bios expire

For young artists whose careers are changing quickly, make sure to check back every year or before a new show to figure out what the most important parts of their work are.