How to write my artist biography

by Jane Litchfield

As an artist, you may not be thrilled about writing about yourself, but you need an artist’s bio for your website, your portfolio, applications, shows, etc. So let’s make it simple, shall we?

Photo by Aaron Burden courtesy of Unsplashed

An artist’s bio is a short paragraph, written in prose, and in the third person. It tells more about the way your life has influenced your work than a CV, which is in point form. A bio is about you, the artist, as opposed to an “artist’s statement” which is more about the work and the themes behind it, and is written in first person.

In an ideal world, you would hire a professional writer to craft the perfect bio, but not everyone is ready to do that. (A great resource is PWAC, the Professional Writers Association of Canada, which has a Guelph chapter.) Here’s how to do it yourself, in five steps.

1) State the basics

The components of a bio are quite straight forward:

• Name and medium you work in; special techniques
• Key t

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  As part of the submission process for our monthly online art competitions, we ask artists to provide the galleri with a biography or an artist statement. For our Solo Art Series exhibitions, we ask for the competing artists to provide both with their entries.  In many cases, we see artists who get these two mixed-up or they are combined. 

  New and framträdande artists should understand that a well-written artist biography is a must when presenting themselves to 1. An art gallery. 2. An art competition. 3. To the press. 4. On your website.  5. Or to anyone who is interested in your art.

  In this post, we will compare an Artist Biography versus an Artist Statement.  The following categories or subjects will help an artist to write an artist's biography:

   

  Include the following upplysning in your artist biography:

   

  • Where you born and where did you live after that?
  • Where are you currently based?
  • What has been your artistic inspiration? Why?

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    An artist biography (or ‘artists biog’) is a paragraph or two about you and your career as a practitioner. It may also contain a line about the key themes to your practice.

    Biographies are often confused with other tools used for self-promotion. A biography differs from an artist’s CV in being only written in prose. An artist statement talks about the work and the thinking behind it. A biography talks about the person themselves.

    What to include in your artists’ biog

    The sort of key information in an artist’s biography might be:

    • Your name
    • The medium you work in
    • A line about the key themes, concerns of your practice.
    • Your showing history
    • Your art related education (degree level onwards)
    • Other interesting information relevant to your practice or career as an artist (e.g. collaborations or arts collectives, other areas or aspects to your career that inform your practice)
    • Where you live and work
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