"Hard-Edge, Erotic Pop meets Tank Girl"

The above description is how Hugh MacLeod describes the work of Hazel Dooney - one of the most successfully rebellious Australian artists who has defined commercial success on her own terms. Now once again Hugh puts up a great blog post (which isn't unusual for him). On numerous occasions I find that my ideas and his overlap - which I find very cool.

About a week ago he conducted an interview with Hazel, in which he asked 10 questions about her art and her work and the conversation that ensued was intriguing to say the least.

What I found fascinating about Hazel is how she has developed her own unique (and radically different) approach to how she markets her work and how she markets herself as an artist. With one of his earlier questions Hugh asks about her decision to bag and circumvent the traditional gallery route by selling her work to collectors online. Her response was this:

Four years ago, I decided to quit the two highly regarded galleries in Sydney and Melbourne that were then representing my work. We had a dispute over how they wanted to position me and (believe it or not) constrain my prices. I found some very smart people in technology and business who were prepared to help me figure out a way to manage myself – not just marketing and selling my work but creating an infrastructure to manage every aspect of the business of it, from identifying and communicating with individual collectors and producing my own shows to expanding my online presence and exploiting tools such as social networks and email to develop a wider interest in my work and me. Since then, the value of my work has increased to five, maybe ten, times what it was five years ago, and 15 times what it was a decade ago and my career has radically expanded – as has my collector base.

I love it! Convergence in Australia - business meets technology meets culture!

Furthermore what I really find interesting is the way in which she is blurring the lines between art, advertisement and entertainment media. She's definitely fearless and pushing the business of art into new realms.

To wrap up the interview Hugh asked her how she sees her work evolving in the future. She says that "it's a commitment to a different way of working, both personally and professionally. And it'll evolve with the ideas within the work. In the end, that's all it's about."

As I read the whole interview I kept going back in my mind to the Warhol-ism post I wrote a few months back where I posed the question: how do we marry the ideas of commercialism and culture (like Andy did so well in the 60's, 70's and 80's) and creatively interpret his process for the 21st century?  Well I believe Hazel is one very interesting  example of this. So now with her on the radar I'll continue to seek more intriguing offspring of today's culture and commerce.

Comments

[L. Ibrahim Moss]

Thanks. This is a constructive piece on so many different levels. The most apparent is that one's internal compass, as in the case of Ms. Dooney, not only becomes one's guide for their purpose, but also the means of achieving successes. Even if such means one goes against the judgment of those in "the know". A lesson that we all can embrace.

The blog's description of Ms. Dooney's paths to successes is significant because it correctly identifies some emerging tools, i.e., new technologies, that artists, entrepreneurs, and businesses may, "exploit" in order to reach financial successes in the world's now highly dynamic marketspace.