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Hi, I’m just wondering if anyone has any advice on pricing artwork? I hear many varying factors and opinions so I’m curious to know how other artists price their work. For example, I was told in school to price per square inch, with the amount depending on material, medium, etc. What’s your opinion on this? Thank you! 🙂
This is a very personal thing, to price art!
I am going to ramble a lot here, so please bear with me. I am going to chat about the pro side of things too– even if you are not looking into that, I hope that it can help someone that is!!So, pricing art…
It matters on a number of factors. Do you want to make a living off of it? Is it just a hobby? Does it matter to you how much it sells for (this goes hand in hand with it being a career) or do you just ‘want a sale’ (more of a hobbyist position where the income is not as important)?There are many variables. If you are doing this in a way to supplement your income, or for fun, or in a way that is not your sole source of income… you can use any method to figure out a price! A very simple method might be:
Cost of all materials used + amount of time invested (multiplied by the amount you want to make per hour on said artwork) +/- any modifiers* such as sentimental value to artist or popular market + Any modifiers for income tax (see below) = final price
* By this I mean if it’s a piece you are very attached to, it’s okay to ask for more. Popular market pretty much means how popular is your subject matter? How likely is it to sell? i.e. you might get more interested buyers for a painting of a wolf vs. a painting of an earthworm.
Pricing per square inch is something many painters do. I’ve never had that idea fly with me though… maybe people that can spend nearly equal amounts of time on different paintings can do this but I cannot! If I make two paintings in exactly the same size, but one takes 40 hours and the other takes 250 hours to paint… I don’t want to make the same amount on both of them! If this formula works for you, though, there is no reason not to use it!
If you are someone that is looking to make the majority of their income from artwork, you have to take other factors into consideration. If you are in the USA, and you make the majority of your income from selling your work or selling the service of your skills to others, you are a small business, even if your only employee is yourself! The government now gives you extra taxes, including self-employment tax and double social security tax. The costs of owning a business are not small, even if you are a simple business of one person trying to sell their art (trust me, hah!!). All of these things need to be taken into consideration when pricing art. How much income tax will you need to pay on it? What about things like retirement or health insurance? These are things that employers usually provide, but the self-employed must provide their own and it’s much much more expensive than when you get them through an employer. If you sell a painting, how much of that do you actually get to keep as profit?
These are all things to consider!!This formula is one derived more for freelance, but it can be easily modified into figuring how much to charge per hour if you want to do it that way:
http://www.allfreelancework.com/articlef1017rates.phpYou can see how hard it can be for an artist to truly make a living enough just to support themselves! The sad truth is that when you start it’s best to have a ‘normal’ hourly job of some sort to back you up.
Sounds like a ton of work? What if you just want to sell some art on the side? That’s great too!
But remember above how I said ‘any modifiers for income tax’? Well.. guess what!! Even if you are not working on art as a professional, and are working on art as a side while you work a normal job, you are still supposed to report the art as ‘other income’!
Here are the minimum numbers from 2009; if you make less than this on all of your income (hourly jobs, salaried jobs, freelance, selling stuff for profit of any sort [including art!]):Self-employed, any age: $400
Children and Teens classified as a dependent: $5,700
Single, under 65: $9,350
Single, over 65: $10,750
Married, filing jointly, both spouses under 65: $18,700
Married, filing jointly, one spouse over 65: $19,850
Married, filing jointly, both spouses over 65: $20,900
Married, filing separately, any age: $3,650Note that those that do art either on the side or as your ‘main’ income source — If you have sold over $400 worth of art in a year you must file for income tax! I know folks sell more than this in PYOs and PYO commissions and guess what– yes! Legally you must report it.
I’m not the IRS and I’m not going to tell you what to do, but it’s food for thought. Whatever you do, never get pegged with tax fraud. It’s scary!
Anyhow these are all things to think about when pricing as well. ‘How much is the IRS going to take?’ ‘Does my state have an income tax? How much will they take?’ And adjust prices as needed to make what you want to make (or need to make!).
One last nugget of advice I can suggest for anyone that is or ever wants to get serious about their work: don’t make the mistake myself and so many other newbies make when they start out! Do not underprice your work simply because you are ‘new’ or ‘don’t have a name yet’, etc.
Good luck and happy arting!
Volunteer mod- I'm here to help! Email me for the best response: nambroth at gmail.com
My art: featherdust.comAdditionally for anyone looking into the ‘business’ side of doing art for a living, this is a great read! http://haikujaguar.livejournal.com/804260.html
Volunteer mod- I'm here to help! Email me for the best response: nambroth at gmail.com
My art: featherdust.comGreat advise! Yeah getting into art as a “living” can be scary. According to the IRS I have yet to make a profit. I file my income tax every year jointly with my husband and my business has been a loss for the past 3 years. Yes I get a little back at the end of the year from my taxes (only nice thing) but I’m not really making any money. I do however right off everything I can, my art studio square footage, electricity, art supplies, even gas too and from art shows…..
now with that being said I price my art on:
Size not really square inches just I have a stander price for a 4″ X 6″ VS a 9″ X 12″
The media used including paper, paint, etc…
Frame and matte is there are one.
And time, I don’t try to look too much at the time, because they say as a free-lance artist you’ll never get paid what you’re truly worth. I added it all up one time and it came out to me making about $5 an hour, when minimum wage is $7 in TX that’s not good LOL 🙁 so I try to look at more the individual piece of art.
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