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Essential Strategies for Curating Your Own (Virtual) Gallery

It’s NFT NYC this week, which means more opportunities than ever to discover digital art and NFTs in real life (IRL).

Not going to NYC? Not to fear, we’ve consolidated a few different online gallery tools you could use to curate and dream up your very own art show to reach prospective collectors.

Before that however, let’s learn a little bit about how and why you should start thinking about putting your very own (virtual) gallery together.

Benefits of virtual galleries

While it is true that nothing beats the power of IRL connections, virtual galleries can still serve as an innovative solution to reach and grow new audiences. In fact, they also come with a few advantages of their own:

• Virtual galleries transcend physical distances. Not in a big arts city? No fear - through a virtual gallery, you can reach audiences and collectors from all corners of the world.

• Virtual galleries defy constraints of physical spaces. With virtual galleries, your creative vision has no bounds. No longer limited by room size or dimensions, you can quite literally assemble a gallery space of your wildest dreams and imaginations.

• Virtual galleries empower you to showcase your art on your terms. While artists used to have to rely on curators and gallerists to showcase their art IRL, you can now curate your own theme, tell your story, and showcase your art in a way or at a time that works best for you, e.g. whenever you have reached a personal milestone, or are launching a new collection.

That said, art viewing and appreciation in a digital setting is vastly different from the organic and analog experience we are used to.

Here are some tips for creating a meaningful and impactful experience for collectors, even when curating an online gallery.

Tips for curating your own gallery, virtual or not

#1: Create the right atmosphere

Unlike in the real world, you can fully customize the environment you wish to showcase your art in. Take advantage of this to think big: from floor to ceiling, play around with colors, textures, and shapes to create the dream setting for your art.

Before doing so however, think about the feeling you would like to invoke in your audience - are you going for something more intimate and cozy? Or are you looking for something grand and otherworldly? Always consider which works best for your art and the specific collection of works you are looking to display.

Further, because it is so easy to make changes in a virtual gallery, feel free to experiment with different architectural combinations until you get it just right.

#2: Write a curatorial statement

While it can be easy to drag and drop any and all artwork into your virtual space, take a moment to ask yourself what your exhibition is about. Even if not every visitor will read your curatorial statement, centering yourself on it will allow you to be selective and curate the right pieces of artwork to go into your gallery.

Here are some general guidelines for writing a curatorial statement:

• Keep it to around 200-300 words and 2-3 paragraphs.

• A basic structure could be as follows: (i) first paragraph to establish the premise and concept of the exhibit, (ii) a second paragraph to illustrate the range of artists or approaches, and (iii) a third paragraph suggesting wider significance of your theme.

• Try not to include too much jargon so that a more general audience can understand and appreciate your work.

Lastly, don’t forget to title your exhibit. Your title does not necessarily need to explain anything or everything, but should instead read more like a clue that is understood after the entire experience, rather than before.

#3: Make use of labels, or better yet, a brochure

Even though the art viewing experience is now online, we can still borrow from the best practices of museums. Labels which include additional information about the artist and/or artwork can further illustrate how a certain piece fits into the overall theme.

Better yet, create a brochure! Unlike labels, brochures can remain with the viewer even once the exhibit is over. Digital brochures are a natural fit for a virtual gallery, since you can include it directly into your exhibition for your audience to access easily as they look around.

All of this additional information serves as a way of enhancing the art appreciation experience.

#4: Build anticipation and excitement

With all the work that goes into curating your virtual gallery, it’s time that it gets the anticipation it deserves! Treat your gallery opening as you would a physical one. Set a date and time for the official opening, and drum up anticipation through teasers, artist interviews, and more.

Circulate digital invites for the people you would like to share this experience with, and make yourself available to answer questions so that you foster personal connections with lovers of your art.

List of virtual gallery tools to explore

Ready to start putting together your own virtual gallery? Here are some of our favorites that support direct NFT integration.

• OnCyber: OnCyber is an easy way for both artists and collectors to showcase their NFTs in 3D or Virtual Reality (VR), and to do so collaboratively. Some examples of spaces created include Justin Averasano’s Twin Flames and Takashi Murakami’s An Arrow Through History. OnCyber supports both Ethereum and Tezos.

• Spatial: Spatial is another platform that allows creators to build their own virtual space to display their artworks, as well as organize events. Additionally, you can sell NFTs directly through the platform or mint the actual spaces as NFTs to sell.

• Decentraland: Decentraland is a virtual world platform that accommodates many different types of metaverse applications, of which NFT galleries are just one of them. Fine art auction house Sotheby’s has a virtual gallery there that is a replica of their iconic New Bond Street gallery.

• Gallery: If you’re not looking for a 3D environment, Gallery is the cleanest way of displaying and organizing your art against a flat white background. This is a less immersive experience, but could be a good solution for showcasing your portfolio on a year-round basis.

Closing Thoughts

While there’s definitely something special about showcasing your work IRL, why not start by creating your own dream gallery by taking it online? Curating any gallery, including one of your own work, is also a good exercise in storytelling and connecting with your audience.

While today’s edition is about curating online galleries, we’ve decided to take things in person this week! Join us tomorrow for our IRL gallery opening from 4-7PM at Pier 17 in New York City, where we will be showcasing community-curated 35 artworks from 35 artists across 17 countries at our debut exhibition, Enter the Inclusiverse.

In the News

Industry News

• Gem, the NFT marketplace aggregator, is being relaunched as OpenSea Pro, which will offer zero fees, advanced order types, as well as greater liquidity and speed.

• Ralph Lauren has teamed up with Web3 community Poolsuite on a co-designed Ralph Lauren x Poolsuite NFT, which provides access to the brand’s new luxury design concept in Miami’s iconic Design District.

• A Photographer Who Found Instagram Fame for His Striking Portraits Has Confessed His Images Were Actually A.I.-Generated. Read more about why transparency will continue to be important with the rise of AI.

• Tezos NFT Summit takes place this week on Apr 12-13 bringing together a dynamic gathering of creatives, innovators, and enthusiasts at the intersection of artistic inspiration, community networking and developer innovation. Register to experience two days of fun and interactive talks, workshops, portfolio reviews as well as various activations by Tezos NFT projects and much more.

Tools and Resources

• Manifold has released an update to their Burn-Redeem app, which now allows creators to use any NFT as a burnable token for their artwork, and also change the burnable token for a given redemption at any time. Read more about the update here.

• Meta launches AI tool that can identify, separate items in pictures. While still in demo mode, the company says Segment Anything can already take a photo and individually identify the pixels comprising everything in the picture so that one or more items can be separated from the rest of the image. Learn more here.

• NFT tab is launching for the MetaMask Extension soon. Read more information here.

• Manifold is now offering creators an easy way to get started and launch Ordinals directly on Magic Eden Launchpad. Read more about the launch here!

Notable Creators

• Artists are taking over New York City! From HUG’s showcases at Pier 17 in Manhattan to Lion’s Milk Cafe in Brooklyn, several artists will also be displayed across Times Square and other parts of NYC for NFT NYC. Check out art collector Cozomo ‘de Medici’s curated collection as an example.

• Crypto artist Gremplin released a surprise burn and redeem event, where he dropped a new edition named “AN EYE FOR A FRY”, which required the burning of 1 NFT from the highly-speculated Nakamigos collection to mint the piece.

• An unreleased recording and never-before-heard version of “Let’s Dance” by the late David Bowie will be sold as a music NFT to benefit MusiCares, a charity that provides health and human services to the music community charity. Learn more here.

Artist Grants and Opportunities

• Ever wanted your work to grace the beautiful island shores of Bali? HUG is working with NFT Bali to curate 10 artists to be showcased at the Superlative Secret Society gallery in Bali, Indonesia. Check out the tweet below on how to submit your work for consideration.

• HUG is introducing a new Innovation Laboratory for artists in partnership with no-code creator tool HeyMint!

  Take part in a 2-week bootcamp where you get to collaborate with fellow artists on your next art drop, receive complimentary minting support, and get your work showcased at our NYC gallery. HUG, Meta Angels, and Curious Addys holders can get a discounted price of $89 (originally $179).

• Earn $250 by successfully referring a creator to other HUG Studios programs designed for various early stage Web3 businesses. Learn more here.

• Get featured in the Daily Ralpha, a Web3 newsletter with a daily circulation of 75K. All you have to do is apply for your own HUG artist profile, and submit your interest here.

• Applications are open for Meta Angels x Adobe’s artist-in-residence program, which gives you a $1,000 grant, access to Adobe Creative Cloud, mentorship, and more. May’s artist-in-residence will be shortlisted by April 15th. Learn more and apply here.

• Bethany Arts Community offers residencies to emerging and established artists for the development of both new works and works-in-progress. BAC welcomes artists working across any discipline and medium, including visual artists, sculptors, writers, playwrights, choreographers, musicians, composers, performance artists, filmmakers, and more to our Fall Multidisciplinary Residency. Any and all artistic mediums are encouraged to apply by April 26th.

• Post your best work to Creatively every week, let the community vote, and stand a chance to win a $5,000 cash grant each month.

This Week’s Art Drops

• Ring of Reflection by Lindsey Price (1/1, 1.7 ETH): An experimental digital collage with scanned imagery from vintage magazines, inspired by diving deep into windows of new dimensions and sourcing power from within.

• Whimsy by Kay Wren (1/1, Auction): Selected for showcase at NFT NYC, this is the second piece in Kay’s first collection on Ethereum, Chao, and explores the intersection of traidtional watercolor and digital art.

• Puppies are a Girl’s Best Friend by KEZIAI (1/1, 0.2 ETH): Part of Strange History World, this piece features 75 year old Marilyn Monroe raising money for dog charities with a tongue-in-cheek rendition of her classic "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" from the 1953 film "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”.

• Ocean Instinct by MeldaVNH (Limited Edition, 20/20, 0.015 ETH): Inspired by how we feel that we are dancing with the ocean when we stare into it.

• Luminance by Etkin (1/1, 0.05 ETH): Curated as part of the #sundayspotlight community initiative by Avril15, this is the second piece of Etkin’s Precision Dreams collection, and features a minimalistic style and soft lighting.

• Jenny by Niccolo Casas (1/1, 0.15 ETH): Curated as part of the #sundayspotlight community initiative by Avril15, Jenny melancholically hints at our aspiration to combine human and non-human life in a balanced and uncompromised way.

• VENOM by Clare Von Savage (1/1, 0.2 ETH): Digital tattoo art by multidisciplinary tattoo artist Clare Von Savage, as part of her Degen Tattoo Club collection.

• Caught by Current by Sarah Script (Limited Edition, DM for allowlist): Caught by Current illustrates Sarah’s experience with epilepsy as a child, specifically the feeling of being pulled into petit and grand mal seizures.

Creator Spotlight: Yolantis

Yolantis is a multi-disciplinary creator working with AI & fine art. Her background is in graphic design, traditional printmaking, and portraits, which brings a unique perspective to the world of NFTs and machine learning art.

Learn more about Yolantis in her HUG Artist Profile or follow her directly on Twitter, and don’t forget to check out her gallery on Spatial.

We asked Yolantis, why did you choose to put together a virtual gallery featuring your work?