Talk:Vanity gallery

Needs Work

This article already was deleted once, apparently without the proper procedures. user:DESiegel reinstated it on 6 May 2007. Since then someone has removed a list of ostensibly vanity galleries, due to lack of citation. I think some references can be found about whether the following actually are or are not vanity galleries: Also, there seems to be a LOT of back-and-forth editing of this article, with no discussion whatsoever (Can I really be the first?). This is apparently an important subject, or at least a touchy one. Can we please have explanations for the edits here? Artemis-Arethusa 17:58, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, I did an almost total rewrite during the AFD discussion. Concerns were expressed during the AFD that the article was original research, and I felt the best way of addressing these concerns was to write what I could from reliable sources. I therefore went ahead and found some, and reported on what they said, mostly removing anything they didn't say (the last sentence, which I considered to be important but left unsaid by the sources, was the only exception). The list of galleries was already gone by the time I did this, but I would have removed it had it still been there. JulesH 06:55, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Sensible. The list of galleries is a distraction and not helpful to understanding the issue, never mind the potential legal difficulties. And the last sentence is probably the most pertinent. Artemis-Arethusa 15:36, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Ironic

The Sylvia White article used as a reference on vanity galleries who charge artists to display their work is on artspan.com, a web site that, er, charges artists to display their work.[1] Ms White herself, uhm, charges artists for consultations and studio visits.[2] Perhaps there should be information on art web sites and art consultants on the same basis.

Tyrenius 18:30, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Art web sites and consultants can fall into the same definition of behaviour. Just as in the literary world, in the art world definitions and practices have blurred. What is the difference between a vanity gallery and a cooperative gallery, which also charges its members for shows? Are online galleries to be considered in the same category? Some part of the definition seems to be the "eye-roll" test: Does the presence of this gallery on an artist's resumé cause a knowledgeable person to roll their eyes; in other words, does association with this gallery actually reduce rather than enhance the artist's reputation. Artemis-Arethusa 15:36, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

NPOV

The article at the moment takes only negative aspects and is not written from a NPOV. Ms White does not actually condemn the practice: she gives advice on how to maximise the potential of such a gallery.

There is WEASEL wording: "Some consider...", "Many professional artists..."

Tyrenius 18:30, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I think part of the reason the article takes only negative aspects is that that reflects the vast majority of opinions of vanity galleries. If there is someone out there who had a positive experience with a vanity gallery, they sure are keeping quiet. It's a little like saying this article on bunco artists only emphasizes the negative aspects. That said, if anybody has anything good to say about vanity galleries, it should be mentioned. Artemis-Arethusa 18:00, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Please read my post again: "Ms White does not actually condemn the practice: she gives advice on how to maximise the potential of such a gallery", so such galleries clearly (according to her) have a potential and one which can, and should be, maximised by those artists using them. It is not all negative then. Tyrenius (talk) 12:28, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Sources

There are some books that discuss vanity galleries.[3] These may of course be vanity publications (I haven't checked). Tyrenius 18:30, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Vanity gallery (hire gallery)- Is usually a gallery rented by the artist to sell its own work directly to the public rather than be represented by a gallery. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.157.83.48 (talk) 21:07, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Just saying

in response to the last 2 sections, artist run galleries (and co-operatives mentioned above), including an increasing number of commercial galleries too (e.g. in New York, Japan, Sydney), charge the artist the rent for the duration, plus get a commission/cut, and get the artist to design and send out their own invitations. This can include the artist or artists manning their own opening and show time, installing and taking down the work, preparing the gallery space without being able to store works for future sales. Some offer a mailing list and increase the cut if they do any of these things for the artist. Yet there are such galleries that would be acceptable on an artist's cv but again the blur occurs between all of these. Sometimes the cv rates it because of the calibre of artist prepared to show there. It's blurring things for sure but a creeping thing just the same. 110.33.249.192 (talk) 11:23, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Just because more galleries are taking up predatory behavior doesn't make it any less predatory. The principle in artmaking is that money is supposed to flow towards the author (or in this case, the artist). Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 13:50, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

resource

many known vanity venues and their offshoots listed in this article: http://www.artbusiness.com/artist-pay-to-play-list.html

don't have time to add the info. anyone else wanna? Cramyourspam (talk) 02:39, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Aelita Andre

Cramyourspam, I would like to make 3 requests:

1. Please stop adding a single artist, Aelita Andre, as a related subject. The dispute on Talk:Aelita Andre from one year ago demonstrates that you have a clear editing agenda with respect to this subject. There are many artists who have shown in vanity galleries, and unless you're going to list every single one of them as a related subject (which indeed would not be practical), it isn't appropriate to repeatedly add this single artist about whom you feel strongly.
2. Please be less hostile in your edit summaries. I'm more than willing to talk about disagreements on the talk pages of these articles.
3. Please don't make threats, such as the one in this edit summary. I know the rules about 3RR as well as you do. At this point, you and I have both reverted one another exactly three times, which is why I won't be reverting you again today. I will, however, bring up all of your blatant POV edits related to Aelita Andre on the Dispute Resolution Noticeboard if you are unwilling to stop making these edits. Let me know what you decide.

Armadillopteryx^talk 02:39, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

user above: you forget to mention that you created the article Aelita Andre and you keep protesting the addition of that article to the vanity gallery 'see also' section. you created that article. your repeated removals don't pass the NPOV smell test. res ipsa. re threats/hostile: you keep undoing my content. we've been through it a couple times --perhaps three by now. certainly three by now if your past efforts are included. it sounds like an edit war and i've notified admin/s of this. that's not threatening. that is how WP works. you're in no position to accuse me of blatant POV re andre when you wrote that article yourself and have been a tireless advocate of the artist. your reverts are the POV here. prove to me exactly what my POV possibly could be or you can take it back. in the past with this article i surely have fought the ADVERT style of writing and have strongly suspected AUTO. i don't have the tools to prove it, but maybe admins will dig around. anyway, that's not POV. that's trying to keep the artist spam out of our encyclopedia. i am indeed unwilling to stop making such edits. i trust that the admins and the noticeboard process will be just. bring it on. the reason for including aelita andre is that her career is the most illustrative example of using a vanity gallery to create and perpetuate an art career --whether one thinks ill or thinks well of getting one that way. not mentioning her in a vanity gallery article is like not mentioning picasso in a cubism article. Cramyourspam (talk) 02:56, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I did create the Aelita Andre article, but that does not mean I support or oppose the artist. Do you think that every user who creates an article has a non-neutral point-of-view with respect to that article? I don't. If I created Mushroom, would that mean I am a POV editor with respect to mushrooms? Unless you think the answer is yes, calling me POV with respect to Andre doesn't make sense. Also, to set the record straight, I have never once "advocated" for Andre. Your edits, visible in the edit histories of these articles, show that you clearly dislike the artist and want to emphasize the fact that her show was in a vanity gallery in order to portray her in a negative light. On Talk:Aelita Andre, you attempted to prove she was not notable even though numerous reliable, third-party sources have reported on her. Your POV is clear: You don't like Andre and want to discredit her validity as an artist. The only edits I have made, including the creation of the article, have been made with the objective of maintaining a well-balanced article about the subject in this encyclopedia.

By the way, not mentioning Picasso in an article about cubism is ridiculous because Picasso is the artist who created cubism. Vanity galleries are not an art movement, and Aelita Andre did not create vanity galleries. That analogy doesn't make sense.

Anyway, I'm glad you notified some admins. This needs outside attention. Armadillopteryx^talk 03:08, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Mushrooms and Picasso are not BLP. the standard is different. thanks for the amusing rhetoric though. there's a possibly unique or at least very unusual situation with andre: her only "notability" comes from having gotten press coverage, her press coverage comes from having gotten a solo in a new york city gallery (therefore she "must" be great and notable), BUT she got that show because her parents/publicists bought it --agora gallery is a known vanity gallery. many news outlets have no art specialists and they reprinted press release material without question. i am a published art writer. i do know that agora is a pay-to-play venue and therefore the usual mystique that goes with getting a nyc solo rightfully does not apply to her case. thus i have fought against her inclusion in WP since her only "notability" is fraud-based. if someone bought billboard adverts of their cat in paris and then sent out press releases about how the billboards of paris were abuzz about the cat --and then some news service put out an article which was then put through the news aggregator echo chamber for a few cycles--- it does not change the essential fact that the cat in question is not really encyclopedia-worthy. to then point out that the cat is not encyclopedia-worthy is not POV. (though to have written an encyclopedia article and shoot down anything negative said about that cat --well it is a tad AUTO suspicious, isn't it?) it is not good to establish this method of acquiring buying "notability" Cramyourspam (talk) 03:34, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

WP:BASIC explains, "A person is presumed to be notable if he or she has been the subject of multiple published secondary sources which are reliable, intellectually independent of each other, and independent of the subject." Andre meets this criterion unarguably. Your concerns about Andre's legitimacy are already addressed in the article. Read the article's last section, which discusses critical reception of Andre. It says, "At least one [news source], The New York Times, acknowledged her widespread notoriety but commented that her paintings 'are hardly novel from a formal vantage, nor do they provide added meaning below the surface.'[11] It also noted that although her 2009 exhibition in Melbourne was not at a vanity gallery, the Agora Gallery's pay-for-show operation may undermine the legitimacy of her recent international fame."

What you don't like about Andre is a concern that I have as well, which is why the fact that the Agora is a vanity gallery is mentioned twice in appropriate sections of the article. However, we need to be careful not to assign undue weight to this fact precisely because the article is a BLP. I don't think your recent edits should be in the article because they place too much emphasis on something that is acknowledged and cited where it is appropriate. Do you understand that you and I agree on the fact that the vanity gallery is largely responsible for her being so heavily documented in the news? I don't dispute that, and I made sure to include it in the article as soon as a reliable source became available. What we see differently is what your edits do. By listing Vanity gallery as a related subject, you are placing a great deal of weight on a single detail of her career, which has included more shows and sales than the one that blew up in the press last year. I am trying to keep the article in accordance with WP:UNDUE, and that is all I am doing. You can accuse me of being "AUTO" all you want. But by your logic, I could just as well be a relative of Aelita Andre, a friend of Robert Frascino, a member of A Banda Mais Bonita da Cidade, or an acquaintance of Dorival Caymmi. I wrote all of those articles, too, and I hold them to the same standard to which I hold Aelita Andre. I must sure know a lot of famous people if doing so makes me "AUTO."

But, in all seriousness, I think the heart of this dispute is whether your edits are in accordance with WP:UNDUE. I think they aren't, and that's what I'm defending. Armadillopteryx^talk 04:10, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

"What you don't like about Andre is a concern that I have as well" that she got her fame only because of having been paid into a vanity gallery. okay then, why did you make the AUTO ("oops") article in the first place?Cramyourspam (talk) 04:55, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Why does anyone create any article? Out of interest for the topic. I don't have to like or dislike her to be interested her story. The press coverage, the NY show, her other shows, her sales, etc.—it's an unusual situation (as you yourself said), and when I searched for her on Wiki to learn more, I discovered there was no article here. So I found the information through other sources and compiled them into an article. I don't have to justify any of this to you, but I hope that telling you this can help us to avoid returning to this argument time and time again. You don't enjoy this bickering, do you? Armadillopteryx^talk 05:18, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

just really odd that someone supposedly does acknowledge that she's not encyclopedia-worthy and is only in the news because of having been bought a show at a vanity gallery --and goes ahead and creates (see) an article anyway. and stridently scrubs away anything possibly looking negative towards the subject --even though true. and claims to have no interest in the matter at all and to not be a COI / AUTO writer. okay. sure. Cramyourspam (talk) 06:12, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

You misread my text. I don't think she's not encyclopedia-worthy. I agree she was only in the news last year because of that show, but the fact that she was in the news most certainly does make her worthy of inclusion in this encyclopedia based on our inclusion criteria.

Also, how can you claim I scrub away anything negative about the subject when I wrote the passage in the article that I quoted above? In case you forgot, it says, "At least one [news source], The New York Times, acknowledged her widespread notoriety but commented that her paintings 'are hardly novel from a formal vantage, nor do they provide added meaning below the surface.'[11] It also noted that although her 2009 exhibition in Melbourne was not at a vanity gallery, the Agora Gallery's pay-for-show operation may undermine the legitimacy of her recent international fame." You cannot selectively ignore portions of the article to pretend they aren't there.

Finally, you have made four reverts to this page in just over four hours. You have violated 3RR. Which of the following would you like to do?

(a) Revert yourself

(b) Report yourself to WP:ANI/3RR

(c) Have me report you to WP:ANI/3RR

I don't really want (b) or (c) to happen because I can tell you're not genuinely trying to harm the encyclopedia, but if you aren't willing to relent with these edits, I don't know what else to do. It's your call. Armadillopteryx^talk 06:22, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Edit: I didn't realize you had already been reverted again while I was typing this. I guess you can ignore the last part for now. Armadillopteryx^talk 06:25, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

CYS: you are in violation of WP:3rr. I'm not going to bother to report you now, but the next time you make more than three reverts in 24 hours, I will. 3RR is a bright line rule, meaning that no matter how justified you believe your reverts are, when you break it, you will be blocked for 24 hours at a time. I don't know what it is that makes dislike this person this much, but your behavior both this year and last is not acceptable. I would suggest that you stop making Aelita-related edits, because you seem to have a problem appropriate engaging with material related to her for whatever reason. However, if you want to continue making edits about her, there are a few non-negotiable things that you must do. First: don't break 3rr. No matter how right you believe you are, breaking 3rr in the future will get you blocked. Second: don't edit war over BLP material. Obtain consensus on a talk page before you try to reinsert controversial or poorly sourced material relating ao a BLP. Don't reinsert material repeatedly if other editors raise concerns re: WP:UNDUE or other BLP issues, without obtaining consensus. If you feel Arma is (or for that matter, I am) blocking material from an article for non-encyclopedic reasons, then go raise the issue at a broader notice board, such as WP:BLPN - but don't edit war over it. Lastly: don't cast aspersions on the motives of other editors. Comment on content, not on the contributor. Regardless of how you feel about Arma or Aelita, it's significantly inappropriate to keep accusing him of having WP:AUTO/WP:COI issues for more than a year without presenting any evidence. I can't make you like Arma or like me, but you do have to respect the rules of the encyclopedia. Kevin Gorman (talk) 09:02, 11 May 2012 (UTC)