Media Alert: Virtual News Conference

A ‘Black Friday for the Arts’ — Helping Artists Survive and Thrive in the Covid-19 Era

When: Wednesday, Nov. 18, 2 PM ET via Zoom video-conference

What:  Artists Sunday – a new nationwide arts shopping alliance — will host a virtual press conference to  highlight how consumers this holiday season can support artists amid the Covid-19 crisis.

Covid-19 has delivered a $13 billion hit to the arts and culture sector with an estimated 95 percent of in-person festivals, art fairs, and shows canceled due to the pandemic, according to Americans for the Arts.  Artists Sunday addresses these troubling trends by encouraging consumers to shop the arts while providing artists a high-profile platform and marketing and PR tools to promote and sell their work.

Learn how thousands of artists across the United States are joining together for the inaugural effort to make the Sunday after Thanksgiving the biggest shopping day of the year.

Who:

• Christopher Sherman, Artists Sunday founder, provides an overview of Artists Sunday – from the ah-ha moment that sparked his idea for a “Black Friday for the Arts” – to building Artists Sunday into a fast-growing nationwide movement of more than 2,000 artists and 300 arts, civic and economic development organizations dedicated to making Sunday, Nov. 29 the largest art-buying day of the year.
• Michael Seman, Assistant professor of arts management – Colorado State University’s LEAP Institute for the Arts, discusses his findings of his Brookings Institution study, Lost art: Measuring COVID-19’s devastating impact on America’s creative economy.
• Ariel Davis, artist, gallery manager Artspace 111, and Artists Sunday participant, shares her perspective from Ft. Worth, Texas, where innovative initiatives such as Artists Sunday are vital to the livelihood of artists as Covid-19 cases soar.
• Brian Rogers, Executive Director, Oregon Arts Commission, representing one of the more than 300 arts, civic and economic development organizations partnering with Artists Sunday.

• Melody Capote, executive director of the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute, highlights her organization’s tireless work supporting Harlem artists amid the pandemic — and how Artists Sunday offers a high-visibility platform for them to promote and sell their work.
• Keona Tranby, Director of Marketing and Communications at the American Crafts Council, discusses the unique challenges faced by craftspeople and artisans, many of whom have largely relied on the art festival and fair circuit to generate sales of their hand-crafted items

Contact: Christina Mancini

christina@turn-two.co/585.747.8464