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Designing a
good website seems to require an endless checklist of chores: organize
and select the materials, photograph the artwork, write a bio, an
artist statement and an updated resume. You need to decide how to
display the materials, what color scheme will look best with your
art, what fonts will compliment your work… and more! Don’t give
up!
I have compiled
20 important points that Artists should keep in mind when designing
their website. Keep these guidelines as checkpoints during your
site creation, or to check and improve an existing site.
1. Keep
it simple.
Don’t try and put every piece of information about your career or
display every single piece of artwork you ever created. Choose relevant
information that will keep the site simple and elegant. Try and
include materials that reinforce your site’s purpose (is it to sell
work? Attract new collectors? Or present a portfolio to galleries?).
2. Keep
your file size low.
People viewing your site don’t necessarily have a high speed connection
to the internet, so be aware that too many images or too many large
files can slow a site down significantly. Remember that a lot of
people will not wait for a site to download! Keep your jpgs at 72
dpi, and try not to have images over 540 pixels in any direction.
You can also try and minimize the number of large files (music and
video are typically very large) in any one page.
3. Keep
your navigation simple.
Do not try and have too many categories or too many layers in your
navigation system. Keep the placement of the navigation buttons
consistent: if you choose to have your links on the left side, keep
them there throughout the site and don’t scramble the order of your
buttons from page to page!
4. Have
your own domain name.
If your aim is to impress galleries and collectors, make sure they
know you take your art seriously: your own domain name looks more
professional, can be easier to remember, and can be more search-engine
friendly! Registering a domain has become quite affordable: typically
between $10 and $15 a year with hosting costs between $5 and $15
a month.
5. No "under
construction" page.
If you are not done building a page, don’t link it to your site.
People’s time is precious: don’t waste it by announcing a category…
then have that category be blank!
6. Prominent
contact info.
Your site is a marketing tool: you can get potential collectors
and galleries to discover your work. Make sure they know how to
reach you when they fall in love with your art!
7. Label
all artwork.
Images on the internet give no sense of scale or medium; it is therefore
extremely important to label each piece of artwork with dimensions
and materials used to make the work. Labeling your pieces with their
price can be valuable if your aim is to sell online.
8. Include
a brief Art statement and resume.
Keep in mind that text is difficult to read on the screen. As an
artist, you must include an art statement and resume (people want
to know about you), but keep both brief. A few paragraphs for an
art statement, and 1 to 2 typed pages for a resume. If you must
have a complete resume, give the viewer the option to print the
document as a pdf.
9. Keep
your text simple.
Sans serif fonts such as Arial are easier to read on the screen.
Don’t overuse bold and italics which make text harder to read and
can get confusing.
10. Avoid
underlined text.
Underlined text is usually reserved to indicate a link: avoid using
underlined text that is not a link to prevent confusion and frustration.
11. Keep
your color scheme subdued.
Don’t blind your viewers! Avoid a bright yellow background with
red text!!! Bright colors can be difficult to look at on a screen,
especially for text. Keep your color scheme with low saturation
colors
12. Avoid
background image.
Background images can slow the site down, and unless properly done,
will tile and look unprofessional. Background images also tend to
make text harder to read.
13. Avoid
background music.
Although it can be tempting to have music on a site, I have to recommend
against it for several reasons: your viewers might not share your
taste in music, music files are large and therefore slow to download,
and finally, even if your viewers like your music, it may get annoying
to hear the same song every visit.
14. No cutesy
mouse animation.
This one is fairly obvious: it will annoy a large majority of internet
users. Your goal is to make people like your site: don’t alienate
them with annoying gimmicks!
15. Don’t
disable back button.
Some sites try and keep their audience captive by disabling the
back button. It’s obnoxious! Don’t do it!
16. Refrain
from using frames and flash.
Both of these methods of coding tend to be unfriendly to search-engines,
so use them sparingly and embed them with good old fashioned html.
17. Make
sure your site is compatible in all browsers.
There are no enforceable rules for website coding, only general
accepted guidelines, so browsers tend to display the same code in
slightly different ways. Therefore it’s important to try and look
at your site on several different browsers and screens to ensure
that your site looks good for most users.
18. Check
that all your links work.
It’s not only annoying to the user, but you may also run the risk
of losing your site’s ranking with search engines, or worse, not
being indexed at all!
19. Open
all external links in new window.
It’s nice to give extra information to your viewers by providing
useful links, but make sure your own site stays on their screen
by opening all external links in a new browser window.
20. Keep
an honest relation with your gallery.
Galleries cannot prevent you from selling work on the internet.
However, you need to keep a good working relationship with your
gallery. Make sure you both understand who gets or doesn’t get a
commission through internet sales. For example, if your gallery
sells work on their site, or you sell work on your site that’s currently
in their space, they should get the commission.
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