Four Years and Far Further
Four years ago I started Phantasm as a hobby. It was meant to bury myself beneath language and visual art that I found resonate and telling of the Self I was discovering. Still it's that, but it's also become my selfish attempt at creating a "legacy," as icky as that is to say.
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I think every one of us is a little selfish admittedly, and we want to matter and amount to something that's created meaning. Lots of us make our legacies by having and raising children. That’s inherently meaningful. Others make creations, which too are like children in a sense. Phantasm is my creation, my maturing child, registered now as a legal business in the state of Washington. Not because I expect to make this a career, but because it's a sustainable method to help artists struggling to sustain themselves in this new media era. This is already longwinded so visit the website to read more on that.
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Speaking of the website: It's updated, and on July 20th I'll be launching an online store for it. There'll be shirts and stickers and art prints for sale, as well as memberships to the gallery. For $1 or $2 a month you can engage in some curating too, the craft I've come to love (another icky thing to say but it's alliterative so, fuck it). By joining as a member you'll also be supporting artists that the gallery features every month—all of that money goes directly to the subsidy we've created for paying them. Any donations that the gallery receives also go entirely to the subsidy, so if you don't want to buy any product but do want to be philanthropic, that's the way.
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And since I mentioned products again I'll note that the artists who we collaborate with receive royalties of 25% of each gross sales price (that's not icky, for the going rate of royalties is almost always less than half that as I understand it). That's my stream of consciousness on this fourth year reflection. Thanks for reading and supporting.
Tess Smith-Roberts
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