When I started Athena’s Art Newsletter in the summer of 2022, it came about as a reaction to my frustration with being on social media as an artist. I wanted to be able to reach my audience, but I was also just so sick of all the algorithm games. I didn’t want to be told when I should post, whether that post should be a video instead of a still image or spend a ridiculous amount of time finding all the right hashtags.
I didn’t anticipate how much I would genuinely come to enjoy writing these posts and how they’ve become an important part of my creative process. I’m finding that whenever I discover something interesting in my research or in my painting practice, my brain immediately leaps ahead to how I want to share it with all of you through the newsletter.
I’ve also been incredibly gratified by the number of folks who have told me how much they are enjoying the newsletter and love seeing it arrive in their inbox.
Opening a new way to support
Once upon a time, artists relied heavily on their patrons who were, essentially, people who believed in the artist and what they were putting their time toward creating. This could take the form of purchasing the artist’s physical artwork or they might provide for the artist in other ways like food and lodging in their castle.
Sadly, we are beyond the days of artists rooming in castles, but technology now offers up new ways for you to support an artist if you so choose.
If you’d like to become a paid subscriber to Athena’s Art Newsletter, you can now do so for $5/month or $50/year (Canadian).
And for this you get:
Access to all posts older than 3 months in the Archive on Substack
The knowledge that your pledge of support has made my day and that you have my genuine gratitude—plus you can now call yourself a true patron of the arts!
Other opportunities may arise in future for me to provide additional benefits for paid subscribers but at this time, I am simply opening up this option for those who see the value in the work that I’m doing and want to support it.
What won’t change
If you are a free subscriber and want to remain a free subscriber, there will be zero disruption to your service. Seriously.
I believe very strongly in the topics that I am writing about in this space and I want to make sure that my writing remains as accessible as possible to as many folks as possible.
As a free subscriber, you will continue to receive every post I write in your inbox as soon as I publish it. The only difference is that those posts older than three months will be the ones slipping behind the paywall in the Archive area on the Substack website.
So, if there’s ever something that I’ve written that you really want to refer back to later, just don’t delete the email and it’s yours forever.
Thanks again for all your support
I may have started this all in a spasm of social media angst, but I truly believe that I have found my audience and I hope you’ll continue on this journey with me as an artist, writer and creative.
YES!!