The Artist’s Guide to: Creating a Portfolio for College
Hello! Welcome to the Artist’s Guide to: Creating a Portfolio for College! In this booklet, you will see how to pick and choose the art you will be using, how to document your work, what else to include (think: resume, etc), and how to put it all together! It also includes best and worst case scenarios to make sure that no matter what, you will have a praise-worthy portfolio. The best part is, if you are in a pinch, you can use this booklet to house your portfolio!
Let’s get started!
1. Organizing/Picking Your Work -choose 10 to 20 pieces -Group Your Work by subject rather than type
2. Documenting your work -Photographing -Editing the pictures -Printing your work
3. Putting It All Together -Find nice order -Tabs a)Fine Art b)Digital Work -What else to include a)Artists Statement b)Resume c)Biography d)digital portfolio cd
4. Additional Resources
Organizing/Picking Your Work Choose Pieces and Group Them
First, you will need to organize and choose your work. At this point, you should have some idea of what you would like to include in your portfolio. Now is the time to pinpoint exactly what you are including and to group it mostly by subject. You will need to choose 10 to 20 of your BEST pieces to include in your portfolio. These will be pieces that you think most showcase your talent as an artist. You will want to limit it to about 20 pieces or less, or your portfolio will be a little too large to digest easily. However, you want to include NO LESS than 10. You want to create a clean, clear look at who you are as an artist, and how you will create a good match for the school or company you are applying to. It takes a lot of planning, but can be done in a way that will not make your portfolio cluttered or too scarce. Try to create a somewhat versatile look while still keeping within your specific artists vision. If you have both graphic design and fine art that you want to showcase, they need to be organized separately, as they are too different to be seen on the same plane at once. They will also be separated in your finished portfolio. If your work follows a timeline or story, you should group your work in this way. For example, if you went from doing hard line work to getting more involved with watercolors, your work should follow this same storyline. You can briefly include this story within your artists statement (more detail on that later).
Documenting Your work Get Pictures of Your Work
The best way to do this is to have pictures professionally taken at a studio. However, if you do not have access to this or are on too much of a time constraint, it is quite fine to take the pictures yourself or to have a friend take them. If you have access to a nice camera that will take high resolution pictures, you can do this yourself. If not, see if you can borrow one from a friend! To take the pictures yourself, find a well-lit area outside (natural light is much better than artificial in the case of non-professional lighting). You will need to find a place where you can prop your work as close to upright as possible. It is best to use a tripod with your camera so that shots are steady. However, if you do not have a tripod, any sturdy surface will work (a box, milk crate, etc). Make sure to match the angle of your camera with the angle of the artwork, to minimize distortion of your artwork. If it is too bright outside, try placing the work somewhere with a little shade, as long as the shading is even and does not distort the coloring of the artwork.
Documenting Your Work Editing the Pictures
After taking pictures of your work, you may need to edit the pictures to be sure that the overall look of the photo looks like the artwork. For example, some of your reds may show up more pink in the photo than in the artwork, or maybe the artwork is not as bright as it appears in the photo. The closer in representation that the photo can be to the original artwork itself, the better. If you have access to photoshop, it will be the best option for editing your photos. However, in the worst case scenario, you can also edit with a free program called Picasa (downloadable from picasa.com). Edit the saturation and the color balance within your photo until you feel that it is as close as possible to the original artwork. Another easy edit that you will need to do is to crop the picture so that the only thing in the picture is the artwork. Go ahead and crop out all other unnecessary background that is showing. You can do this easily with the cropping tool in either photoshop or Picasa. Once edited, save these in a folder on your computer that is easily accessible, as you will need it again.
Documenting Your Work Printing Your Work
At this point, you will want to get your work printed out, so that it can be placed in your portfolio. If possible, get your work printed professionally. Google search printers in your area and go talk to them. A professional printer will have many more options by way of paper type and flexibility with what you want to do. However, if you are in a time pinch, your local Staples or other office supply store will do just fine. Just get your photos printed as full size on the paper you choose, in as high quality as possible so as not to appear pixelated. Try choosing a paper that is a little higher quality as well, such as a heavy bright white paper. The reason it is best to choose a higher quality paper is that it will help your images to look the best they can. Try not to print portfolio pieces on regular printer paper, as they will not look as nice. Once printed, cut small tabs out of paper that you will affix to the back of your image. This tab of paper should had listed on it the date the piece was created, as well as media used, and the name of the piece.
Putting It All Together Find a Nice Order Add Tabs For Each Section
Now that you have all of your pieces printed, it is time to put them into your portfolio. Try going through them again and finding exactly the order you want the images placed in your portfolio. Refer back to the beginning of the how-to if needed. However, don’t be worried if you place all of your images and decide you want to change the order. The beauty of a portfolio is that it can be added to and changed at any time, for any reason. After you have your order figured out, it would be a good idea to add tabs to the portfolio so that each section can be found more easily. You can pick up a set of cheap tabs at your local office supply store. You can put little pieces of paper inside of them or a sticker on the outside to label them. Just be sure that your handwriting is legible! Otherwise, it will defeat the purpose of having tabs. Label the tabs according to the sections of work coming up. For example, labels such as: linework, sculpture, surrealism, and digital work would all be appropriate tab labels.
Putting It All Together Other Things to Include (1)Artists Statement (2)Resume (if you have one) (3)Biography (4)Digital Portfolio CD
At this point, your portfolio should look pretty nice! It should be all put together and labeled with tabs. However, we aren’t completely finished yet. If you want to really “wow” the college you are applying to, there are a few other things you will want to add.
(1)Artists Statement This should be about a half page explanation of your background in art, what type of art you like to do, and what message you hope to portray with your art.
(2)Resume (if you have one) Your resume should include past work experience, if you have any that includes working in art or any skills you have acquired that are relevant to your college choice.
(3)Biography This should be a half page to a page about who you are, what experience you have with your art, and what experience you have with marketing or displaying your art. Included with this should be newspaper clippings or notecards from any exhibitions your art has been featured in. This is a good way to show that you are experienced.
(4)Digital Portfolio CD Go back to your pictures saved on your computer and save them to a blank CD. Once you have burned the CD, type up your name, contact details and “Portfolio” in a 9 point font. Print this out. Cut out your details and paste them to the CD. Get a very thin plastic CD case and paste this into the back of your physical portfolio. Place the CD inside. This gives a digital representation of your work for your reviewers to hold on to, without having to haul out the large portfolio.
Additional Resources Additional Clear Sheets More Information
When you have finished putting together your portfolio, you may find that you need additional materials. A great resource for additional clear protective sheets is Dick Blick: http://www.dickblick.com/items/16983-1005/ A great resource for more information on creating an Artist’s Statement or a Resume, with step-by-step instructions, is ehow.com. Do a quick search and many tutorials will come up with more information. Good Luck!