I’m John Friel, cofounder of Art in Res (https://artinres.com). Art in Res is an online marketplace where painters sell their art directly to buyers, instead of needing to work with an art gallery.
I studied art and moved to New York in 2008 dreaming of making it as an artist. It wasn’t easy. I lived in a maybe-legal warehouse space that doubled as a poorly-ventilated art studio. My first day job was stocking shelves at Trader Joe’s, which covered my rent and groceries but, at New York prices, not much else.
My best friend in NYC had a side hustle making artist websites by hacking them out on top of WordPress. He was great at it. Through that side-hustle, he got approached to make an online store for a small business. Shopify wasn’t wasn’t widely known back then and he needed help. So he proposed to me: “Hey John, I know you have a nerdy side. Do you think you could learn to program and we could make the website together?” I told him “No way! That’s crazy! It would take me years to learn to program!” But he said “Look, there’s this new thing called Ruby on Rails. At least just Google that before you say ‘no’”. So I did a Rails tutorial and thought “Hmm, maybe I _could_ do this.” We accepted the gig and I’ve been a happy coder ever since. (We did _not_ ship the site on time.)
I’m all in on coding now, but most of my artist friends are still making art, and still working day jobs. Their studios are full of amazing paintings that barely anyone gets to see. And for every one of my friends there are a thousand other artists out there, cranking out amazing work and not selling it because they don’t have galleries selling it for them.
A couple years ago, my cofounder John (we’re both named John) told me that he had bought a painting from an artist he’d met. He couldn’t believe how great the paintings were, how cool the artist was, how the artists’ studio was this cool warehouse space that was overflowing with unsold paintings. He knew me as a programmer – but wasn’t I a painter before that? He had the idea that we could put our experiences together and make a website where people could buy art from all the amazing but not-famous artists around them.
We started Art in Res as a nights-and-weekends project. We found lots of people who liked the idea of buying art – but we also realized that most people who aren’t hardcore art collectors think that paying over $100 for a painting is hard to swallow. The thing is though, that paintings are made by hand, often painstakingly over long periods of time, and so they don’t benefit from the economics of scale that create the prices that modern consumers expect.
We resolve that by having our buyers purchase art on _installment plans_, where each payment results in a payment to the artist. In normal circumstances, revenue for artists tends to be spiky and unpredictable. Once an artist on Art in Res gets a couple installment plans going, they have a nice, predictable revenue stream. And a buyer who is purchasing this way gets to live with a unique, hand-made painting for ~$30-60 per month. It works really well for both parties.
We’re working on Art in Res full-time now and our team has grown to 5 people (all creatives in some capacity or another.) We’re John, Dan, Noni, Emily and me. We think art should be affordable and artists should get paid. There’s so much amazing art out there, collecting dust in studios. It deserves to find loving homes. <3
Thanks so much, and we can’t wait to hear your thoughts!
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PS - I’ve been lurking HN for close to a decade and this is thrilling for me!
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I want to love this idea, but I struggle to get past the lack of full price when browsing. It says "$48 • 24 months" and expects me to intuit that the product costs $1152.
Or rather, I worry that it expects me not to intuit that. Breaking the absolute price into a series of less frightening numbers to obscure the magnitude of a purchase feels slimy when cell phone carriers use it to trick people into buying new iPhones for "cheap". This seems like the same tactic. Especially since the payback periods vary between paintings, so you can't even compare apples to apples in terms of monthly dollar cost.
It's okay that paintings are expensive. It's less okay to undermine people's ability to reason about the cost of things.
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This is super helpful, thank you! The last thing we want to do is to deceive people.
There's a lot of information we want to convey in those little artwork thumbnails and we've been struggling with how to cram it all in. We thought that two prices in that small space would be confusing –– but I think you're right that it was a mistake and we need to find a way to work it in.
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This seems like kind of a nitpick when lots of expensive things (not just cell phone plans) are priced this way. Apartment leases, car leases, internet/cable service, and insurance all come to mind. Saas subscriptions also commonly frame pricing in per month/per user terms (even for annual plans) and leave it to the buyer to figure out the total cost that entails. As long as it's clear that the price is a monthly installment and not a total, which does seem to be the case for Art in Res, I don't see a problem.
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So given this idea does not seem different than the many before (and far from the 10x YC talks about when the needed improvement of a product to win a space), what am I missing?
Is there an underlying technology, unique community angle, or do you believe the timing wasnt before from the time of Artix to 2019 but 2020 is the year.
I love artists and design, and am shocked this has not happened yet, so Im rooting for you.
As someone with particular domain knowledge (I worked in the art world for years and have many professional artist and gallerist friends), I don't I've ever seen an online art sales platform that actually understand the purpose of an art gallery--for both collectors and artists.
Galleries are not simply point of sale vendors for art. They establish a scene, they contextualize the art and the artists, and they make strategic decisions in how to cultivate the careers of their stable of artists via a number of different tactics:
0) By organizing solo shows. It seems silly to say this, but actually putting on shows is a critical element that is missing from these online sales platforms. Shows allow the artist to present a body of work and establish a narrative around it via reviews and and social scenes.
1) Connecting the artist, through sales or even social means, with relevant collectors. Collectors have different status' in the art world, different connections to other art world players, and have particular themes to their collections. By placing art in the right collections, a gallerist can make a significant impact on the career of an artist.
2) By organizing group shows, or using their influence to get their artists into other's group shows, which will then associate their artists with a scene or an institution.
3) Funding! A lot of art is _expensive_ to make. I have friends who have literally calculated how much it costs them per square inch to make a painting and it can be shocking. It is not uncommon for a gallerist to front a large sum of money leading up to a solo show.
Not all galleries will do all--or even any--of these things. However, these are the actions that define a good gallery. A good gallery is invested in an artist, much like a good VC firm is invested in a startup.
If a startup wants to 'disrupt' the art world, I think the first step would be to figure out how you are going to make a business that cultivates an artist's career over the long term and which establishes a real art scene involving both artists and collectors.
As an aside, this view of how to establish a startup and 'disrupt' an industry isn't a very positive one. I hope artinres aren't aiming to take over the existing art market, but instead they want to grow the whole market and bring together new buyers who haven't bought from galleries with artists who want to sell their work.
Whenever a startup's pitch deck includes something like "The global market for this is $X billion, and we want to get 5% of that.", I always wonder why they want to fight the established competition who won't give up their business easily. Competing is hard. If you can find a way to grow the market by 5% instead you'll get the same result for much less effort (still a massive amount of effort though, obviously).
Also nothing here says that I represent a viable customer segment either so there's that.
Perhaps they make large scale installations that are difficult to sell, perhaps they are performance artists, or perhaps they are simply having a down period in the market.
A good gallery will leverage the sales of their more successful artists to support the production of work by their other artists
Any medium/cost data you can share?
I really appreciate it! And I appreciate the thoughtfulness of your questions.
One aspect is that we're not business people looking at this problem in a cold, analytic light: we care about the wellbeing of artists and the joy that people get from having art in their homes. I know from my experience as an artist that most artists are suspicious of new businesses – but we've found a way to work with artists where they really trust us. We do more for our artists than just provide a self-service tool for them to list commodities and get some sales – we coach them on selling; we help them build community with other artists; we're building new features to fit their workflows; and we'll even hop on the phone with them and let them vent to us about life as an artist, haha.
Artsy seems like a great platform, but we're mostly targeting a different type of buyer than they seem to be. We're also working with artists directly, rather than through their galleries. So, despite both being online art marketplaces, I think it's a bit of an apples-to-oranges comparison between us and them.
Regarding the rest of the startup graveyard, when we talk to our users on the buyer side of our marketplace, they haven't heard of things like Saatchi, or even Artsy, in many cases. So I think that, to a significant degree, the mental category of "place to buy art online" is still open, at least for people who aren't already experienced art collectors.
So I think in our case the answer is timing + obsessive attention to our users.
I've personally found the entire industry off putting at how much it's about prestige and how specific collectors see an artist or a piece.
But at the same time, I don't think normal people want to pay high prices for art. It just doesn't serve much value to them. If your users haven't heard of Saatchi or Artsy, what are they doing buying art and why do you think this is going to be a large market?
It seems like you'll end up with low priced artwork and artists who want to graduate to a "real gallery" when they get bigger, and so you really need volume to make to work. Respect the hustle from one YC founder to another but scratching my head on this one.
Im not sure your argument that your buyers have not heard of Saatchi is a good thing (you're right artsy is different market). This means its going to take more education and cost for discovery. They should say I looked online and found these four places but dont like them because of X. Then you address X.
Here's all I'll add; you should really think about what problem you are solving and why. Is it true that artists don't sell art because buyers can't find it? Or is it rather that buyers are very specific about why, and from who, they buy art when they buy it?
One of the most important things successful artists do is market themselves well, even the "best" artist won't sell art without an audience and a brand, period. Perhaps instead of creating a marketplace you can create tools to help artists market themselves and build that audience, GL to you and the team.
I won't comment on the art for sale, because I think it is too much in the eye of the beholder but I will give some feedback on your website and concept.
- Why fixed installments? Why not say "this piece costs 300$ buy now, or pay 10 installments of 35$ or 20x20$" (forget the numbers, just an example).
- why are there so few pictures of the work? If I buy a piece of art I want to look at it from all angles, get up close, see the structure, see it from far, see the frame etc.
- since you got excited from seeing artists' workspace, why not show them to us? Why not show those cool warehouses/storage containers/houses where the art is piled floor to ceiling?
- When I click on an artist's bio, the last thing I want to see is a full-bleed picture of his face. I want to see where he works, how he is inspired or how this piece was formed.
- out of curiosity: how did you come up with the 30/70 split between fees/artist's check? How do the artists respond? Have you had anyone say the fees are too high?
We're considering adding more options like that. The only reason we haven't so far is that we're weighing it against overwhelming people with too many options and also other features we want to implement.
> - why are there so few pictures of the work? If I buy a piece of art I want to look at it from all angles, get up close, see the structure, see it from far, see the frame etc.
I totally agree with you on this. This is actually one of the features we want to add before adding additional installment options.
> - since you got excited from seeing artists' workspace, why not show them to us? Why not show those cool warehouses/storage containers/houses where the art is piled floor to ceiling? > - When I click on an artist's bio, the last thing I want to see is a full-bleed picture of his face. I want to see where he works, how he is inspired or how this piece was formed.
Again, I couldn't agree more. For the time being, we've been getting our photos from the artists themselves and they tend to have better portraits of themselves than shots of them visible in their studios.
- out of curiosity: how did you come up with the 30/70 split between fees/artist's check? How do the artists respond? Have you had anyone say the fees are too high?
Traditional brick-and-mortar galleries take a 50% cut so we're taking significantly less than that. We also 'insure' the art ourselves: if someone stops paying and the artwork can't be reclaimed, we pay the artist their full cut anyway, even if it's a loss to us.
The difference is software on Google's store has infinite leverage and takes almost 0 to scale sales. Every piece of art takes lots of work and cannot scale in the same way. Art works do not scale like software.
With this cut, I feel your platform is taking advantage of artists (they do not know where to sell) rather than helping them.
Even auction commission is only between 12 & 25%.
A good gallery--emphasis on good--does a lot more then simply sell art to the highest bidder. They strategically place artists into 'important' collections, work with museum curators to bring the artists into a more critical narrative, get the artist into group shows and fairs internationally to contextualize the artist in a current scene or trend, collude with art critiques and magazines, and generally help to promote the artist's career over the long term.
All of this sounds somewhat silly outside the art world, but you have to remember that this is a very particular industry based around historicizing high-brow cultural production. When a good collector buys a painting, they are doing more then just buying a physical object they like. They are throwing their own clout behind the artist and saying "I think what this person is doing is important and I stand behind it."
All of this is done with the intention of increasing the profile of the artist which benefits--each in their own way--gallery, the artist, and the collector over the long term.
As far as the sales split between gallery and artist, standard split is roughly 50% with some variance around material expenses and whatnot.
Note, everything I am saying is the sort of ideal story and there are a lot of bad actors in the business. In reality I find the art world rather gross and the premises it is built upon to be deeply flawed.
Auctions take a small cut because they are resellers of art. The artist doesn't get paid when a work sells at auction, the previous owner does.
Art is usually sold by galleries, and the standard cut there is 50%. On top of that, artist and gallery often share discounts, so a work that is sold for a 20% discount means the artist will only see 40% of the total price. For artists, this will be a pleasant surprise rather than a steep expense.
While the customer facing portion of the website appears like a more traditional marketplace, our artist facing website contains tools for artists, and we do more than just list their art, we help them get better at selling, help them promote and market their art, and we provide support wherever needed.
We are artist centric first and foremost, and always heavily consider and consult our artists point of view.
I hear you that, when looked at in a certain light, it might seems high – but we work closely with our artists and they seem to all like that our incentives are aligned. Plus, we do our best to use that 30% in ways that benefit them, e.g. by guaranteeing that they get paid if someone absconds with their work without paying it all the way off.
This feels right. The site name seems to promise something it doesn't deliver: the process of production as education / entertainment. This could be a major differentiator vs bricks and mortar galleries. Lots of streams of the work in development.
We're so used to the paying-in-installments piece that we must have gotten blind to the fact that people seeing it for the first time would think it's the total price.
Same thing with the delta – it's always 1 / 24 of the final price (you pay the artwork off over two years), with a minimum monthly price of $30 (for the artist's sake.) Put differently,
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I feel like Etsy used to be a place where individual creators created things… and now it's mostly used by industry professionals with a specific vibe or aesthetic feel.
Is the thing that distinguishes Art in Res from something like Artsy that you're buying directly from the artist? How do you all plan to deal with, for example, galleries that might want to use or abuse this platform?
There are outliers, but it's not unusual to see art being churned out by factories, or shops full of stuff from AliExpress.
After looking at several paintings, I found it difficult to get excited about any of them. Not because I didn't like them, but the web site just doesn't give the art presence. I mainly looked at oils and acrylics, and I could not get any idea of the brushwork, the texture. I just could not connect with any of them across the intertubes.
So I love the idea, but to me it seems the challenge you face is how to present the art. Sorry I don't really have any great suggestions -- more views of each piece that allow for examining the technique? More careful lighting of the photos in a way the best complements the art? It is a big challenge and I don't have any great ideas.
But there is something about being there -- we have all seen Munch's "The Scream" or Van Gogh's "Starry Night" a zillion times on the internet, on mouse pads, in cartoon parodies -- but actually standing in front of those paintings is an experience from another world. I want to get as close to that experience as I can when I look at your artist's works.
I think you need to up the curation somehow -- maybe some comments from the artist about the piece, or some very close images of exciting details.
Very sincerely best of luck, I hope you succeed for your artists.
I agree with you on this! We're planning to roll out detail shots and installation shots soon, and I think those will go a long way to helping viewers get a sense for the IRL presence of certain works.
Also, while we don't have a concrete plan for it yet, it's clear that some artists need help photographing their work.
> Very sincerely best of luck, I hope you succeed for your artists.
Thank you!
I think this is a great idea! This is probably not a core competency in your platform, but I can imagine a lot of artists don’t have a resource to get decent photos taken ( not good camera, or understanding of composition, etc). Would there be some way to partner with local photographers to have them come out using your platform to either connect or maybe even pay for it? For example, $50 for the trip out and to set up if within 30 miles, and then $20 per piece to digitize it with multiple angles and staging?
Either way, good luck with the platform and I’ve passed it along to my wife, who is an artist.
Absolutely. Photography is it's own media, with it's own techniques to master. I doubt many painters are going to have the necessary lighting equipment and the know-how to use it. Not that they couldn't -- it's just not their media. Some assistance from a specialist would help a great deal.
I think if I were choosing something I liked, I’d want to just look at the pictures first (a gallery I suppose) without much distraction. On my screen there’s a load of search controls taking up a third of my screen (but maybe other people have a better idea of what they’re looking for).
It’s probably also worthwhile trying to make the images work with the wide gamut displays that are starting to become more common (mainly on various apple products) as they will magically just look a bit better/more colourful.
Vectorizing - I don't see anyway to share these creations with the world. Why not have a Pinterest share button? The looky-loos who will never buy anything can share these creations for you and generate free traffic for you. Put them to work. Also, encourage artists to put their store URL as their Instagram bio link.
Authority - You kind of have a Kickstarter problem. They launched with thoughtful projects to fund so half the two sided marketplace was done. What happens when you get a few customers who then want to become sellers? When Aunt Marie wants to put her crappy poodle paintings on your site? How do you let her down gracefully? If you don't, why would I as a customer stay on site and sift through garbage?
Elitism - You are disrupting the gallery system but you are also accidentally creating a gallery. How do you reconcile that contradiction? Galleries don't make their money on selling out stock from the current show (this sometimes happens), they make money from generating press, becoming authoritative, and the wealthy go to the back room, where the great stuff is. Sometimes the gallerist will say, no, a museum is considering buying this. Are you going to do that? Say no to make more money later?
Lastly, you couldn't have picked a better time to launch. I would have to imagine the gallery system is getting flattened right now.
> I hope you are psyched this post hit the first page
It didn't hit the front page organically; we place Launch HNs for YC startups on HN's front page. This is one of three formal things that HN does to give something back to YC in exchange for funding it. The other two are job ads and displaying YC founder names in orange to other YC founders.
I'm sorry this wasn't clear. More explanation here: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
I'd like to open this feature to non-YC-startups in some way. It's not clear yet how to do that. Also, it would be hard to scale: we do a lot of editing to help founders write about their startup in a way that we think the community will find interesting. That's time consuming and we don't have a lot of spare resources.
That said, if anyone is planning to make a post like that which you would like some feedback about, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and ask. Just please understand that we can't reply right away—the inbox is constantly piling up (and a bit higher each time it does).
https://imgur.com/605DZMN
That a login page is tacked onto this is a new twist though, I'll hand them that.
Were you a guest user or logged in when this happened?