Category: Interviews

Maartje Jaquet, you are a multitalented artist, creating Video art and Photos, Collages, Drawings and Paintings, writing poetry, doing In-house publications and you are a strong bass player. Next to that you make extensively use of digital media to report and write about your exhibitions and performances on FaceBook, Flickr, Twitter, a mailinglist and a WordPressblog.

Q1: How do you do that as a matter of balance between creating and reporting? 

A1: To be honest, ever since I started my WordPress blog I am hardly using that mailinglist anymore. And my use of Twitter is very minimal too.

The main digital social platforms I use are Flickr, Facebook and my WordPress blog, which is my website at the same time.

Flickr is a visual diary and a personal archive. It was the first platform I started using, that was back in 2007. I guess I need feedback of other people to enjoy my own work, otherwise making art, being in my studio on my own, feels too lonely to me.

So, to answer your question, when it comes to creating, the reporting part means a lot to me. Also, seeing other people’s work and interacting with other artists is a big inspiration, comparable, to the times at the Rietveld Academy.

Q2: Can you describe your use of Facebook? Is it, and if so, how would it be different from Flickr?

A2: Well, on Facebook I have more contacts who are actually friends in real life, or people that are part of my direct professional network. So facebook can be a little more personal on one hand, and more work related on the other hand.

I have a facebook page, ‘kunstjuf’, to report about my work as an art teacher, after a while it felt better to keep that part separate from my social life and my life as a maker of art.

On this facebook page I share the art projects I created and taught. Beside my friends and colleagues there are different followers of that page: they can be teachers in elementary schools or people that work with children with special needs or other art education professionals.

Sometimes I create facebook events. These are mostly for my exhibitions. It’s an easy way to promote an exhibition and then invite people to it with a mouse click.

Q3: Do you have a website?

A3: Yes I do: www.maartjejaquet.nl= www.maartjejaquet.wordpress.com(one and the same site). I use this website both to keep people up to date with exhibitions and other events. At the same time my website can be used as a reference to my work as an artist. It contains different sections that describe my collages, photography, video art, drawings, and so on as well as my work as an art teacher, my exhibitions and my resume.

Q4. Do you have an agent?

A4: No, I do everything by myself.

A5. Do you need to lobby?

A5: I tend to keep a low profile there. I don’t go to occasions like openings or conferences so much. Maybe I should, but I found that for me it works best to get to know people in real life, and there has to be a ‘click’ between us anyway for things to work out.

Q6. Where do your clients/buyers/people who hire you come from?

A6: Mostly through personal contact or via someone I already know. They can be (former) visitors of exhibitions. Or people I know in the art educational field or friends of these people. I didn’t get a job through my facebook page yet, but then again that page is quite fresh.

Q7 What is your reach?

A7: If you are talking about followers / contacts on social media. I have looked them up for you:

Today, my art teacher’s (‘kunstjuf’) facebook page has 332 likes, I have 1333 ‘friends’ on facebook and 932 followers on flickr. My work on flickr is viewed about 2500 times a day and has had more than 3 000 000 views since I started my flickr site in 2007. All these numbers don’t mean so much to me though. I don’t interact with all these people, and the interaction is the most important part for me. You can compare my answer here to what I said about lobbying.