Selling Face

Selling Face is an international exhibition of 44 artists from 21 countries, who were invited to reflect on their relationship with themselves and, specifically, their faces, through the lenses of self-presentation, capitalism, online persona and social media.

People buy from people they know, like, and trust! Right? How many times has everyone heard that you can’t sell anything nowadays unless you show yourself? Personal branding is important! Your audience needs to feel a connection to you. Tell us about your journey — there’d better be a struggle so your story forms a hero’s arc! Make a video about how you work. Show yourself. You have three seconds to get their attention. Do a little dance!

In the age of extreme transparency and borderline oversharing with strangers on the Internet, everyone is pressured to expose themselves online even if the goal isn’t attention to the person but to their work. The online face has to be carefully crafted with just the right proportions of sincerity and marketing hooks, look inspiring and be tailored to every platform where an artist displays themselves. While online self-presentation gives artists a chance to promote themselves and build an audience with little money or few connections, the pressure of constant exposure can be a lot. So how does it affect them and what do they do to cope?