Hello! My name is Humberto Valle, I am a strategic marketer with expertise in Blue Ocean competitive strategy and have previously made a living selling my paintings through galleries, side walks and online. I'm also currently helping a gallery in Texas and Mexico run promotions for their shows which happen 3x per year.
What you want to do first is gather input from the community, you can do this through facebook groups, meetups, facebook page, local newspaper printed ad for group meeting, etc. This is basic but you need to start small and gauge the involvement and interest of the community in which you want to set up. In your case, this could be the city in which you want to show first, I recommend your home town for accessibility.
- get clout with local galleries, artists and museums by reposting their content online. Is useful if you are doing so through a page that provides them an idea of who you are and what you are trying to accomplish.
- approach them, many of them will have 'growth' exposure plans of their own - you can leverage these by offering your help and offer to provide more on their behalf with the resources you have available for your own efforts, prepare to have printed promotional material for those events and occasions if you are given the go to join them.
-take as many pictures as possible, as you promote your next event you will need images and videos to entice your next audience to your next show dates.
- share stories that belong to your displayed artwork, people go for stories, so give it to them.
- Recruit someone else to help you, wether is digital and you to in person, or an assistant to be doing the admin/paper work of it (there is typically a lot of it) find someone who can pick up where you lack strength or interest.
- Talk to artists, there is sometimes drama found locally and or the art scene might be too structured for new comers to easily promote - so find that out first so you don't step on any toes.
- plan ahead, each event should always have a minimum of 3 months to execute a promotional campaign, not including the planning and setting up prior to that. Plan your business model and your support/team accordingly.
These are some basic starting points that you need to master before you launch yourself and completely be overwhelmed by the effort and attention needed. I hope it helps, again my name is Humberto Valle. I am an expert strategic marketer and founder of Unthink Digital Marketing, which has now 2 offices and we help small business clients internationally. www.unthink.me