The North Crow Barn

I captured this image on May 1st, 2020. And yes, there is still that much snow in the Mission Mountains in May. I added the image to my Etsy shop, www.lightintoart.com, in January, 2024. I also added it to my RedBubble shop, and to my Flickr gallery. It is not, yet, in my other two online galleries, FineArtAmerica or DeviantArt, but I’ll rectify that later today. Why should I add it on other sites? Simply this. It’s a stunning image, and I’m not the only one who thinks so. I want to give it as much exposure as I can.

My first real online sales gallery was RedBubble. I joined RedBubble in 2007 and made my first sale in 2009. To date I have added 1,863 images to the site and sold 746 products earning several thousand dollars from the sales. Two hundred sixteen other artists are following my work which has received over 3,100 favorite marks. The North Crow Barn image has sold twice to people in Montana. (August 27, 2024 as a sticker, and Jan 9, 2024 as a 24×16 print) RedBubble prints my work on a wide variety of products, including clothing, mouse pads, pet products, household goods as well as photographic prints, art prints, and posters. What RedBubble does not do is tell me who bought my work. Nor do they give me any way to get in touch with my customers.

In the last year, I sold two photo prints of Northwestern Montana’s Kootenai Falls, the waterfall that Leonardo DiCaprio went over in the movie The Revenant. The customer wrote me, using RedBubble’s internal mail system, to tell me that as a member of the Kootenai Tribe, he appreciated my work. The Kootenai People hold the Falls to be the center of the universe–a sacred place. My photos, he said, reminded him to pray. Unfortunately, since RedBubble keeps customer information to themselves, I had no way to respond. The image below shows the original North Crow Barn photo as displayed on RedBubble.

In the last year, I sold two photo prints of Northwestern Montana’s Kootenai Falls, the waterfall that Leonardo DiCaprio went over in the movie The Revenant. The customer wrote me, using RedBubble’s internal mail system, to tell me that as a member of the Kootenai Tribe, he appreciated my work. The Kootenai People hold the Falls to be the center of the universe–a sacred place. My photos, he said, reminded him to pray. Unfortunately, since RedBubble keeps customer information to themselves, I had no way to respond. The image below shows the original North Crow Barn photo as displayed on RedBubble.

I opened my DeviantArt gallery thirteen years ago and have added to date 565 images, which the site calls “Deviations.” Eighty-one other artists are watching my work, and have viewed my work over 21 thousand times. They give me stars, llama badges (reallly) and make very nice comments on my work, but I have yet to sell anything on the site. The North Crow Barn does not yet show up on the site.

Nor is it available through FineArtAmerica. I joined that site in 2017 and have 125 images there. Several of my RedBubble colleagues started moving away from the original site, so I joined them. The site isn’t terribly “user friendly,” in my opinion, but I pay my annual dues (something the other sites do not charge) and load new images on occasion. I have made a few sales, but nothing that will keep me in the style to which I wish to become accustomed. In other words, they’re not paying for the RV I want so I can continue to travel, camera in hand.

Which brings us back to Etsy. I have two Etsy shops. One specializes in ceramic mugs, mostly adorned with my photos of classic cars. The second shop focuses on photographic prints, like the North Crow Barn. Etsy expects artists to interact with their customers, so I have all the information needed to correspond with folk interested in my work.

In mid August, I received an email from a fellow in the Seattle area asking about the Dupuis Barn photo. That was the first time I had heard that name. Turns out the man had grown up spending time with family in the area, and he knew the barn well. He also wanted it to hang on his wall as a three-panel 40×90 inch print. Wonderful. That’s the largest print I sell, and I sell it at a good price. Trouble was that my regular offering is 3 40×30 prints. He wanted one similar to a triptych hanging in the lobby of the Ninepipes Resort in Lake County. Kevin remembered the hanging, but I didn’t. Sounds like a road trip was required.

Kevin and I drove over to St. Ignatius, and stopped at Ninepipes. We told the desk clerk that we needed the dimensions on the art work and she handed us a tape measure. We then drove north so I could get more shots of the barn and also some of other locations in the area. When I got home, I sent my prospective customer the news that I would be happy to resize the triptych so that he would have two outer panels that measured 20×40 and a central one 50×40. In retrospect, I think 25 – 40- 25 would have been better, but hindsight is always 20/20, right. In any event, I sent the revised measurements off to the company that does my printing and the customer got what he wanted. Proving again that the customer is always right.

In closing, let me say that should you want your own copy of the North Crow Barn, or anything else I have in my galleries, I am happy to work with you to get just the right size, shape and medium you wish. I can do that with Etsy, but not with the other sites, so if you find something you like in any of my galleries, let me know before you order it so I can make sure it’s available. I’m also haopy to sell my work to you directly. Just ask. And for the record, I sell images from 8×10 all the way up to 40×90 as seen here. My work is available as satin paper prints, stretched canvas prints, acrylic prints and brushed aluminum prints. The North Crow Barn print is available in my Etsy shop.