Art? Who can afford to collect art? Isn’t collecting art for other people—people who have so much money they can’t think of how else to spend it?
Some art, sure. But there is a way in: fine art photography. And it turns out this is a particularly good time to buy a stunningly beautiful, emotionally riveting photograph to hang in your home, a photograph that lets you see the world through someone else’s eyes.
With AI threatening to replace human-created art and galleries closing at an alarming rate, photographers are facing something of an existential crisis—which means every purchase is more meaningful to them and there are plenty of bargains to be had. All of this makes now an ideal time to buy a signed, original photograph, and a new site lets you do it in a way that puts more money in the photographer’s pocket.
“I can’t remember a harder time to be a photographer—or a better time to buy a photo,” says Bill Shapiro, the former editor in chief of LIFE magazine, who recently launched the BluePhoto Collective, a mission-driven site whose purpose is to make shopping for a photograph easy while ensuring that photographers keep a much larger percentage of every purchase than they would through a gallery.
Still, starting a photography collection—or even buying one print—can be intimidating. Here are a few tips to demystify what should be a fun and rewarding process:
Buy what you love
This is rule number one, two, and three. The only knowledge you need going in is what makes you feel good when you look at it. Does it stir a particularly fond memory? Will it make you happy when you walk past it in the kitchen? Is it full of mystery that lures you momentarily out of the everyday routine? These are the questions to start with.
Landscapes from Ansel Adams, as well as work from emerging photographers, are available on BluePhoto.coSmith Collection/Gado – Getty Images
Set a budget
Photography is one of the more approachable art forms when it comes to affordability. “Especially if you look for work by unknown or emerging photographers,” Shapiro says, “a gorgeous print can be had in the lower hundreds of dollars. You could start at $150 or $400 or whatever you like, then explore within that range.”
Get inspired
Curl up with Instagram some afternoon and look around for pictures of what interests you—the outdoors, urban decay, fashion, flowers, animals, airplanes, whatever. Then check out some photo-enthusiast accounts like @parisphotofair, @Magnumphotos, and @burnmagazine (they showcase emerging talent), and click on other suggested accounts from there. Before you know it, you’ll have learned a lot and seen a ton, and you’ll start to feel “ready.”
Tom Werner – Getty Images
Visit a gallery
Physical galleries still very much exist, and not just in big cities. A walk through gives you the chance to see photos up close and in real life. Find a local gallery and wander in. If whatever is being exhibited that day doesn’t speak to you, ask what’s coming next—galleries rotate their shows every month or two—and if you describe what you like, the gallerist may show you what they have in the back. (They have a lot in the back.) If the gallerist is friendly and encouraging, go back. If not…never go back! “Watching the unsmiling gallerist size you up, flash a fake smile, then ignore you can be pretty intimidating,” says Shapiro. “Which is ridiculous because photography is the most democratic of art forms, one that everyone should be able to enjoy.”
Pick from curated photos
BluePhoto.co offers a highly curated selection of signed photographs at the widest possible range of prices—from $25 to the cost of a new Honda. There’s work by legends like Ansel Adams and Henri Cartier-Bresson, but the more exciting (and more affordable) photos come from incredible, still under-the-radar photographers that Shapiro has handpicked from all over the world.
For instance: Avani Rai shoots wildly colorful fashion images from the streets of India; Nigerian photographer Adeolu Osibodu creates mesmerizing, dreamlike images that linger in one’s memory; Canadian Dave Green’s work features lonely bar scenes that pair well with Tom Waits; Anne Skoogfors makes almost psychedelic scans of botanicals in her Philadelphia studio; Geraint Smith’s landscapes shimmer and glow with New Mexico light; portraitist Lora Webb Nichols ran the photo studio (and ice cream parlor!) in a tiny Wyoming town in the early 1900s; Sharon Smith’s Polaroids of the ’80s dance scene in New York City feature Bowie, Blondie, and Madonna.
Currently there are about 45 photographers on site, ready to be discovered by you and hung in your front hall. “We could add a hundred more tomorrow,” says Shapiro, “but the whole point is not to overwhelm shoppers with a million options. BluePhoto is the opposite of eBay: Only the good stuff.” Some of its customers are interior designers. Others, says Shapiro, “hadn’t planned on buying anything but were just moved by a picture they stumbled across. Those are the moments I love.”
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