Why I Quit Applying

September is here, my kids are about to go back to school, and I’m considering how to use my time until the end of June. 

Most advice to artists these days can be summed up as DO MORE: make more work, particpate more in career programs, apply for more opportunities, post more on Instagram, go to more openings…you get the idea. It’s a numbers game, and the more stuff you do, the better shot you have at getting opportunities.

I don’t disagree in principle, but bound as I am by the reality of nonstop adulting, I personally can’t do more of EVERYTHING. I have to choose. And of the things I could conceivably spend my limited time on, I’m for sure not doing more of the things I loathe (Instagram), and—because adulting—I can’t always do more of the activities I at least sometimes enjoy (openings). 

So about 18 months ago, I decided to focus on something I love: connecting with interesting human beings IN REAL LIFE. I put my energy into making art, inviting people for studio visits, meeting new people and community building. 

I made a radical choice: I stopped applying to RFQ’s. 

And guess what happened? Absolutely nothing.

You see, to date my public art projects have arrived through private art consultants and municipal invitationals, i.e. phone calls or emails that come out of the blue. I have completed exactly one project that came from the RFQ process, and I didn’t even win the project I applied for! The client liked my work so much, they commissioned me to create a sculpture in another location. My endless hours of applying have resulted in a whopping 0% success rate.

After many years renaming my jpegs, typing my address into yet another platform, parsing confusing calls and requirements, expanding my bio from 250 to 500 words, trimming it down to 150, and editing it again to less than 2,000 characters as they are counted on one particular website, I calculated whether this idiotic busywork was worth my time, and the answer was clearly NO.

I know other artists have great success throwing their hats in the RFQ ring, and I commend them! Maybe I’m doing something wrong, but I suspect that I may not be the only artist lacking an ROI for their time and energy. 

As much as I’d love to create a sculpture in an airport, or on the arts quad of a college campus, I have other needs that directly impact my daily happiness: to spend more time making art, and (much, much) less in front of the computer renaming my images from 01_MPearlman to Pearlman_Mia_1. Maybe I should hire someone, or use AI…but then I’d have spend time correcting all of their/its mistakes.

So what have I done instead? The newsletter you’re reading is one way I’ve expanded my interest in public art and the people who make and support it. Another is the PUBLIC ART PARTY, which will happen next on October 20th at the Van Alen Institute in Brooklyn. I hope you will join us!

It all started in April 2025, when I had a solo show in an untraditional location, the very swank gallery space of a very big New York architecture firm, FXCollaborative. I figured that their clients overlapped with my potential clients, so I mounted a show that included an installation about my public art work. Instead of an artist talk, I put together a PUBLIC ART PARTY to share the exhibition with people who might find it relevant. 

30 minutes in, people were already asking me when the next one would be—and now I have a new unpaid job for the rest of my life! Kidding aside, I love organizing the PAP, and the return on my investment is exactly what I want: new friends, learning about public art all over the world, inspiration, information, fascinating conversations, and helping to build a community I’m honored be a part of.

But did I get any projects without applying for RFQ’s, you ask?

Yes, and they partially grew out of connecting with other humans in person (I still had to win on the strength of my proposal). I regularly hear from possible clients out of the blue, and every once in a while, those conversations turn into real projects. Hurrah!

So, 18 months later, should I give RFQ’s another shot? Maybe I should wait until the kids are in school to decide!

Let me know what you think in the comments…

Mia Pearlman
http://miapearlman.com