Galeria Azur Madrid
This gallery contacted me through Instagram. I don’t want to sound rude, but what first caught my eye was the low quality of the artwork they were displaying. That can be disputed of course.
It will cost the artist 1000€ to get 2 pieces on display in their physical group exhibition + 1 piece is there in the back room just in case (for what exactly??). The group exhibition lasts about a month.
Also you get up to 10 pictures of your artworks for their online exhibition (including the 3 you sent them to the physical exhibition). They put them up for sale on ARTSY and ARTSPER too for 12 months.
There’s 30% commission. The artists pays for the shipping to the exhibition and back.
There’s about 30 artists in every exhibition. 30 x 1000€ = 30 000€ per month. Kaching!
Gallery looks nice and everything sounds professional. What’s the problem then? They hardly sell anything as you can yourself check from Artsy. In the best month I counted they sold 3 pieces through Artsy, all from the same artist. If you have any credible evidence that they sell a lot more, please provide it here. When I asked about their sale figures, I got very vague answers.
At their opening it seemed there were mainly artists whose art was exhibited there that time (check reels on their Instagram account). Probably rest of the quests just came for the free wine, because they didn’t buy any art…
There’s also Galeria Azur Berlin, their fee is 1500€ for the same c*ap.
Vanity gallery 100%. No thanks.
36 comments
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Anonymous
Thanks for sharing your experience! I got an email from the Azur gallery in NYC this week, and it felt a bit fishy at first. Your story really helped me out, and I’m sure it’ll be super helpful for others too. Really appreciate it!
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Anonimo
I participated twice in Galeria Azur, in a group exhibition and in the Red Dot art fair. I have paid to exhibit and I have loved it. No gallery is representing me at the moment, and this is helping me to showcase my work, be seen by a wider audience, and I am hopeful to sell a piece soon. I understand that this never depends 100% on the gallery, and with the attention they are giving me, I am sure they are working well.
I’m glad you don’t need to pay to exhibit, but by criticizing galleries that provide opportunities to others (who also consider themselves artists), you’re not just criticizing the gallery, but also the artists, and I find that unnecessary.-
Anonymous
First of all tell us your name and where we can find social media channel so we can verify that you don’t work for Galeria Azur but are an artist.
Secondly please educate yourself on what vanity galleries actually are and why they never benefit artists in any way before you criticize us for pointing out the grievances.
You participated twice but didn’t sell anything. So your money was wasted, and now even more scammers are contacting you and trying to get their share of your money. In the end, you realize that you have displayed your art in several vanity galleries, but you haven’t sold a single piece of art, and you haven’t progressed anywhere in your career. Good luck.
P.S. Send me money too, since you seem to have extra.
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Anonymous
I smelled a scam when I saw the note from the “curator.” Thanks everyone for confirming my suspicions.
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Anonymous
I just received an email from them as well for Berlin with an opening in a month… I am so glad that I googled. Shocking to see that price for an “entrance fee”. This is disappointing but glad to know now that this is a thing. Thank you to everyone who has shared. I am a newish/emerging artist and clicked the links in the email — hopefully, I did not just get some virus or hacker situation!
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Anonymous
I also just received an email from them and was initially quite excited, bur am glad to have read everyone else`s experience. Thanks for the warnings…..its back to the drawing board again!
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Anonymous
I tried to ask other artists’ experiences with The Holy Art Gallery London/Athens on this site, but for some reason only the comments are published.
I couldn’t find the gallery owner’s name or their sales anywhere, and I didn’t even get this information when I asked. So I came to the conclusion that The Holy Art Gallery is also a Vanity Galleria and a pretty bad one. Worse than Galeria Azur, if it’s even possible.-
Anonymous
Ive came across the holy art gallery as well And couldnt believe how much they were charging artists to display their own work.
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Anonymous
I received an email from these people and chose to ignore as i generally see them as predatory and scamming. 1 week later i receive yet another asking if i had received their first and that they are so excited to have my work with them. LOL yeh right. – I simply respond with “Thanks for taking an interest in my work, as I receive a lot of requests for exhibits there is limited availability of work. I have a few guidelines for releasing work for exhibit which include – Gallery to cover shipment and insurance, maximum of 44% commision on agreed prices and so on.
They soon understand that it isn’t your first rodeo.Take no notice of these galleries, if you want representation do it the old fashion way – Folio in one hand, a bunch of confidence in the other and head into the galleries.
You will eventually find representation which should cost you nothing but a commission fee once your work sells.As for Azur and the likes, they should actually feel ashamed taking advantage of Artists, who already have it tough enough and are generally struggling to keep their practice going and make a living.
All the best my fellow artist 🙂
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Anonymous
Great information, thank you. I’ll send them similar answer to held further contacts away. Thanks again!
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Anonymous
Many thanks I just got contacted by them and I thought they were genuine until I saw you had to pay to exhibit, which is the sign it’s not a real gallery. Plus I thought they had way too many artists in their books.
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Anonymous
Galeria Azur currently has so many artists on Artsy.net that I lost the count at 600. Some of them only pay the online participation fee, which is a few hundred. However, the gallery makes a lot of money! But I couldn’t find any sold work on Artsy, although I only scrolled through about 30 pages.
Sold artwork in Artsy remains visible. They tell a lot about gallery’s sales figures. That’s apparently why The Holy Art Gallery doesn’t have online sales because it reveals too much.
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Anonymous
Hello to everyone. I will be there at the opening in Berlin. I am realy curious what’s going on with this gallery. I will tell you about my experience.
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Anonymous
Thank for this! I just received an email from them. I looked at the sample contract and that’s a lot of money to pay, especially for an overseas artist like me. And to be honest, I can’t afford such fee.
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Anonymous
Thanks for this review! I had the exact same experience with them, via email, recently. And, btw, the low quality of the work is very telling. This is a scheme to make money for them only preying on emerging artists and individuals with little to no experience in the art world. If you wish to pay this sort of money for exposure I’d recommend putting it into a well established art fair that showcases artists without representation (there’s many of them, just google art fair in the nearest big city to where you live). This would be a much more worthwhile experience in terms of exposure and return on investment than some tiny unknown gallery that seems to showcase just about anybody willing to pay.
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Anonymous
There are also Branches in Buenos Aires and in Bogota.
I gave them the finger after being pretty excited after the first 3 mails..
I have been in this line of work for 20 years, i dont need a shitdeal moneywise from peoples that never met me.
Fakeness all over. 🤮
I want my gallery holder to have a connection with me.
What I sell is not a product.
Its a piece of my soul.❤️
You are buying a piece of the life of Fr.. .-
Anonymous
Thank a lots! Is that trasparent?
See below:Hello …
can you send me more information if you want, but I assume it is an invitation for artists willing to pay to exhibit. Is that correct?
Best regardsHi ..
Thank you for your response.
I should inform you that this is a paid opportunity. If you change your mind or would like more details, feel free to reach out.
Kind regards,
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Anonymous
Thank you to everyone who has posted on here about this gallery. I have also been contacted by them via Instagram and immediately suspected they were a vanity gallery. But seeing all of these posts really is helpful. Be very wary peeps!
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Anonymous
I received same email from Galeria Azir Berlin. How depressing to find out it’s all a scam. They seemed legit and professional, so did Sophia the curator contacting me. So glad I decided to google.
So if a gallery is really interested you don’t have to pay for shipping and promos?
Vanity galleries are bad karma for them not the artist.
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Anonymous
Vanity galleries like this their keep expenses to a minimum because they know that the art they present will not sell. It’s because they choose beginners or young artists who haven’t gained experience and recognition yet.
If you research more closely what kind of artists have collaborated with them, you’ll probably see the reason why their art doesn’t sell. Have you really liked the art this gallery have on display? Would you buy art from the gallery yourself?Check also how many followers those artists have on Instagram and how much and what kind of collaboration they have done earlier. Some artists buy their resume. They end up only losing money.
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Anonymous
Hi I just received an email from the Berlin one too and I’ve asked for the paperwork. Now knowing it’s a scam it’s very disappointing because I thought I was getting somewhere.
Thank you for heads up!!!
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Anonymous
I’ve had many emails from these people, and it’s said that nowadays you have to research the galleries in order to see if they are legit.
The best way of finding gallery representation either local or Overseas, is by physically attending the galleries and showing your work to them. Of course contact them yourself and ask if they would be interested in exhibition your work. Many years ago, i started exactly this way, I was turned down so many times but i kept trying. Eventually I had a gallery accept my work and boom, within a couple of years i had several galleries showing my work.My experience over the years tell me that galleries which contact you directly and persistent are usually vanity galleries and it’s best to keep clear of those 100%.
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Anonymous
Yep – obvious. Just realized they have been emailing me the last couple of years. Goes to my junk folder.