The concept of a personal brand has a bit of a bad reputation. And honestly, it’s kind of deserved.

When you’re fundraising, you’re trying to accomplish something. You might be trying to pay your theater’s rent for the upcoming year, cover pre-production costs on your documentary, or get enough money coming in regularly that you can count on paying your bills through recurring donations. These are all different kinds of goals that you can make for your fundraising campaigns.

Nobody becomes an artist because they secretly want to become their own accountant. However, once you’re in your creative practice it’s inevitable that you’ll have to deal with your own finances. As a creative, you need to manage your budget, create and sign contracts with studio spaces or freelancers, sock away funds into your savings, and then make it all legible to the IRS come tax season.

We’re closing out the year looking back at the information and advice we’ve given our community of artists and sharing our favorites. We know that artists need financial resources to make your work and getting those resources often means fundraising.

Looking back at the past year, we’re rounding up our favorite articles on a number of topics. Here are the best pieces of advice we’ve shared about marketing for artists; from getting into the mindset to market yourself to figuring out what kind of content you should be sharing on social media.

On this blog, we share a variety of tips and tools to help support artists in your creative practices, from managing the nuts and bolts of a creative life (what’s a contract, after all?) to building better economies for artists (we’re big fans of cooperatives). Here are some of our favorite tips and tool articles from 2021.

To create art, you need materials and tools. For the most DIY of us, we can find some of those materials and tools around our homes. But the rest of us will need to source tools, equipment, and materials to make our work.

Fiscal sponsorship is an important tool for artists, arts organizations, and creatives looking to fundraise to support your work.

At Fractured Atlas, we are dedicated to helping our community of artists and arts organizations get the resources you need in order to bring your vision to life. Often, this means fundraising.

Artists and arts organizations looking to start your next year off strong are probably considering an end-of-year fundraiser. End-of-year fundraising is a chance for you to connect with your current and previous donors, thank them for their support, and ask them to give one last time before the new year. For artists and arts organizations with either 501(c)(3) status or a fiscal sponsor, it’s also a time for your donors to make their final tax-deductible donations before the end of the year.