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Why Perfecting Your Art First Is Stalling Your Career

If you’re waiting until your art is perfect before you let yourself think about the business side, you are not protecting your work. You’re stalling it. That single belief, that art business mindset has to come after the art is “done,” is one of the most common things quietly keeping talented painters stuck, and it’s exactly what Jodie unpacks in Episode 161 of the Honest Art® Podcast.

This one is personal. Jodie walks through her own 23 years of building a seven figure art career and admits she’s never separated the art from the business, not for a single day. As she puts it, that either/or thinking, get the art perfect first, then think about selling, is usually just a well dressed form of stalling. And underneath the stalling, there’s almost always fear.

The Painting That Was Technically Perfect and Sold For Nothing

Jodie tells the story of an artist who came into her studio with genuinely gorgeous technical skill, representational work so tight you could feel the hours in it. But something was missing. There was no story in it, no energy, because the artist had been so focused on getting every petal exactly right that her own voice never made it onto the canvas. Technical skill matters. It just doesn’t matter as much as the story you’re telling with your hand. If this hits close to home, Episode 16: How to Get Out of the Fugly Stage of Art goes deeper on trusting the messy, unfinished parts of a piece instead of over polishing them into flatness.

The Rebel Trifecta: Three Things You Can’t Separate

Jodie names three things that have to move together, not in sequence, if you actually want a sustainable art career:

• The art itself. The quality, the energy, the story that’s actually yours.
• The business. Simply put, the work of letting people see it and know you’re an artist.
• The mindset. The identity work underneath both, including the fear of looking like a rookie and the terror of charging what your work is worth.

Most artists aren’t missing all three. They’re quietly ignoring one. Jodie says the mindset piece is the one people skip most often, because it’s the hardest to see in yourself. If pricing fear is your version of this, Episode 31: Artist’s Money Mindset and Episode 145: How Your Mindset Impacts Art Pricing both dig into exactly that.

The 85% Rule: Done Is Better Than Perfect

This is the mindset hack Jodie leans on when she catches herself stalling: get the work out into the world at 85% instead of holding it hostage until it’s flawless. She shares the moment a design consultant walked into her studio, pointed at a piece still in what Jodie calls the “fugly stage,” and said, “I want that one.” The work doesn’t have to be finished in your eyes to be finished in someone else’s. If you’re not sure whether your own work is ready, Episode 113: From Hobby to Career is a good next listen on making that leap.

Cringeworthy Early Work Still Sold. Here’s Why.

Jodie is candid that most of her earliest paintings are, in her words, cringeworthy, flat, primitive, nothing close to technically polished. And they sold anyway, because they had energy and a story behind them. She’d tell people she was an artist long before she fully believed it herself, and she just kept putting the work in front of people. That’s the whole business side in a sentence: let the world see it. If imposter syndrome is the thing keeping your own work in the closet, Episode 87: How Imposter Syndrome Is Holding You Back as an Artist is built exactly for this moment.

Pick Up the Brush and the Pricing Sheet in the Same Week

Jodie’s closing challenge is simple. Stop waiting to get all your ducks in a row. You can work on your art and your business and your mindset in the same week, the same day even. That’s not chaos. That’s the plan. Studio Elite exists precisely because Jodie only teaches all three of these together, twice a year, in a small high touch cohort, and this episode makes the case for why that integration is the whole point.

Resources Mentioned

• The Artist Who Gets Paid, Jodie’s 3-part workshop (August 20, 25, and 27): https://www.jodiekingart.com/artistseries
• Studio Elite Mastermind applications: https://www.jodiekingart.com/studioelite
• Episode 16: How to Get Out of the Fugly Stage of Art: https://jodieking.com/episode-16-how-to-get-out-of-the-fugly-stage-of-art/
• Episode 31: Artist’s Money Mindset: What Do You Really Believe Is Possible?: https://jodieking.com/episode-31-artists-money-mindset-what-do-you-really-believe-is-possible/
• Episode 87: How Imposter Syndrome Is Holding You Back as an Artist: https://jodieking.com/episode-87-how-imposter-syndrome-is-holding-you-back-as-an-artist-what-to-do-about-it/
• Episode 113: From Hobby to Career: How Artists Go Pro: https://jodieking.com/episode-113-from-hobby-to-career-how-artists-go-pro/
• Episode 145: How Your Mindset Impacts Art Pricing: https://jodieking.com/episode-145-how-your-mindset-impacts-art-pricing-one-on-one-coaching-with-jennifer-cupp/

🎬 Watch on YouTube

• 🎬 New to Honest Art®? Start Here: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDRbtjrfQyOs
• 🎨 Painting Techniques: Best Of: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLW9oZj4G3KkA

Want More from Jodie?

Learn from Jodie:

🎨 Studio Elite Mastermind: jodiekingart.com/studioelite

🎨 Color Course for Rebels: jodiekingart.com/ccfr

🎨 Honest Art® Workshops: jodieking.com/workshop

Jodie’s favorite resources:

✍🏻Check out my free guide on how to hang and wire a painting: https://www.jodiekingart.com/how-to-hang-a-painting 

✍🏻Get my top 10 studio tools here: https://www.jodiekingart.com/10-studio-tools-opt-in 

✍🏻Learn 5 things they don’t teach you in art school: https://jodieking.com/work-with-me#free-rescources.0  

✍🏻See Jodie’s favorite things: https://www.amazon.com/shop/jodie_king_ 

🧘🏼‍♀️Guided Meditation for Creative Clarity: https://www.jodiekingart.com/guided-meditation

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This episode is for educational purposes and reflects Jodie King’s personal experience building her own art career. Results vary by artist. Nothing in this episode is a guarantee of income or sales.