How to Make Your Own Website and Post Art

April 25, 2022 Post a Comment

How to make a website for your creative work

If you're a artist living in the world today, people volition look to be able to notice some examples of your piece of work online. How you choose to put it there, though, is completely up to you.

I got started on the spider web in the early on aughts when I created a gallery for my creative work. I phone call it a gallery because it was just that: a bare space with images in a row that linked to some projects I wanted to share with friends. Since then my site has evolved, disappeared, come dorsum, and spawned other sites that express my ideas and identity online. Each evolution was a take chances to share new work in a style that reflected how I wanted people to experience it.

I work on the web everyday. I aid designers, artists, and galleries observe and create their online presence. And for vii years, I designed and led teams at Etsy, a platform that helps millions of creative humans effectually the globe use the web to make an income from their arts and crafts. In all of my piece of work, I've learned that every person brings their ain body of knowledge and point of view when they create their own infinite online. The unique approaches that each individual brings to the feel are what make the internet an interesting place to explore.

Before digging into this guide, I recommend reading Laurel Schwulst's essay, My website is a shifting business firm next to a river of knowledge. What could yours be? Information technology's a great sister piece to this more practical guide, and provides many poetic explorations of the website format. Similar Laurel mentions in her essay, "Artists excel at creating worlds." I hope this guide will assist y'all start creating yours.

— Jason Huff

Get-go with "why"

Consider your finish goal

Begin planning your online presence with an end goal in mind, i.e. what you hope to accomplish by putting your work online. This goal tin can be as simple as, "share my best pieces of writing with friends and acquaintances," or, "make the internet a bit weirder and more than wonderful by documenting my artistic process daily." It can also exist more ambitious and specific—"I'd like to sell enough ceramics to be able to hire a studio banana," or, "I'd similar to show off my all-time curatorial work to aid me win more grants and residencies than I did last year."

Goals tin can experience intimidating, specially when they're applied to a creative practise. Equally you start considering the end goal for putting your piece of work online, you might observe yourself asking, "Won't having a goal simply make me feel constrained, or cause my site to end upwards feeling contrived?" The answer is no. Simply like with designing something or making a work of fine art, using a constraint tin assist you be more focused and inventive. It will also ensure you plan your site in a way that'due south attainable, sustainable, and helpful to your practice.

Getting started: it ain't that difficult

Starting can exist hard. Trust me, I know from years of experience. And then I'm going to offer you lot a vi-footstep mini-guide for getting what might feel similar a daunting task off the ground. To complete this short process you lot'll demand a blank sheet of paper, something to write with, a timer (you can create i by searching google), your intuition, the ability to temporarily avert critiquing yourself, and nigh 30 minutes.

Mini-guide to create a goal for your artistic web presence:

Take a deep breath. Chill out.
Set a timer for 15 minutes. Then, costless-write some ideal outcomes (aka potential goals) y'all have for sharing your work online. Hold off on judging these outcomes—but write what pops into your mind. Try to write down five to 10 ideas. The more than specific you lot tin be, the better. If you experience stuck on ane, simply motion on to the next.
Once yous've completed your list, use a 1-minute timer to review and circle the two outcomes/goals that resonate well-nigh deeply on a gut level. This is your moment to tune into your inner guide.
Spend five minutes expanding each of your circled goal ideas. You lot tin can exercise this by writing a long and more specific clarification that gives the goal more color. This should accept well-nigh 10 minutes in total. You can employ the SMART goals framework if you lot're similar me and find frameworks helpful. This will ensure your two draft goals are southpecific, 1000easurable, attainable, relevant, and time-spring.
Utilize the last v minutes to review both goals and make a conclusion virtually which one resonates nearly with why you want to create a space for your creative piece of work online. Yous can also take pieces from i and add them to the goal yous're more excited about, or you can merge both together if information technology makes sense.
Voila, you've narrowed downwards your reasons for making a website into one specific goal. Read your final goal out loud. How does it feel? Make tweaks if necessary.

Notation: If you achieve the stop of this process unsatisfied with your goal, feel free to have a break for a chip and then replay it.

Congratulations! You've officially started the process of creating your online presence. Writing your goal down means you're 33% more likely to go your site up. Putting information technology in a spot where you tin can see it everyday is even better. So, take a moment to celebrate.

Who is this thing for, and what should it expect like?

Identify your website's audience

When you put piece of work online, you lot're adding it to a public infinite. This is the case fifty-fifty if you pattern your website to exist a small collection of images and links held together by a few lines of lawmaking. Because of this, it's crucial to consider the needs and wants of your futurity website's visitors. Equally with your site's goal, existence specific about your audience volition help y'all to focus precisely on how your site's content and form should take shape.

Spend some fourth dimension imagining your website's ideal visitor, and write out a list of things that might be of import for their experience. Ask yourself: Who are y'all creating this website for? What kind of experience is that person looking for? Where are they coming from? Are they friends, artists, curators, potential clients, or someone else?

To get even more specific about your audience, it can be helpful to recall nigh people in your existing community who match the profile of your ideal visitor. Then you can imagine that person'southward wants, needs, and motivations for visiting your site.

Once you've created this ideal visitor profile, experience free to requite them a name. And so, keep them in listen alongside your goal as you keep work on your website.

Inspire yourself past researching other websites

Chances are you've visited some other creative people's websites and can easily recollect a few of your favorites. It'due south worth your time to revisit those sites to see what makes their site successful. What does their web presence expect and experience similar? Tin can y'all translate their end goal from their site'southward design?

As you explore different websites for inspiration, keep your goal and audience in mind, and accept notes on what you do and don't like. You'll likely detect a remarkable corporeality of similarities and differences between all the sites you visit. The similarities are unremarkably focused on meeting common expectations for any site visitor regardless of their profile. The differences are what brand the experience of visiting an artist'southward site memorable, and usually relate to their specific practice, technical abilities, and creative sensibilities.

Equally you brainstorm some of your favorite creative websites, I'll share a few of mine:

Visual artist, curator, writer, and teacher Morehshin Allahyari uses a customized WordPress site that works well for both desktop and mobile viewing, and for screens of all sizes. She keeps content organized into logical sections that match how she works: artworks, curatorial, writing, teaching, contact.
Visual artist Petra Cortright creates an expressive experience with an early-web vibe. The arrows bespeak you toward an intentional xxx-second scroll to finally reach the links to her work.
Visual artist American Creative person uses SquareSpace with a minimalistic, monochromatic aesthetic. The stark black groundwork creates focus for the big images of their work while keeping the navigation, links, and writing crispy articulate across the site.
Artist and writer Ingrid Burrington keeps her site'southward experience simple by relying primarily on text. She shares what she's up to in a mode that shows both self-awareness and a sense of humour. Note that her navigation is created by a judgement that describes her work.
Visual artist and programer Damon Zucconi resists common navigational buckets by creating a sprawling and immersive portfolio that can exist filtered by "Not Everything" and "Mostly Everything."
Visual artist and writer Jenny Odell uses a custom splash page (a page that loads earlier the site's principal content appears). Once you're past the splash page, she uses a grid layout to make information technology easy to navigate her projects and writing.
Creative director and designer Seokhoon Choi creates a graphic, unmarried-page site that works more or less similar a business card. It has all the cardinal information needed to get in impact, while expressing his personal aesthetic.
Early tech pioneer and creative person Tom Jennings uses his site to share an unassuming 25-yr-old archive with 30,000+ pages of content, all written in basic HTML with a simple CSS setup. A line well-nigh the bottom of the homepage points out that the site has "no trackers, no ads, no javascript."
Designer Carly Ayres uses a public Google Doctor for her site. The championship, "[Carly Ayers] Website FINAL," is a wink at file naming practices, because few digital files are ever terminal. The doc is open up to comments and editing from anyone online, making her site a truthful public space—graffiti and all.

At present that you've run through some folks on my list, you can head off and explore people that inspire yous. Almost everyone will share their website links in their social media profiles, and then browsing Twitter or Instagram can be a good identify to beginning your research. As yous browse, take notes and make sketches of the layouts and ideas yous like. Once you've gathered enough inspiration, information technology'southward time to put it to good utilise.

Recall strategically about what will live on your site

Start by making a list of exactly what you lot'd like to share on your site: the words, images, projects, music, blog posts, news, links, or whatsoever else. Every bit you do this, return to why you lot've decided to put things on the internet—yes, your cease goal. If you're like me, there might be years (or even decades) worth of work hanging around. Sharing it all likely doesn't make sense. Would your platonic audience want to sift through your whole archive trying to find your all-time projects?

The way you choose to remainder and contextualize your past, present, or even future work on your website is completely up to you. Ultimately, this gives you lot the power to say exactly what you want to say nearly yourself and your practice—without feeling obligated to exist completely comprehensive. Information technology's totally up to you to decide what you want to share, and how you want to share it.

Basic organization

As you've researched other sites, you've likely noticed these four basic types of pages:

Work/projects: A portfolio-mode presentation of the things you've made or done that together create a good representation of you, what you practise, and what you lot want to exercise. This could exist a more than thorough archive, or simply a few highlights—it's upward to yous.
Nigh: A page sharing a short statement virtually who you lot are and what you exercise, plus (if you desire) a longer paragraph detailing your more than recent work, the specifics of your exercise, or annihilation else y'all'd like to share. Some people include a link to a more detailed CV here, but yous don't need to.
Contact: A simple page sharing how your site'southward visitors can get in touch with y'all, be that through email, social media, or a contact form. Sometimes this is combined with the About folio.
News: If you lot plan to mail service frequent updates, it's a skillful idea to have a section on your site that'south just for announcements. You tin also employ this section to create pages about new projects, before those projects are ready for your "Work/projects" portfolio section.

Start sketching your site out on paper

Your first instinct for getting started might be to buy a domain or sign upwardly for a platform. However, starting by sketching with a paper and pencil is helpful because information technology's much easier to play around and try out multiple approaches. Doing this initial work will help you better empathise what capabilities your site will need when it comes time to choose a platform or framework, or even domain name.

With your content in listen, take some time to brand a few wireframe drawings of what your site might wait like. As you start sketching, consider these questions:

What are the key pages yous need?
How can someone navigate around?
How often volition you be updating your site with new projects?
Where will y'all share news or other updates?
How will someone sign upward for a mailing list (if you take one), or find your social media profiles?
Where can visitors detect info well-nigh how to go far touch?
What volition be unique near your site's overall expect and/or experience?

As yous sketch, keep referring back to your terminate goal. Be playful at commencement, then revisit what you lot've fatigued with a more critical eye. At some betoken, consider your site from the perspective of the ideal site visitor who you identified before. From their perspective, what might be missing? What information won't be helpful or relevant to them? Which elements will make them feel a connection to your piece of work, and to you as a person?

In one case you've reached a point where you're feeling good almost your sketches and you know the basic pages and components yous want to include, that ways yous're ready to get started in the virtual space.

Technically speaking

To code or not to code

Now yous may be asking, should I lawmaking my own site? To answer this question, simply admit your existing coding skills (or lack thereof), assess what yous'll need to learn to create a site you're excited about, and then think about whether or not it makes sense for you to spend the extra time information technology takes to build a site from scratch. Know that at that place is no demand to code your own site these days, as there are tons of flexible, piece of cake-to-use platforms out there.

If there are web skills yous're looking to develop, coding your ain site can be a peachy learning opportunity. Plus, there are lots of great courses and guides out at that place, like those found on codecademy or BitDegree. Simply continue in mind that learning to code while you create your site can add significant time to the project.

Quick-start platforms

The site-building platforms listed beneath will let you customize themes to meet most of your pattern needs. Additionally, extensive documentation and support are available with each platform. With the exception of Squarespace, each of the below also offers a complimentary version. Paying for the platform will you get more features and options, including the ability to annals a custom domain proper noun, which I highly recommend. With this in mind, hither are the most usually used platforms:

Wordpress.com - This is the most mutual platform on the spider web for building and maintaining pocket-size sites. It has plenty of templates and plugins to meet about of your needs. Wordpress.com too offers fairly low pricing compared to other options.
Squarespace - This platform offers a wide array of beautifully designed templates that work responsively across all screen sizes. It also provides plenty of customization options. They take 24/7 client support that is responsive and helpful.
Wix - This platform is like shooting fish in a barrel to apply and flexible, and includes automatic site backups. They take a wide array of templates with a clever algorithmic helper called ADI (Bogus Design Intelligence) to guide you through setup. Unfortunately in that location is no live back up (just email), so when you encounter a problem, it can take a fleck longer to resolve.
Weebly - This platform is similar to Squarespace and Wix in many ways—including the setup, features, and pricing. They accept a more than limited theme selection, only they exercise work on all screen sizes. Themes tin't exist edited as much every bit yous like.

DIY frameworks

If you are technically adept, exploring these DIY options can exist rewarding, and will make your site feel more than unique. Go on in listen that these options will require more steps, skills, and time than the platforms listed above—even if you already know how to code. Too note that if you plan to sell things from your site, you lot will have even more work to exercise hither.

All of these frameworks are free, but require you to pay for your own site hosting and domain registration. I've listed the DIY approaches in order of complexity, with the simplest options towards the pinnacle:

Basic HTML - If you lot're good with the nuts of coding, but take the desire to practice something technical, this choice is a swell place to start. Seth Price's site is a good example of a notable creative person with a basic HTML site.
Wordpress.org - This is the gratuitous and open up-source version of Wordpress. Most companies that offering website hosting and domain registration have 1-click installation options for this version of Wordpress. You get a lot of the perks similar to the paid Wordpress.com platform mentioned in the previous list, only play a bigger role in maintenance, upgrades, and security. Notation that without certain plugins, these sites tin be vulnerable to security threats.
Indexhibit - Developed by other creatives, Indexhibit is the beginning framework I used to create my site in graduate school. It's free, flexible, and simple, simply does require that yous know how to create databases, use FTP, and change permissions on files. They accept helpful tutorials for getting things prepare apace.
Github Pages - For the nigh technically adept, this is a great option. Y'all will still need to register your domain with another service. This offers speedy static sites, version control, and free hosting. The templates that come with this setup are very basic, and you'll likely want to make bigger changes to them. If you lot choose this road, I recommend using Siteleaf to make editing content easier.

Your name dot com

Once you lot've chosen a platform or framework, you're ready for 1 of the most exciting steps: buying a top-level domain proper name. This is essentially buying an address on the internet.

Now, if you accept a fairly mutual name, in that location is a adept chance that yourname.com may already be taken. If it is, fret non: this gives you i more opportunity to be creative. Domain names accept go more plentiful in the by few years, with the introduction of many alternatives to ".com." If you tin't get yourname.com, try to choose something memorable that relates to your creativity, personality, or audience. A personal favorite domain name was John Michael Boling's now defunct http://www.gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooogle.com/. There are as well plenty of fun alternatives to ".com," including ".pizza," ".order," and ".info." You can browse available domain names related to your own proper name here.

Notation: iwantmyname.com is a good tool for exploring bachelor domain names, however I highly recommend buying your domain name through the platform or web hosting service you'll be using. It will brand managing your site over the years much easier. More on this beneath…

In one case you have a domain name picked out, how do you purchase it?

If you chose to get with a quick-offset platform, each ane will have its own guide to ownership a domain, and it will likely automatically connect it to your site after you've purchased it.

If you chose the DIY framework route, in that location are dozens of sites that volition register a domain for y'all. To proceed your setup simple, it's practiced to purchase a domain with a company that can too host your site. The service that I've personally used for this purpose is Dreamhost. They accept reliable uptime, affordable pricing, and are completely carbon neutral. If y'all want to dive deeper into the options for registering and hosting services, you can read this list of reviews.

Building and versioning

The web is ever-evolving, and hopefully your site will evolve as well. Just before it can evolve, it needs to alive. Similar with whatever other creative endeavor, perfection is the enemy of progress. It's piece of cake to get caught up in all the possible ways you lot could create your site. Because of this, it's best to prepare a deadline for yourself, get feedback, and launch the damn matter.

Some basic steps to follow as you start to build your website:

Assemble all the content you programme to publish on your site, and organize it based on where it volition live. If you accept images or articles, bring them together within one file. (A nerdy note well-nigh those large images you're probably using: somewhen, y'all'll want to run them through TinyPNG before uploading them. This is a free service that will compress large images to help your site load efficiently for visitors.)
Using your before sketch as a guide, and with either a quick-start platform or from scratch, dive into building an initial version of your website. Think of what yous're making as a paradigm, or "minimum viable product," that will change and get meliorate every bit y'all experiment and get feedback. At this phase, don't worry about getting every single image or article upwards—you'll have fourth dimension to practise that later.
Share your epitome with a few people you trust, who also know you and your practice well. Y'all can practise this by simply emailing a link, or meliorate yet, by sitting with them and having them explore your site while y'all sentinel. Tell them your goal, and so ask for their feedback. Annotation: You will get something extremely valuable in this moment. In the future, when people on the internet view your finished site, you will not be sitting with them. This means you'll have no idea how people will perceive your site, and therefore, how they'll perceive yous. Use this fourth dimension with your trusted friends to see what their showtime impressions are, what they recall the site says virtually you, and whether or not they think the experience will work to assist you attain your chief goal.
Based on the feedback you get, you lot may want to tweak some things, or even rearrange your site entirely. (Call back: how your site comes to life is upwards to yous, so it's ok to cherry pick the feedback you hold with.) If you practice brand edits, ask for a second round of feedback—from the same friend, and maybe a new one, too—to run into how your newer version lines up to your goal. Hopefully after a few rounds, you'll have confidence that your new site is accomplishing what you want it to accomplish.
Finally, add the rest of your content and put on all the finishing touches. (This is the moment to procedure your big images using TinyPNY, as I mentioned in the nerdy side note before.)
Once your site is complete, transport it to another trusted friend (preferably someone who is good at catching typos and details), and inquire them to do a quick review.

Launch day

Congratulations, yous've put the finishing touches on your site and now it's time to launch it into the earth! Only similar how you built a site that suits your mode, y'all tin launch it in your ain style besides. I accept some friends who like to keep their announcements more intimate by sending around an email note with the people they desire to share it with BCC'd. Some other friends would go for a wider audience by using Instagram and/or Twitter to share news like launching a new site. Any mode you want to share your new home on the web is smashing, every bit long equally it feels right to y'all and keeps your goal and audience in listen.

For more than tips on thoughtful approaches to promoting your work, read A creative person's guide to thoughtful promotion by Kathryn Jaller.

If y'all've made it this far and successfully launched a site, that'due south a large bargain. Please do me 1 final favor and celebrate all your hard work. Care for yourself to something special, and admire what y'all've accomplished.

Appendix: Maintenance mode

Some basic steps to follow as you commencement to build your website:Much like your own man trunk, a website is made upward of many ever-so-slightly shifting components, and because of this, it'southward worth doing at least an almanac checkup to make sure things are all working as they should.

Hither is a checklist of recommendations for keeping your site running smoothly once y'all've got it upwardly:

Make sure your domain and hosting account is set up to auto-renew. If y'all can afford it, invest in a multi-year contract from the start to save some money in the long booty, and brand things easier on your time to come self.
Use a password manager, and/or create a private and secure document that has all of your account information and login details. The more than complex your setup is, the more than important this documentation volition be when something goes awry, or when you lot finally need to renew that hosting contract 3 years from at present.
Annually log into your business relationship manager and backup your site to your computer or a thumb bulldoze. This archive will be nice to look at years from at present when your site has evolved and changed. It besides comes in handy in rare moments when content is lost or a service goes down. (Note: If you're on a platform like SquareSpace, backups can be a little trickier)

In summary…

Creating a infinite for yourself online with your own domain and style is one of the most important things you lot can exercise to share your work. Equally you think near how to present yourself and your piece of work online, don't captivate over getting everything perfect. Go along your setup simple, and focus on your goal and audience. Once information technology's up, pause to gloat your endeavor and accomplishment. Then, become back to making the work you'll exist excited to share in your next site update.

Most the Author

Jason Huff is a Los Angeles-based artist, designer, and writer. He spent the past seven years designing and leading teams at Etsy, a platform that helps nearly two million creative entrepreneurs around the world sell their crafts online. In 2016 he co-led LRLXNY—an ongoing conversation series hosting artists, writers, and technologists—alongside artist Nicholas O'Brien. He is a mentor at NEW INC and has written for Rhizome and The New Inquiry. His diverse projects are included in MoMA'south library, and take been cited in Mazed Digital, the Daily Dot, Electric Lit, the New Yorker, and Jeu du Paume in Paris. He holds an MFA in Digital Media from the Rhode Island Schoolhouse of Blueprint and has exhibited his work and performed readings internationally. He recently moved to Los Angeles, and would value whatever local recommendations from readers of this guide.

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