As an artist you are your own brand. Hard as it is, first impressions count, so you’re branding needs to reflect who you are. At least that is how I feel. It also needs to be consistent across websites, blogs and social media etc.

My biggest issue has been what name I use. Do I use my maiden name, my married name or just my forenames. I did research and there are already several artists called Helen White and even though my maiden name is Dougill, there is an artist called Helen Dougal and she comes up in website search engines as they automatically correct the spelling of my name to that with an ‘a’.

When I started my studies back on the foundation course I choose the name Helen Louise Art for my wordpress blog, as there weren’t any other pages on social media at the time and I have decided that this will be how I go forward with my brand. I am Helen Louise Art. I have purchased the domain name http://www.helenlouiseart.com and am yet to design and build my website.

I toyed with a few ideas of fonts and how my name would look across one or two lines, and also chose a piece of my artwork as part of my logo. Because I try to use plant based or cotton rag handmade paper with my prints when I can, I want to use the same ethos in my business card and letterhead printing. I also wanted to use natural earthy colours, as it represents my link to nature and the tones and pigments I tend to use in my artwork.

on the back of my business cards I have small pictures of my current artwork, and these can be updated as I create more work. I have tried to include examples of my ceramic, painting and printing works.

How I show up and connect with other artists, galleries and organisations is important. Once my website is up and running I can at least hand my business card over when I visit galleries and art fairs as an introduction.