Two of the most asked questions -
How do I become a Juried Member?
You must be a business members to apply for juried status. Please make sure you read the jury procedures and judging guidelines prior to submitting your application. You should also read these bb posts - "How do I become juried?" and "Question About Judging Jury Selections".
Juried applications are voted on by the existing juried members. If a juried application is approved, they will be added to the juried gallery.
Juried members must maintain a business membership to retain their juried status. Juried members MUST PARTICIPATE IN JURY VOTES to retain their juried status. As a juried member you will understand the effort required to submit a jury application. Do not become a juried member if you are not willing to participate in each and every vote on new members! Juried members that do not participate in voting will lose their juried member status.
Guild members can find current and past jury applications posted in the members areas of the website. If you are reviewing the applications to help you with submitting your application, please focus on the applications from round 2, as they are the most pertinent to the current guidelines and judging standards.
PLEASE READ THE GUIDELINES PRIOR TO SUBMITTING YOUR ENTRY!!
From reviewing jury applications to date, the two major things that seem to stand out are -
1) Pay attention to the pictures you submit! The camera is like a microscope, enlarging any flaws in the work. And if they picture is not good enough to see if there are flaws or not, then you stand a good chance of getting a "can't tell" instead of a score.
2) Workmanship can not be sacrificed to creativity. The judges want to see creativity and versatility, but it can not be at the expense of neat, well placed wraps, tight coils, etc.
Jury applications may be sent to Jury@WireJewelryArtists.org and will be posted for all of the existing juried members to review and cast their vote.
How do I apply to Jewelry Artist Direct?
You may apply to JewelryArtistDirect.com as a general member, but if accepted, you must upgrade to a business member prior to inclusion. If you do not wish to be a guild member at all, you may still apply to the mall, but the fees are the same as if you were a guild business member.
Complete this application to have your web site reviewed by the mall selection committee. They will notify you of their decision.
When it comes to jurying, I can't offer much advice - just some observations from having watched it for a while now as the person posting the aps. The new round 2 jury procedures seem to be working pretty well - at least the email on the topic has dropped to nothing. The only complaint anyone ever seems to have is if they didn't pass jury and people didn't give them specific enough feedback about why they didn't pass.
The juried members seem to take the job of judging applications seriously. I can never tell which will pass and which won't, but any kind of sloppiness in the workmanship really hurts the chances - you can't sacrifice workmanship for anything - even extreme creativity. Read the procedures and judging guidelines before you make an entry, so you know more about what they are looking for. Pay particular attention to the creativity and versatility sections!!
This guild is focused on wire - so you need to submit wire focused pieces. While simple may be commercially viable, the jury participants want to see more than just simple offerings.
I'm sometimes surprised when I'm familiar with people's work and then see the pics they choose to submit. The camera really magnifies any flaw in the work, so really pay attention to the picture of the item - don't just submit your favorites if they don't show well in the pic.
As someone said, if you are ready for critique, the worst that can happen by submitting is that you'll get more critique than you had hoped for. But no one knows it is you, unless they happen to recognize one of your pieces. All of the past jury aps are accessible from the members areas, for your review. Most that don't make it the first time take the critique to heart, give it a little time to "heal", re-submit and become juried. I think one said - well, that is my style and I'm doing ok, so forget it. And one was so upset they didn't make jury that they basically walked away from the guild. Most though just take it as a learning process and move on.
I think everyone is nervous when they do it - who wants to be told no? I think it just depends where you are with wire and how well you take critique that you should think about when deciding when to jury.
FYI - the mall is not focused just on wire, but on jewelry handcrafted by the site owner. It looks more at how good is the web site shopping experience and hopes for a wide range of jewelry, to equate good wire jewelry with good handcrafted jewelry in people's minds.
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