Yup! Like I said, if I did a Kickstarter campaign, I’d announce it here. Well, we (Hannah and I) have been putting it together over the last week, and it will launch sometime during the late afternoon on March 23rd. Until then, people can sign up to be notified by Kickstarter when it launches, so please sign up!

It’s taken some time to set it all up because of special circumstances with me personally receiving funds, because I can’t—especially for something like this. The money has to come and go through my special needs trust. It’s a little complicated. It’s because I’ve been on disability for a while. If the monies are collected through my regular checking account, I could lose my health insurance. See? Complicated!

So, many measures had to be put in place. I think it’s all copeasthetic now. (Fingers crossed!)

I’m pretty sure you have to sign up/sign in on Kickstarter to click the “Notify Me” button. But people have to do that if they want to pledge, too. So there you have it.

I also had to go through a bunch of inventory in my art storage to arrange all 20 rewards for the pledges, which, in turn, helped me organize my prints and books a lot better. I wish I could offer the world, but I looked at what other people offer in their rewards, and I felt like mine are comparable, and in some cases, pretty generous. I’m sure the original art pieces will seem steep, but I really did discount those pieces significantly.

All in all, I’m only hoping to raise a couple of thousand bucks to make this discussion panel happen, so I can pay all the members and stay in LA (Santa Monica – which is West Side-pricey) for a couple of days around the event. The one thing that makes me a bit nervous is that Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing model. If we don’t reach the goal, then there are no funds to be had. Bummer, but apparently Kickstarter vs. GoFundMe is notoriously more successful for art projects.

The last time I did a Kickstarter was about a decade ago. It was for the biggest solo show I’ve presented to date, Exodus. I made my goal and then some, but I feel like I was better known then, and my gallery at the time was also very helpful in pledging funds. The show still cost me a lot ($5K out of pocket), and I received a $3K grant on top of that. It was an expensive exhibit to put together. The movie was the most expensive part.

This time is very different; the art economy is down, money’s tighter, I now live far away from the art scene in LA, and I’m operating under a different name (Ayin). I think a lot more people knew me as “Carol Es,” and honestly, I don’t think everyone received the memo. I announced it everywhere, but it couldn’t have reached everyone I knew. However, those were the risks I took when I changed my name, and I knew that at the time. And I’m not even sure if all this is true, or it’s an excuse I’m making in case I don’t raise the money.

In any case, I have a newsletter coming out the day after the campaign launches, and I hope enough people from my mailing list get on board.