Croyds: Montreal’s first Online Art Gallery.
Selling your art can be hard. First, you’ll be facing tons of competition. Art galleries have rigorous filtering (somewhat exclusive) procedures to select showcased pieces, which doesn’t always make sense for the average up-and-coming artist who’s creating oeuvres on a shoe-string budget. And sure, good art sells itself. But rarely is the sensitive, chaotic mastermind behind the craft also a shrewd businessperson.
Mevin Runganaikaloo is looking to change that. About a year and a half ago, he founded Croyds, an online art gallery that specializes in two services: advisory and resale. At first glance, Runganaikaloo looks like he’s all about the business: sporting a suit and tie and wearing trendy reading glasses. But rest assured it’s only a matter of style and presentation. Deep down, he’s an artist first: ”ever since I was kid, my dad would get artworks from McGill book sales, and I would sit down and replicate them”. His artistic parcours has also extended to the performing arts; during his college years he was part of a Hip Hop dance crew while pursuing his studies in architecture.” Dancing really got me to develop my own style, as well as understanding the technicality that lies in art”.
Croyds founder Mevin Runganaikaloo (Facebook).
Post college, he took a break from the artistic world and tackled on more business-oriented fields, such as finance and marketing. Eventually, the formulaic side of the business life took a toll on him:”I couldn’t keep going like that anymore, there was no substance in what I was doing”. With a penchant to go back to his artistic roots and apply what he learned during his business journey, Mr. Coyds threw himself into the entrepreneurship world, starting his art gallery with an approach that not only aims to sell pieces, but to act as a guide for the artists:”Art and Marketing very much have a sibling rivalry. They hate each other, but ultimately they’re indissociable”. Church.
Croyds has modern a twist when it comes to selling art: Runganaikaloo makes a convincing point on how establishing an online gallery has a more inclusive approach to it: ”In traditional art galleries, you’ll walk around the block a few times before you enter”. He’s referring to the intimidating nature most galleries seem to carry, not to mention the restless dealer constantly breathing over your neck without giving you the chance to browse the art.” Online, we’re able to reach the masses, and the clientèle can spend all the time they need to really grasp what we’re about”.
So sure, going online in the age of the knowledge economy is a good call from Croyds, but what makes this gallery so different? Having the artistic background, Runganaikaloo knows he’s able to establish a much more collaborative relationship between the artist and the gallery. ”With each artist that comes in, we usually sit down, curate the piece together, and I really try to get them to express the main idea behind their art”.
It’s not so much about trying to sell the art to the highest bidder, and Croyds has really shown how businesspeople can be creative and more lighthearted: ”We don’t want to be greedy — we take a reasonable portion of the profits and we really teach artists how to sell their work. Plus, they get to keep the original piece”. Winning formula? Possibly. In any case, there’s no shortage of candidacy: “There is a lot of midweight art that is unexplored, and the artists behind it don’t even now how good they are. In the end, we are trying to educate artists into becoming successful entrepreneurs and most importantly, build a sense of community through the process”.
In short, Croyds is well on its way to redefine the “art of selling art”. It’s inclusive, educative, and fits well in the fast-paced world we live in. While most local institutions lean towards supporting local artists, Croyds walks the extra mile by empowering them, a little something that could be lacking in the urban artistic hubs of the 21th century.
Originally published at artinest.com on November 16, 2015.
