Painting Pro Bono is an impartial, universally accessible project through which I distribute my work and raise money for socially important causes. I do this by selling artworks for between £10 and £25 each, and donating 100% of all sales income to one of my selected charities; The Stephen Lawrence Day Foundation, Youngminds and Level Up. Painting Pro Bono has been the sole distribution method for my work since January 2020 and to date I have raised over £10,000 for good causes. Please do sign up to the Painting Pro Bono emailing list here to be notified when new works are made available. Works currently available for purchase can be found on the Shop page.
My practice is essential to my happiness - without it my day to day life would be significantly less fulfilling. I am fortunate enough to be able to dedicate time and resources to my wellbeing in such a way, and therefore I do not believe I have any right to demand making art provide me a material gain on top of this. If I am to sell my work, I feel duty bound to ensure doing so yields social rather than personal benefit.
It is important to me that my work is priced at an accessible level. There are two reasons for this: Firstly, and very simply, unsold work does not raise money for good causes, so sense dictates I price to sell. Secondly, I have no interest in subscribing to the standards of a market that lines its own pockets by following a largely arbitrary and unjustifiably inflated pricing structure in order to deliberately exclude the majority of society from an important aspect of culture, and cement scarcely obtainable luxury as its paradigm. Having been employed in the commercial art industry for over 20 years, I can assure you that this description is accurate.
So, I price my works as noted: a blanket cost of £25 for a unique work and £10 for a limited edition, irrespective of their material particulars. I make work universally accessible through a free emailing list (sign up here), and donate 100% of the sales proceeds to one of my selected causes. In these ways I hope to maintain a practice that is fiercely independent in all aspects, offers tangible social benefit and is intentionally turned away from an industry whose standards and principles appear directly opposed to my own.
The System
Upon receipt of payment in full, by bank transfer or Paypal, I will make a donation of 100% of the price of the work to the charity in question and forward the receipt email I receive from the charity to the purchaser as proof of having done so. Voluntary overpayments are welcomed will be included as part of the charity donation.
Selected Charities
Stephen Lawrence Day Foundation