When talking about Shane Townley’s journey to becoming President/Director of lagunaart.com ,one might assume his trip began in California. However, in order to get the full story, we must go back to his beginnings as a graphic designer in New York where he had a graphic design firm for 10 years.

“His art career kind of started when he was a graphic artist and he had artwork up in his graphic design office,” Bill Bradfield, Sales & Marketing Director states. “His clients that were attorneys and restaurant owners started seeing the artwork in his graphic design office and they started buying his art. Then he said ‘wow, maybe I can make a living doing this as well’.”

After returning to California, he decided to open up shop in Laguna Beach, an area that is #3 in the world for art sales per capita. With such a strong artistic identity already established Townley found it difficult to find real estate for his new venture.

“In 2004 when we registered lagunaart.com, we knew we’d always do something with getting into the community,” Townley explains. “In 2004 you couldn’t find any open space in Laguna, so we though we’d be an online company hoping for something to open up. Once it did open up we realized how many artists come through every single gallery.”

Despite the fact that Laguna has an astounding 80 galleries, the ratio of artists displayed vs. artists who want to be displayed, remains skewed.

“We’ve had 3,000 submissions to lagunaart.com, 3,000 artists that want to be in a gallery,” Townley Continues. “Artists want to show here, but it’s really hard to get in to any of the galleries. So we decided to start the Laguna Art Group. It’s a group of artists that are rotated through an iPhone app, and this app is downloaded by tourists visiting here.”

With annual tourist traffic exceeding 4 million, exposure in Laguna Beach is key. The iPhone app not only gives tourists maps of galleries, museum info and more, but it also rotates the work of featured artists, giving them a much larger outreach.

In addition to the app the website itself is a virtual hub for all things art in Laguna Beach. When asked what sets lagunaart.com apart from other art related sites Townley’s answer was simple.
“We’re grounded,” Townley explains. “We have physical galleries that we work with, including a network of 80 galleries. Once the artists are a part of the group, the galleries can ‘shop’ for them, and vice versa the artists can ‘shop’ the galleries.”

“Basically the internet is expanding so rapidly that when people travel somewhere, prior to traveling to that locations, they’re often doing a little bit of research and trying to plan out their trip,” Bradfield adds. “They’re coming here not only because it’s a beautiful location, but also because it’s a great art destination. So they’re googling ‘art’ or ‘Laguna’ or any combination there of and we come up to the top of the list automatically. That’s how we’re driving so many visitors to the site and to the group.”

It’s a problem that many business owners face in the digital age. How does one avoid becoming a middleman? How does one avoid losing a potential buyer to the internet?

“Music stores and bookstores are going out of business left and right,” Bradfield continues. “A lot of galleries are struggling as well and it’s all for the same reason: the internet is taking over and people are buying direct and bypassing the stores that represent the medium whether it be art, literature or music. People come into our gallery all the time, pull out their smart phones and ask us ‘how do you spell that artists name’ because they want to bypass the gallery and go directly to the artist. We didn’t invent the internet, so we ask ourselves how can we use this as a tool? How can we turn this into a benefit instead of something that is going to hurt our business, and how can we help other galleries and other people in the art community understand how to use technology to benefit their business— instead of having it take away from their business.”

With such a simple yet logical business model in place, it’s easy to understand why so many artists want to be a part of lagunaart.com and the Laguna Beach art community in general. To be welcomed in, an artists must go through a five person jury process where they will be critiqued on a variety of criteria.

“It’s kind of all over the place,” Townley suggests. “What we do look at is originality, how it’s presented, even how it hangs on the wall. We actually physically call and ask them how it hangs on the wall once we’re considering them for the jury. And also style, medium and,of course, it has to be hand-made by the artist.”

90% of the art represented by lagunaart.com is original art, the other 10% coming from prints or Giclees which means that almost all of the art represented is one of a kind and can’t be found anywhere else in the world. This is important because when it comes to art, a large portion of originality is how an artist pushes boundaries. When it comes to lagunaart.com they are pushing some boundaries of their own.

“We’re the first of our kind to have an iPhone app that rotates artists through the app,” Townley explains. “As a living artist it’s the first thing available as an app directly for artists and the art community.”

In addition lagunaart.com pushes boundaries in a very literal sense.

“As a group we’ve looked at Google analytics and have seen that 3,000 cities around the world have logged on to lagunaart.com as well as 122 countries,” Townley continues. “I think we’re definitely pushing boundaries and reaching globally as a community and reaching out. We get submissions from all around the world.”

It’s easily apparent that lagunaart.com is so much more than just a website. It’s one part art, one part social networking, and one part technology== all coming together to form an integral piece of the Laguna Beach Art Community.

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