If you want to be a professional artist, your journey starts with a powerful portfolio. In this post, I’ll walk you through actionable strategies to create a strong portfolio that will help you stand out from the crowd. No matter what your goal is as a professional artist, your portfolio is the key to making your creative dreams a reality.

I’m excited to share my portfolio tips with you in this post, but before we dive in, I wanted to share a free resource to help you succeed as a professional artist. My Creative Business Bundle is chock-full of industry insights including trend forecasting tips, email templates, marketing resources, and much more! Download it for free here!

So what should you actually be putting in your portfolio? Ultimately, your portfolio should be in line with your goals as a professional artist. Make sure the work in your portfolio is relevant to the kinds of paid opportunities you want to attract. If you want to create artwork that can be licensed out through giant companies to be printed on cool products– the artwork in your portfolio needs to align with that goal. Your portfolio should be filled with collections of sellable designs that are ideal for art licensing like trending motifs and repeat patterns. And if you’re a muralist, for example, your portfolio should be filled with images of your murals or mockups of murals. Whatever your goal, it should be at the forefront of your mind as you’re creating your portfolio.

If your goal is to license your artwork with big brands, a powerful portfolio that aligns with that goal will open up licensing opportunities for you. If you want to learn more about how my portfolio helped me land licensing deals with big companies like Target, Urban Outfitters, and Home Goods, check out this blog post!

Pro Tip: Always add your website, social handles, and email in your shops, online portfolio, etc. This will help big brands find you should they decide that they want to work with you.

Now let’s dive into the strategies you can implement to build a strong portfolio

Make Your Portfolio Cohesive

A cohesive collection of designs will make your portfolio feel well-rounded and unified. But don’t think that cohesiveness means that everything needs to match with each other. It can simply mean that you have a theme going on. For instance, you can pick a specific set of colors or subjects for your portfolio to have a unified look.

Be Mindful of Trends

Brands like Target and Urban Outfitters want to be hip and cool, so they’re much more likely to pick up artwork with trending motifs, patterns, and color palettes. If you want to earn royalties, it’s important to stay on trend and continue creating designs that are relevant for customers.

Pro-Tip: Use a mixture of evergreen trends and current hot trends to keep your income stream flowing. If you want to learn more about trend forecasting, check out this blog post!

Be True to Your Own Unique Artistic Voice

Regardless of the medium you use, whether you use hand-drawn or digitally designed art, you want your art to feel distinctly like your own. Brands and art agents want to see your unique voice, so this is another opportunity for you to stand out from the crowd!

Include Collections in Your Portfolio

Collections are very strategic! It makes your portfolio feel cohesive and professional. And when you present a collection to a potential collaborator, they’re able to see how your art can work together on multiple different products. More products with your art = more opportunities for royalties.

In your collections, make sure that the color palette works well together and that there’s a mixture of motifs– some complex and some simple. Same for patterns. You can choose some big hero patterns like the otters in my example below and some teeny tiny supporting patterns like the white and mint dots.

Capitalize on Your Top-Sellers

If you have a popular piece of art or design, don’t be afraid to capitalize on it and work on creating more designs with the elements that made people love your work. For example, if you have a popular summer-themed design that went viral, you can create more art with the same color palette, or you can create more designs based on the elements of your popular piece.

I created this retro sunshine illustration and it quickly became my top seller. So I created an entire collection of artwork using the same color palette. I also created new illustrations to complement the retro sunshine so that they could be sold together.

Pro tip: Charge your client for color and pattern changes.

Use Relevant Color Palettes

Creating color variations for your artwork will not take as much time as the illustration process, but it significantly bulks up your portfolio and creates even more licensing opportunities. After all, more color options = more potential sales. Here are some helpful blog posts for how to create color alterations in Photoshop and how to do it in Procreate.

Don’t be Afraid of Mixed Content

It’s helpful to show your artwork in a variety of different settings in your portfolio. Using mockups and lifestyle photography to showcase your artwork helps potential collaborators envision what your art can look like on their products.

Curate it!

You don’t need to include everything. Choose your best and most relevant pieces for your portfolio.

Include Different Types of Motifs

You want to include different sets of patterns, quotes, and standalone designs. Different brands are looking for different types of design. So it’s important to be able to show them what you can do.

Add Your Signature or Logo on Your Designs

This one is crucial especially for online portfolios! You absolutely want to get credit for your work. Adding your signature or logo on your design will help people (and big brands) find you. This also reinforces your brand recognition.

Pro tip: make your signature legible and SEO-friendly, so someone can easily google you and find more of your stuff.

Your portfolio is your most valuable asset as a surface designer. Use these strategies to build a strong portfolio and start landing those licensing deals!

If you want to learn more about what it takes to succeed in the art licensing industry, check out my Creative Business Bundle which is a free PDF full of industry knowledge like trend reports, marketing advice, art licensing email templates and so much more. Click here to download it for free!

Strategies for Creating a Strong Art Licensing Portfolio