Consummate art-world professional Bill Carroll considers how artists can effectively structure their time, drawing on his extensive experience as an artist, a nonprofit administrator, and a former gallery director. Carroll also explains the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts’ Studio Program, and he and Paul debate the value of “niceness.”
“My approach to professional practice is that, having been a director of a gallery, it made me crazy that I would deal with these artists who had no idea what we did and didn’t think they were supposed to know what we did…. I teach that this is a community. You need to understand what the other members of the community do and respect them. Which, by the way, is going to help you in the long run: the more you know, the better.”
William (Bill) Carroll is a New York-based artist, the Director of the Studio Program at the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, and a Visiting Associate Professor of professional practices in Fine Arts at Pratt Institute. Carroll was born in the Bronx and grew up in Long Island. He studied painting at Pratt, graduating in 1973, then moved to California where he worked a number of odd jobs. Carroll returned to New York in 1981, taking positions first with the Dia Art Foundation and later with the Brooklyn Museum. In 1987 he became the director of Charles Cowles Gallery (closed in 2009), where he remained for nearly ten years. He subsequently became Director of Elizabeth Harris Gallery for a several years before returning to graduate school to focus on his own art practice. He graduated from Queens College with an MFA in 2007 and began working at Nancy Grace Foundation and teaching at Parsons The New School for Design. Carroll now works approximately four days a week at the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, dividing his remaining time between teaching and his studio.