WHY SOOMI EXISTS
Built from direct experience with artists and exhibitions.
SOOMI helps independent artists organise their work, present themselves professionally, manage enquiries and opportunities, and get paid without relying on several disconnected tools.
FROM DIRECT EXPERIENCE
A repeated problem across artists and exhibitions.
SOOMI was developed by Christos Markou, a business builder whose background spans media, technology, marketing and the creative industries. Over the past decade, he has founded and developed Arrival Gallery, Art Seen, Spreads Magazine and Dot Athena Studios, taking projects from early ideas into operating businesses.
Through international exhibitions, publishing and artist-focused projects, Christos has worked closely with artists from many countries. Again and again, he saw important parts of their practice split between Instagram messages, email, spreadsheets, notes, payment tools and application platforms. Enquiries were hard to track, details had to be rewritten and the artist’s professional identity changed from one platform to the next.
THE PURPOSE
Make the practical side simpler, more organised and more portable.
SOOMI combines that direct industry experience with practical product and business development. It is not a promise of instant success or a replacement for a gallery or agent; it gives artists useful infrastructure and more control over the professional activity that remains with them throughout their career.
WORK YOUR WAY
One companion, alongside the relationships you already have.
A gallery may represent selected work for a particular exhibition or period. SOOMI belongs to the artist and travels with them between exhibitions, galleries, organisers, direct buyers and new opportunities.
The name is inspired by a mosaic: individual stories and practices coming together while keeping their own identity. That same idea guides the product—shared practical infrastructure without asking artists to work or present themselves in the same way.