Viviana Puello Story with ArtTour International Magazine
Passion and Abundance: The Story of ATIM and Viviana Puello
Written by Paul Simpson
Award-winning artist and activist. Feature filmmaker and director. Honored podcast and television host. Esteemed entrepreneur and business coach. Founder and CEO of ArtTour International, who has expanded the revolutionary platform to encompass print and digital publications, an award-winning TV show, international events, and so much more. A Top 10 Female Entrepreneur of 2020, as recognized by New York Weekly, whose passion now promotes artist worldwide and serves talented individuals from more than 205 countries.
With all of these successes and accolades, you may wonder how Viviana Puello has never graced the cover of the magazine that she brought to life ten years ago. The answer is quite simple—she always refused previous requests from her artistic peers and staff, preferring instead to keep the focus firmly on talented international artists and their innovative works.
For this special anniversary issue, however, she finally relented not only because she hopes to spread her unique brand of inspiration to you, beloved readers, but also because the story of ArtTour International Magazine simply cannot be told without her own.
Viviana’s childhood in Colombia was far from idyllic. Indeed, growing up, she was set adrift in the turbulent seas of parental abandonment. In the wake of these difficulties became ingrained in her a belief system that limited her horizons. Only at the age of 12, when she ventured upon her first joyous explorations of art, could she finally glimpse ahead the creative powers of possibility. While the vagaries of fate and the duties of the day-to-day would obscure this vision—sometimes for years at a time—Viviana would always return to art.
Once she truly realized that abundance begins only in the pursuit of what you love, however, she was finally able to embrace art in full. Viviana ensured that art remained in her life, day in and day out for ten years, as an independent artist and curator, as well as founder of Vivid Arts Network, which helped artists exhibit their work in international venues. During this period, pursuit of these passions led to passion of a different kind, when Viviana met her future partner and husband, Alan Grimandi, while working on an exhibition in Italy.
While on a flight between venues in 2011, the idea of creating an art magazine suddenly struck her. She immediately marshalled the support of Alan, friends, and fellow artists in order to complete the necessary preparations to launch ArtTour International Magazine at the Auditorium al Duomo in Florence, Italy.
And launch there it did—at exactly the wrong time and in front of entirely the wrong people. You see, the day that Viviana arranged to tour the prospective venue happened to coincide with a convention of approximately 500 international cultural figures from more than 30 countries. After asking the permission of the responsible, who was a mere acquaintance, Viviana was able to secure three minutes to present the magazine project. Within an hour, she began to speak the words that would secure the foundation of a budding success.
This ability to brave potential rejection, as well as to practice a seasoned flexibility, has allowed Viviana not only to ensure that ATIM is available at all Barnes & Noble locations and 1,200 newsstands around the world, but also to grow its readership from 1,500 to 2.1 million readers in more than 205 countries.
Her collaborative spirit has found expression not only in award programs and ceremonies such as the ATIM Masters Awards and the ARTYA Artivist of the Year Awards, but also in original activist groups such as Create 4 Peace and Artists for a Green Planet.
Her cultivated openness to creativity has driven the foundation of AITM Web TV and The ArtTour International TV Show, which has journeyed to more than 50 cities around the world in order to support artists and art organizations. Honored with the Olee Public Media Award of Excellence in 2018 and 2019, the show airs every Thursday at 5:30 PM on MNN-HD Spectrum 1993. Moreover, it propelled the stunning documentary “Kintsugi – The Line of Destiny,” which features the Berber people’s natural livelihood in the Sahara Desert, the Atlas Mountains of Morocco, and the Italian countryside. The film garnered numerous prizes, including “First Time Directors” (Top Shorts Film Festival), “Best Documentary” (New York Film Awards), and “Top Documentary” (Los Angeles Film Awards).
Viviana’s latest venture, The Winner’s Journey Coaching Program, originates from her desire to pass on her hard-earned knowledge and experiences, helping others learn in hours what had taken her years to learn. Through this coaching program, she is able to work one-on-one with vivacious entrepreneurs to find abundance by pursuing their passions and to establish profitable, fulfilling businesses. This program is complemented by The Winner’s Journey Podcast, which offers inspiring interviews with celebrities, entrepreneurs, and spiritual leaders.
To gain further insight into the journey of AITM, as well as the possibilities of its future, we recently sat down to chat with Viviana on an exclusive interview for this issue of ArtTour International. R
Click here to read the full article
