First off, because it needs to be said: if you’re a serious artist, it’s ok to not want to make a living as one. As for people who don’t make art who think having a pro-labor stance when it comes to being a professional artist as a trade is inherently elitist? I’m putting this out there for the people who *are* making art — a form of labor — who need to hear it, not you. Get it? Good.
OK, so that’s done. Here goes.
This comes up regularly. I’ve seen it happen for decades now.
Trust that anybody who is making a living in the arts (or trying to) has heard all of them over and over again.
Also, they really don’t bear repeating. Sorry, bros and bro-minded individuals.
It’s stating the obvious, for a lot of people. “Really? I can’t pay my landlord in art? Who knew?”
For those of us who are not in that position, it’s likely because of having to juggle several different forms of income to do so. Making ends meet from your art alone is not the same as being rich, or even middle class. It can be, but that’s not a given, and it gets into issues of race, class, gender, sexuality and representation in society to have a full discussion of this. It’s the antithesis of something that can be reduced down to hot takes.
It’s also literally impossible for some of us to do so, both by trade and by inclination, unless we’re counting “misery or worse” as a valid option. It’s gaslighting to tell people how they should approach their art-making as a trade, and by extension, a huge chunk of their lives — if not insist on your approach being the only way to do things.
Making art takes time, patience and perseverance, typically for years upon years. This is especially true for making art professionally. It’s a gift that gives back by putting your work out into the world, paid or not, not via bad advice from people who aren’t even in your trade, or who aspire to be, and got frustrated along the way. Including by having to take a day job out of necessity.
There’s also a lot of social pressure under capitalism to not make art, and that pressure only gets heightened if you’re serious about it. Listen up, this is important: Fucking with your creative process based on internalized fear or doubt will usually make everything much worse.
I repeat: Fucking with your creative process based on internalized fear or doubt will usually make everything much worse.
This is *NOT* necessarily the same as “taking a job to pay your bills”. Which is a choice that only someone themselves can make, including out of necessity.
There’s also the challenges of making the art itself. The “artist’s life” can be hard enough without having to contend with the particular flavor of concern trolls that bug at artists, both famous and not. A lot of the truisms around the arts, especially in countries that lean towards active hostility towards the arts such as the US, are designed more to punch down and keep people out of the arts, rather than finding useful ways to sustain careers, or even the process around the work itself, period. Art is a threat to the established power structures, including the time and effort it takes to make the art itself. Even when it’s part of established norms, it’s “not playing by capitalism’s rules”. (Why do you think there’s so much effort put into “managing” both art and artists alike, rather than unconditional financial support, unionization or both?)
I’d finish with “If you’re doing this? Stop”, but every experience I’ve had with pointing this out has usually led to…even more truisms. So let’s say I didn’t say that and say that we, uh, did not.
