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You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

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Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#31

Post by [deleted] »

phoe-krk wrote: post #10
falcolas wrote: post #4

I saw a great commentary from an art gallery owner on Tiktok about the "inherent value" of art. The inherent value of art is zero. That is, the art itself has no inherent value. The actual value of a piece of art is whatever you can convince someone to pay for it. One thing that can help is having receipts of what you've sold an artists work for in the past, since you can use that to inflate that amount a current pie…

> The inherent value of art is zero. So is the inherent value of gold, sans its use in electronics and dentistry.

[deleted]

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#32

Post by runevault »

klipt wrote: post #24
ohiovr wrote: post #21

Who paid for the great works of music in the period between 1700 and 1918? From such musicians as Liszt, Beethoven, Mozart, Bartok, Handel, Debussy, Bach etc... there were a heck of a lot of great composers in that period. I was analyzing Bach the other day. His Brandenburg Concerto #2 has tens of thousands of notes. That is a heck of a lot of work.

Rich patrons mostly.

I feel like the patron system of old ended up turning into the modern professional sports system instead of supporting the arts. Which sort of shows the shift in priorities at least the rich have had in more recent years.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#33

Post by thethethethe »

Seems a little entitled to me. Why should artists be able to spend their time doing exactly what they want while all the boring plebs have to pick vegetables/write CRUD apps?

Sounds like someone is upset that more people dont find utility in their work

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#34

Post by lancesells »

delisam wrote: post #7

Art, in its current state, has been fully commercialized in that if you don't have someone who is "in the know," then there is very, very slim chance of being successful. I was briefly in the art world (paintings) and everyone wanted to kiss the successful dealers' asses to get exposure and get a curated exhibition. W/o it, nothing's going to happen. It's sad but that's what it's become.

I think success in art is very much like any other industry. It's part luck, it's part "playing the game", it's part networking, and it's part skill & talent.

I'm a fine artist and would put myself in the "not successful" category. I don't make nearly enough to live off of it but it's inherently something I have to do. I could, and have, done commercial work in the past that I could live off of but I just can't bring myself to feed the content machine.

edit: And although I'm kind of ok with the "not successful" part I think my work is important and should be seen. More than anything my measure of success is to add to culture.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#35

Post by dexwiz »

The 20th century was an interesting time for art. Art for the sake of art became the norm. Historically art has always been paid for by 1) the church 2) the state or 3) the rich. Many subjects in museums are religious, propaganda, or vanity. Even the Sistine Chapel was a job.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#36

Post by dimitrios1 »

klipt wrote: post #24
ohiovr wrote: post #21

Who paid for the great works of music in the period between 1700 and 1918? From such musicians as Liszt, Beethoven, Mozart, Bartok, Handel, Debussy, Bach etc... there were a heck of a lot of great composers in that period. I was analyzing Bach the other day. His Brandenburg Concerto #2 has tens of thousands of notes. That is a heck of a lot of work.

Rich patrons mostly.

They were also something that most modern artists and writers are not: good.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#37

Post by balentio »

The system is mostly pay to play. However, it is not really art that's the problem. It is the platform on which to display your art where things get complicated. It's rather like first have the talent to paint a Mona Lisa, then have the talent and time to shove it in everyone's face on social media in the hopes someone recognizes how great you are. In the meantime, crowdfund and keep track of all your accounts so the newly formed IRS gun mafia doesn't come knock on your door requesting your nothing.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#38

Post by anigbrowl »

egypturnash wrote: post #3
anigbrowl wrote: post #2

Underrated piece. In many creative or specialized subfields, some of the best work is being done for peanuts or being given away. Prices are generally thought of as ruled by supply. demand, and product quality, but inferring the latter from the first two really only works in terms of commodities that are relatively fungible. Preferential attachment is a large and underappreciated (by most) factor. You could do experi…

This strategy kinda selects for "great at SEO and promotion", not "great at art".

Yes, that's my point: popularity and quality are only weakly correlated, and platform economics select for the former.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#39

Post by buscoquadnary »

ohiovr wrote: post #21

Who paid for the great works of music in the period between 1700 and 1918? From such musicians as Liszt, Beethoven, Mozart, Bartok, Handel, Debussy, Bach etc... there were a heck of a lot of great composers in that period. I was analyzing Bach the other day. His Brandenburg Concerto #2 has tens of thousands of notes. That is a heck of a lot of work.

Patronage. Honestly music was profitable for a very brief period of time between around 1940s-1990's. Every other time in history it's required someone rich to like you enough to pay you to do it, or be a traveling minstrel who lived on the edge of society.

Like even Wagner who is arguably one of the most influential and popular composers of all time spent most of his life destitute and only was stable when the Kaiser himself was sponsoring him.

I think in the same way though this speaks to something deep and profound about music, I once heard the saying "You can buy anything in this world for money" and I think that the problem we have pricing music has to do with how transcendental it is, it is designed specifically to convey or share something that transcends mere language or description, musics purpose is to communicate from one soul to another in a way that is deep and meaningful, that touches people and brings them in alignment and helps people see that which we can't quite understand in normal life.

It is beautiful, and I think the attempt to commoditize music, make it corporate and subjugate it to the whims.of the market end up making music a little less musical.

Re: You can't afford to be an artist and/or author, let alone be respected

#40

Post by [deleted] »

runevault wrote: post #32
klipt wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rich patrons mostly.

I feel like the patron system of old ended up turning into the modern professional sports system instead of supporting the arts. Which sort of shows the shift in priorities at least the rich have had in more recent years.

[deleted]
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