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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

#231

Post by nosianu »

watwut wrote: post #223
nosianu wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both examples you picked were at the very top of their profession - and then some - even at their time. I'm not sure if looking at the Newtons, Einsteins, or Mozarts and Bachs of the past tells us all that much for the current discussion. Not to leave it at criticism, while highly specialized, the excellent lectures of Professor Christopher Page of Gresham College linked on the bottom of https://www.gresham.ac.uk/spe…

All examples in the original comment are people at the top of the profession. Literally none of them is average music teacher. And the question was "who paid for the great music of the period". Einstein was not richer then other physicians. His fame could have help him when emigrating and at keeping employment, but afaik it was not rewarded by super unusual riches.

> All examples in the original comment are people at the top of the profession.

And how does that invalidate the argument? "Others made the same mistake!" - Yes, and?

> Einstein was not richer then other physicians.

How is this relevant to the argument? (Rhetorical question - it is not)

> And the question was "who paid for the great music of the period".

OP wrote "there were a heck of a lot of great composers in that period". Which is correct - most of the works were from regular people. They were not as outstanding as Mozart or Bach, but still produced a lot of the great music. People like Johann Pachelbel, to give an example. Not in the same league as Mozart, but there were many of the same type and they produced most of the music of the period.

I play recorder and violin and most of the sheet music I play is from those more normal people.

Oh and the parent (buscoquadnary) is not quite correct when he only points to "patronage". A lot, if not most of those people made money with performances (Mozart too! - https://www.biography.com/news/mozart-pauper-lost-fortune) and with teaching.

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

#232

Post by contentboot »

>Seems like in order to practise their art, they need a reliable but remedial job to pay the bills. Unfortunately, the nature of that kind of work is energy depleting zapping any creative juices needed for the concentration and initiative to produce content.

I'd highly recommend quitting your job. 10/10 experience.

Just make sure to check your funds war chest before hand.

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

#233

Post by afiori »

cecilpl2 wrote: post #9
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…

> That is, the art itself has no inherit value. The actual value of a piece of art is whatever you can convince someone to pay for it. This goes for any good or service. Usually when people talk about the "value of something" they mean "the price that people are willing to pay for it".

Value and market value are two different things.

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

#234

Post by PurpleRamen »

wwweston wrote: post #210
8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #95

There's a lot of entitlement from "artists" who sit on a moral high horse and expect special treatment because they're "expressing a higher truth" while the rest of us normies toil in obscurity and sell our souls to corporate overlords to pay the bills. Not all artists are like that, and IME the more successful and experienced ones are the least likely to think that way, but the attitude is quite common with beginner…

> You always see signs exhorting you to "support your local artists", yet you never see encouragement to support your local roofers. Nobody asks roofers to work for "exposure." Nobody's telling roofers that a penny per shingle / tile would be "entitled" of them ( https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2021/06/29/spotify-executiv... ). Nobody's arguing that roofers should agree to roof for a pittance and come up with some "…

I don't know any roofers, but I know many people from others crafts, including my own; and sorry, but no, people trying to pay with exposure or something cheap like a beer or cookies are everywhere, in most trades.

Labor is undervalued all the time, especially if someone has no experience with it and does not understand the amount of time necessary for getting something done. And if you are young and starting your business, they try to exploit you even more. This is not limited to art. And Internet just intensified this, as now you have not only the cheapskates from your neighborhood, but of the whole world. Though, with art there is also the part that some people are not seeing it as a real job, but only as a hobby or something you do for our own enjoyment. So they are even more willing to undervalue it.

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

#235

Post by PurpleRamen »

finexplained wrote: post #137
pcwalton wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people would say the same about programmers.

Sure, but we actually provide business value and our toolset is applicable to a broad set of problems.

Depends on whom you ask.

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

#236

Post by PurpleRamen »

filoleg wrote: post #152
pcwalton wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people would say the same about programmers.

Yeah, but programmers aren't trying to justify higher pay or claim they deserve some special treatment because they are "expressing themselves". Programmers are simply paid what they get paid because businesses they work for can make up that cost (of paying programmers the salary) with profit multiple times over, using the work produced by those programmers.

> Yeah, but programmers aren't trying to justify higher pay or claim they deserve some special treatment because they are "expressing themselves".

Yes, and no. There are entitled developers who think they deserve more than the average worker. And there are those developers who delve into their "Devine art" and are cranky because the world does not appreciate it. Usually those people are to be found around the more exotic languages it seems.

Art and IT have a big intersection from my experience. And majority of people in IT and also art are not entitled, nor are they on the Divine Train. It's just that as an outsider, you barely encounter those people, because of which it's harder to get a good picture of the art-scene.

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

#237

Post by PurpleRamen »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #95

There's a lot of entitlement from "artists" who sit on a moral high horse and expect special treatment because they're "expressing a higher truth" while the rest of us normies toil in obscurity and sell our souls to corporate overlords to pay the bills. Not all artists are like that, and IME the more successful and experienced ones are the least likely to think that way, but the attitude is quite common with beginner…

> yet you never see encouragement to support your local roofers.

Do roofers need support?

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

#238

Post by 2-718-281-828 »

vanadium1st wrote: post #87

Outside of my regular job, I am an indie folk music artist, trying to rise in the local music scene here in Dnipro, Ukraine. Even though learning to be a musician from scratch in my 20s was a hard process that took years and years, by far the hardest part of it was trying to establish a passive income, so I could have enough free time for practicing, performing and writing music. A lot of my talented peers are so muc…

> I guess the life of artists was always like that - either you are struggling, or you have a source of passive income that carries you through the development years

Most importantly ... wealthy parents ;)

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

#239

Post by srg0 »

ch4s3 wrote: post #135
rafaelero wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the development of AI, it's been quite an experience to see artists grasping the fact that their craft is not the magical thing they think it is.

DALL·E 2 and co are pretty neat, but the output mostly sucks as art. Good art comes from somewhere, having provenance in person, place, culture, and time. Really great art can be quite moving, and I've yet to see anything AI generated that elicits more than a chuckle or a mild "huh neat" from anyone who doesn't know why it's technically impressive.

I can see Dall-E and co lowering the skill level required to accomplish some artistic tasks. Specialisation and delegation were part of the artistic creation for centuries. AI can do some mundane tasks reasonably well (e.g. shade a volume or draw a character in a specific pose). This should lower the barrier to entry and allow new artists with a different training and background to create in new ways. Sort of like some electronic musicians do not know to play an instrument, and rely solely on hardware or software to actually trigger sounds.

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

#240

Post by hoseja »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #95

There's a lot of entitlement from "artists" who sit on a moral high horse and expect special treatment because they're "expressing a higher truth" while the rest of us normies toil in obscurity and sell our souls to corporate overlords to pay the bills. Not all artists are like that, and IME the more successful and experienced ones are the least likely to think that way, but the attitude is quite common with beginner…

It's the product of culture mostly being hijacked by artistic types and so they implant memes beneficial to them into it disproportionately.
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