Simple answer is to make art people want to buy and to be pushy enough to get it seen. Quite a big ask for a lot of serious artists, but well understood by a lot of less serious artists who cash in on creating middle of the road decorative artworks.
I have an artist friend who is constantly struggling to break even even after having some big commissions and having most of the right connections. While some of his mates have become rich doing paintings in Dubai hotel lobbies and selling along side shite like Alec Monopoly he just keeps falling back on the well worn path of punting out little bits of work for mates.
Like everything in life, the aggressive go-getters will take all the opportunities if you let them.
A mate does art full time and it really is a “grind” as the kids probably don’t say anymore.
He gets a few commissions off councils painting walls (in Aus) and tries to sell as much merch, prints etc as possible by doing “experience” type events. He hired a ghost train for one. Still struggles with cashflow I think. He hates having to do the social media stuff but does it relentlessly anyway. Probably a different vibe to where you’re coming from, but it is the way to get seen by as many people as possible. However “conversion” (clicks / likes to actual sales) is tiny.
Another friend does loads of instagram, posts work in progress stuff, finished stuff, and general Insta lifestyle bollocks. She’s really good but still does it as a hobby basically.
Yeah, it’s a conundrum. I’m not going to stop working to try this thing, i’m only going to make that break if it gets feasible. But rather than stopping myself trying altogether in the first place because it’s barely workable and unrealistic i’m going to go for it because you never know. I really have to change the way I think.
I really don’t like the socials side of it and I don’t think it would be beneficial to what I want to do, it’s not impressive stuff it’s just modern aesthetic painting.
Something that might help pay some way and would absolutely need socials is to offer doing bedroom/wall murals. Totally separate to the art of course.
I think it is possible to get stuff happening without any social media. I barely use it (re music stuff, which is kind of similar), deleted instagram and just keep fb for one niche group that I send stuff to very occasionally via the admin. I did do a lot of youtube for a while but find it doesn’t translate into anything useful so kind of sacked that off too. That said I’m a long way off making anything like a living from it, but it pays for my occasional (music) gear upgrades
I saw a clip of some artist guy (can’t remember who sorry) who said “I just focus on making really good stuff, then other people discuss it on social media. I don’t have to”
Real world connections are well underrated. I guess you could do a zine or something if that appeals? What does your stuff look like? Got anything I can see?
Does a song revert from being ABU in a video section if the person skating to it is cancelled/a wanker?
Example: mikey Taylor skates to crumble by dinosaur jr in mindfield.
His section is the vert button of the video and should never have been included. Given his recent property-bro, MAGA leanings does crumble fall back into the public domain?
Hmm would that depend on how much you associate the skater with the song?
Mikey Taylor in mindfield- I had to listen to the song, then think really hard ‘Has someone already skated to this? Hmm I’m sure I’ve heard it used. goes to skatevideosite damn, fucking horse face’
Heath in mindfield - if Spotify randomly feeds me speedway by morrisey, I immediately have the image of a black and white owl and heath’s silhoutted profile in my head. By the end of the song I’m imagining that I am Heath
There’s always going to be someone who makes the connection though.
“I like this song, where have I heard it before? Oh it was fuckin HorseFace Killah”
Just pick another D-Jr song, there are literally millions.
My get around for this is to assume that Greg Hunt picked the music and therefore any Taylor links are minor. It’s got a slight whiff of shit but isn’t fully covered in it
In related news @Gconroy I’d really like to see somebody else skate to ‘Let it ride’ by Dinosaur Jr even though Blender skates to it in Speed Freaks mainly because it’s such a great song and the original Blender part has all but disappeared from the Internet.
Messed up my drawing so badly ha. Thought I’d add colour with some pencils and watercolours from Smiths but messed it up. Can’t draw people so turned it into some kind of abstract thing ha. Was way more fun anyway.
just graffitied over far right hate speech. A black heart over a hanging star. It annoyed me so much. I struggled to get black spray so want over with a black heart in acrylic.
