Making art, making a living

The problem with artistic / creative pursuits is making a living doing them, especially early in a career.

A few, very few, will make it to the top and earn good money; many others will get better over time and make a decent living, but starting out is tough.

The rest of the world does not value the labour of early-career artists, by and large. Which means that only people who inherit some privilege can afford to persevere through to the times when they can get by on their own. (And it’s not that arts education is cheap.)

Things have changed a bit, and there are, of course, grants, fellowships and other kinds of support. Often, though, the pursuit of these can take up inordinate amounts of time, time that could have been spent being creative.

And yes, privilege still counts, not just in who gets this kind of support but even in just hearing of what is available, getting one’s foot in the door.

For the rest who are driven enough, it means making far less money than their peers in other walks of life.

Or working in some other — hopefully allied — field and creating in one’s free time. And, maybe, later, with savings banked away or spousal/family support, try again.

Nothing wrong with working in an allied field; one can pick up extra skills, build networks, all that. And a world view, experience in life, which is invaluable, possibly informing one’s creative vision, making one a better artist. (In the creative world I know best, writing, I know very few people who were able to get a novel or volume of poetry published early in their lives. Most writers had — and many still have — day jobs.) And nothing wrong with working in a non-allied field either. For some people, in fact, it actually works better to have that unconnected day job.

It’s just that… wouldn’t it be nice to devote oneself to an art and make a living at that art, starting modestly, as in any other profession, but at least making a decent wage?

In other words, wouldn’t it be nice to have a decent arts ecosystem? An ecosystem that gave creative practitioners the choice of working and growing within it?

p.s.

It is hugely encouraging to see the work people I know and am proud to call friends are doing. Rashmi Dhanwani, who with her team is doing the kind of work too many creative people consider unsexy, like research and documentation, aside from the more visible work of building community and platforms and necessary conversations; Arundhati Ghosh, Menaka Rodriguez, and Darshana Dave raising funds and seeding work; Hemant Divate and Smruti DIvate who are doing the unthinkable and publishing books of poetry; Ranvir Shah growing a foundation and platforms for the arts and also growing people like Meera K, who are the glue that binds the arts without ever taking centre-stage themselves, more and more smaller venues, from ones that have been around while like Prithvi Theatre, the ones that host events aside from the other work they do, like the British Council and Alliance Francaise branches, to new places coming up all around us.

I’m sure I’m forgetting lots of people and things — and also oversimplifying the work of people I have mentioned — but I am not an authority on the field, and this is not a speech, so I can come back and edit it.