Don't Be An Artist

Do you, or have you ever, called yourself “an artist?” This title, which I once coveted, is now anathema to me.

I remember when I was young wanting so very badly to be able to say legitimately that I was an artist because I thought it was the supreme profession. Nothing, I thought, could fill me with greater pride than to be an artist. But things started happening to me to deter my ambition early in my education.

My problem was academics. I was reasonably good at them—particularly with sciences—and so everyone around me, my teachers, family and friends, encouraged my academic advancement. A practical benefit of my academic success was scholarships that served to make my post-secondary education affordable, but they also forced me into an academic track increasingly focused on the sciences.

As an undergraduate college student, academic success seemed to create increasing limitations. The more I succeeded, the narrower my world seemed to become. I found myself in smaller classes, exposed to fewer students and my courses became more and more focused on biology. The trouble for me was that my success was unfulfilling.

Academic success seemed to me, as an undergrad, to be involved with nothing more than memorization and regurgitation. The quantification of learning into marks and the pressure of the competitive academic hierarchy created an unwelcome atmosphere; I craved the ambiguity and freedom of the creative courses that had disappeared from my life as a scholar. I wanted to be “an artist.”

My discontent was my secret. Everyone around me was so pleased with what I was doing I felt that I could not express my frustration. But at the end of my third year at college, I was forced to declare my dissatisfaction: I turned down an opportunity to be semi fast-tracked into a pre-med program. For the first time, out loud, I said I wanted to become an artist. The effect was as though I had said I wanted to become a cannibal.

Anyone can memorize, I thought. Anyone that had academic potential, it seemed to me at the time, could be a doctor or a lawyer if they were prepared to work hard, but being creative seemed to me to be about the nurturing of a “gift.” Learning could enhance creativity, I thought, but it could not be academically induced. I craved the opportunity to test myself in a creative environment instead of academics—creative success, I knew, would fulfill me.

Now, a career later, I teach business skills to artists at Emily Carr University and every term, in every class, I can be heard saying: “Do NOT be an artist.” (I love using what I call “the provocative tense” when I teach.)

So how have I come to abhor the title that once so inspired me? The answer is simple. The word “artist” has no meaning as a professional identifier. It is an insulting answer because it tells the asker nothing.

Research says the majority of sales by local contemporary artists are to people with whom the artist has a relationship, so visual artists with aspirations must make the absolute most of every single opportunity to establish or to further a relationship, and the question, “What do you do” affords visual artists with the opportunity to do just that. But if you answer, “I am an artist,” what is the listener to conclude? You are a dancer? A writer? An actor?

A person who is truly interested in you, a person who may become a customer, a fan or a word-of-mouth advertiser for you, learns nothing from the statement, “I am an artist;” the person is forced to ask, “What kind of artist?” Even the term, “visual artist” is lacking in enough specificity. The question, “What do you do?” is an opportunity that you should maximize. Your answer to this question should be a thoughtful and carefully crafted one.

The better answer is one that helps the asker learn more precisely about what you do. I am not advocating that you respond with a virtual advertisement or that you bore your interlocutor with too much information. What I advocate is that all visual artists have a thoughtful, meaningful answer. Consider, for example, these responses:

• I am a (master) printmaker
• I am a creative self-employed professional
• I am a watercolour landscape artist
• I am an artist that, according to the Leadington Star, is a “national treasure”
• I am a wildlife photographer with a fine artist sensibility
• I am a contemporary impressionist
• I am a fine art painter and I teach technique

All these responses to the question, “What do you do,” are from my students after they have discussed the importance of a life-long professional identity. Every one of these examples is from a visual artist who, prior to our discussion, self-identified as simply “an artist.”

The issue here, is your professional identity; your “brand.” What you call yourself is a vital business decision worthy of thoughtful reflection. Your professional identity should help people understand exactly what you do. If you say, simply, that you are “an artist,” you are throwing away an opportunity.

Every time you introduce yourself to an individual, to a group, to a jury, a curator, a customer or a potential customer you have an opportunity to impress and to inform and you should use it. My advice is to not identify yourself as “an artist,” but instead, to think of a self-descriptor that is more meaningful and engaging. Reward the person who expresses interest in you with a thoughtful answer.

Artist "Pensions"

I interviewed twenty artists for Making It: Case Studies of Successful Canadian Visual Artists. Collectively, they have half a millennium of experience; had I thought of the project that way from the beginning, I might not have been so surprised by some of its wonderful but unexpected outcomes.

One great idea that emerged from the panel interviews came from Val Nelson. She referred to one of her business practices as the development of her self-directed artists’ pensions. Whereas I was familiar with the professional practice of strategically retaining work throughout the span of their career, I had never thought of the practice as the creation of an artists’ “pension.”

I have often heard artists bemoan the volume of their unsold inventory, but rather than see it negatively, thinking of it as a pension changes a perceived liability into an asset. Val put a clever (financial) spin on an established professional practice; she made me consider an artists work record (or unsold inventory) in a different and positive way.

What is a Curator?

Image credit.

Curators are stewards of collections. They are the primary caretakers of the objects in the collections of archives, libraries, galleries, museums, individual and corporate collections and many botanical gardens. The curator’s role may include some or all of these tasks:

• Collecting objects.
• Making provisions for the effective preservation, conservation, interpretation, documentation, research and display of a collection.
• Making the collection accessible to the public.

Most visual artists and the general public become aware of curators in their capacity of organizer of exhibitions—a curator (or director acting as a curator) runs most public (non-profit) galleries. In the past, curators often had degrees in fine art; today, many curators have degrees in curatorial studies. Curators are either employees of visual art organizations and are attached to a specific institution, or they freelance, proposing projects to the resident curators of institutions.

Curators can also be understood as tellers of stories. They tell their stories in both imagery (the artifacts themselves) and interpretive accompanying text. The exhibitions or “stories” are revelatory: by seeing a large number of pieces by one artist or by viewing the images of several artists in one exhibition, viewers find deeper meanings through the relationships between the images, and by doing so they discover the thread of the curator’s intension in creating the exhibition. The curator’s story is told in the artifacts themselves for those who want to discover it, as well as in the catalogues, artist statements, the narrative of gallery docents and sometimes in text panels that are part of the exhibition.

As stewards of our heritage, curators working in public institutions have a responsibility to tell us the most interesting or most important stories of, and for, their constituencies. They are responsible to the local taxpayers (the general public whose taxes support the institution), the artists of their community and their members, sponsors and donors. They must show us the best of our local, provincial and national artists—those artists who excel at saying who we are and those who make a significant contribution to contemporary art practice. And, when possible, they should show us the work of very significant artists from outside our communities. The role of the curator in a public institution, or the institution’s curatorial objective, is often defined in the institution’s constitution or mandate.

Curators also function significantly in the lives of Canadian visual artists because of the role they often play in the peer jurying process of the Canada Council and other funding agencies. Their regional knowledge of artists helps coordinate public investment in specific artists and/or art practices. Artists who are often featured in the exhibitions of significant public institutions are those who become part of our cultural heritage. Art critics, dealers and collectors pay particular attention to the artists who capture the interest of curators.

Curators are responsible for knowing what is going on in their communities— provincially, nationally and internationally. The specific responsibilities of a curator vary from institution to institution; some curators have a specific focus on a geographical region (such as for a relatively isolated or rural public gallery) whereas others may specialize in a medium or genre of art. Curating is a creative and intellectual activity designed to provoke thought about a thesis. It is a process of narrative, assembling the work of artists around a theme, issue or concern. The curatorial process can address the relevance and interconnections between the works of diverse artists, or it can focus on the work of a single artist revealing new insights into their process.

Curators who work in an institutional environment (the large public galleries) have to shape the thesis of their exhibitions in the context of their gallery’s mandate, its academic/aesthetic worth, and its relation to the institutional audience. Their exhibitions often have to serve as a basis for public funding applications, so they must be meritorious. Curators approach artists, galleries and collectors for work to include in their exhibitions—work that supports their thesis.

A curator can become aware of you by means of reviews of your work in the media, by seeing your work in an exhibition, by word of mouth from other visual artists or through the artist’s efforts to meet the curator. Many contemporary artists have representation by a commercial gallery and seek to exhibit in public galleries as well. Their shows in commercial galleries can serve as a means of introduction to curators (and vice versa). No matter how it comes to be that an artist has an interview or studio visit with a curator, the artist should be properly prepared.