How to Make Money From Your Art (Blog)

[Savage]

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Steve Pavlina's blog:

How to Make Money From Your Art

[skinnyninja]

I make money from my art by working harder at it than what I worked at my day job.

[Andrew Brunelle]

Great piece of art, Steve. Thanks for shedding some light on how to make money from it. I've been struggling on the money side, at least when it comes from my art. To be honest, I haven't been earning anything from my writing or my stand-up comedy...why? Because I haven't really been committed. This is a wake up call for me, or just a friendly reminder. I've been getting a lot of reminders lately about what it is I feel I should be doing with my life, but for some reason, I'm finding it hard to commit to anything. The only thing I've committed to whatsoever is my job, working night shift.

I find myself entertaining the people I work with on a regular basis, but it's not getting me paid for it. I have an opportunity coming up in December to perform onstage for as long as I want. I just have to start seizing the moments I have. It's just very hard work and it isn't always easy, and I just have to accept that and keep going. I haven't performed much in over a year and it's just that maybe I'm using my disabilities as an excuse and that if I really wanted it, I would overcome all of this.

I'm going to make a solid commitment right now to really try my best to make some kind of income from what I'm doing creatively, if not just for myself, because working nights is starting to get rough.

[neilarthur]

Heard a story about Salvidor Dali and money.

Apparently when he wrote checks he would scribble a drawing on them and now there are hundreds of unpresented checks because people kept them thinking they would be worth more later.

Mind you he was already famous.

[Ken Benjamin]

Really great article, Steve. One of your best in a long time, I'd say.

Maybe that's because it resonates so strongly with what I'm doing.

I launched WisdomWebsite.com just two months ago, though I've been working on it for some months longer, and despite many years starting and running several small computer businesses, this artistic endeavor is a new experience.

For the first time in my life, I'm creating something for which I cannot be sure I will have customers. Now I know what it feels like to be an artist.

I'm truly following my bliss and, I believe, providing strong value for my readers that will translate into customers longer term but the process of putting your heart into an unknown is exciting and terrifying at the same time. I wrote about that here: Is This Hell? The Danger Of Following Your Bliss

It is little wonder that so many people fail to up their game to succeed. So much easier to allow someone else to make the decisions for you, to pass responsibility to a "higher power" in the form of a boss, religion, societal "norms," or ignorance.

Thank you, Steve, for doing what you do. You're an inspiration and while you may not yet count me as a customer, you certainly can count me as a fan (since 2007).

[elucidate]

Originally Posted by Andrew Brunelle

Great piece of art, Steve. Thanks for shedding some light on how to make money from it. I've been struggling on the money side, at least when it comes from my art. To be honest, I haven't been earning anything from my writing or my stand-up comedy...why? Because I haven't really been committed. This is a wake up call for me, or just a friendly reminder. I've been getting a lot of reminders lately about what it is I feel I should be doing with my life, but for some reason, I'm finding it hard to commit to anything. The only thing I've committed to whatsoever is my job, working night shift.

I find myself entertaining the people I work with on a regular basis, but it's not getting me paid for it. I have an opportunity coming up in December to perform onstage for as long as I want. I just have to start seizing the moments I have. It's just very hard work and it isn't always easy, and I just have to accept that and keep going. I haven't performed much in over a year and it's just that maybe I'm using my disabilities as an excuse and that if I really wanted it, I would overcome all of this.

I'm going to make a solid commitment right now to really try my best to make some kind of income from what I'm doing creatively, if not just for myself, because working nights is starting to get rough.

I think I need to make this same commitment now. I have had the same issue with not being committed to what I love, which is art, and it's making me miserable.

I know I can make some sort of income selling the blooming vulva birds, and already have 3 people who have ordered one, so I just need to get going with that.

Making painting a daily habit, and drawing as well as card readings, I think I can get this off the ground...I just have not been the best at committing to it. That needs to change.

[Ken Benjamin]

Originally Posted by elucidate

I think I need to make this same commitment now. I have had the same issue with not being committed to what I love, which is art, and it's making me miserable.

I know I can make some sort of income selling the blooming vulva birds, and already have 3 people who have ordered one, so I just need to get going with that.

Making painting a daily habit, and drawing as well as card readings, I think I can get this off the ground...I just have not been the best at committing to it. That needs to change.

Where would I go if I wanted to see your art?

Assuming your profile photo is your art, I'd love to see more.

If you have a website, why not add a link to it in your signature here?

Maybe I'm mistaken but I think it would update on all of your past posts giving you quite good exposure.

[elucidate]

Originally Posted by Ken Benjamin

Where would I go if I wanted to see your art?

Assuming your profile photo is your art, I'd love to see more.

If you have a website, why not add a link to it in your signature here?

Maybe I'm mistaken but I think it would update on all of your past posts giving you quite good exposure.

Hi.

Firstly, no...my avatar is not my own work...I wish!

Mine is mainly on canvas. You can actually see a few I put up in the "Your Art" thread in Fun and recreation if you like...

Thankyou for the suggestion.

What I have planned with the blooming vulva birds is more for a shop when they are ready...and just word of mouth with friends and at parties etc. I do also have some collages that I want to print onto t-shirts and sell through etsy, so that's one or two things I have in mind.

I'll show you one design that I intend to make into a t-shirt now if you like...I will put it up as my avatar.

[mrthejazz]

From a fiction writer's point of view, it seems he is saying to be Stephen King over a Herman Melville. I'm not sure I agree. Melville made little money and died thinking he was a failure. Years later, his work Moby Dick was widely received as a great work of literary art. He was literally a starving artist. King, on the other hand, is a great writer who knows his market and knows how to craft the kinds of page-turners that people are addicted to.

It's true that taking the King path will get you money, but what if you care more about your contribution to society? What if that true gem just waiting inside you that you have to write turns out to be initially hated by the rest of the world? What if you just write organically instead of trying to find a target audience all the time? What comes of the story then?

Of course, realistically you don't want to cut off your own legs. A starving artist can't generate much art, but given the stupidity of our society right now, I wouldn't put it past them to "not get" most intelligent writing in the world. Twilight may have sold a crapload of copies, but that to me isn't a measure of how skilled or artistic the writer is. It's a measure of how well she knows her target audience. Sometimes the public needs to see controversial material. Sometimes the public needs to be exposed to things they don't like or don't want to hear, and to ignore that because you want to make more money off your art is in my opinion irresponsible.

Perhaps a better option is to just have a day job or alternate source of income, that way you won't feel the pressure to taint your work just to satisfy people who don't necessarily understand what you are trying to do or who aren't necessarily in your corner.

[elucidate]

I was considering writing tacky romance novels for Mills and boone under a pseudonym as a side to fund my projects.

But yeah...a day job is fine for a while. I can't stay in the same crap job too long though. Gotta make sure it's bearable..likeable even.

[cassiopeia]

Inspiring article...

I've recently started taking my art more seriously, but haven't really been focused on making money from it. I find that when I do put pressure on myself to make money from it, my creativity dries up. Right now I'm just focused on getting into the mode where I create something every day, and also just getting some more exposure.

But to make a living from my art... What a dream life that'd be!

[elucidate]

Originally Posted by cassiopeia

Inspiring article...

I've recently started taking my art more seriously, but haven't really been focused on making money from it. I find that when I do put pressure on myself to make money from it, my creativity dries up. Right now I'm just focused on getting into the mode where I create something every day, and also just getting some more exposure.

But to make a living from my art... What a dream life that'd be!

Yep, I'm the same. Money isn't the motivating factor for creating, and at the same time, it would be so fantastic to be able to just paint or draw or whatever full time, and earn a living. That's the dream.

[ButterflyWoman]

Originally Posted by elucidate

I know I can make some sort of income selling the blooming vulva birds

Where can see one? I love this sort of thing. Georgia O'Keefe and her erotic flowers enchant me, and the way Romans put phalluses on everything for luck, and sheela na gig figures... So blooming vulva birds sounds fantastic!

[edit] I see now that you already answered this. I'll go look in that thread, then.

[smartile]

Originally Posted by Savage

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Steve Pavlina's blog:

How to Make Money From Your Art

My favorite line from this blog post... "These beliefs are financially retarded."

In retrospect, I completely agree and laughed my ass off when I read it

[tatoeba]

Originally Posted by mrthejazz

From a fiction writer's point of view, it seems he is saying to be Stephen King over a Herman Melville. I'm not sure I agree. Melville made little money and died thinking he was a failure. Years later, his work Moby Dick was widely received as a great work of literary art. He was literally a starving artist. King, on the other hand, is a great writer who knows his market and knows how to craft the kinds of page-turners that people are addicted to.

Yep, it's up to you : do you want to enjoy your life or not ?

Also Herman Melville, at 27, saw his first published book become an instant bestseller (Typee). Too young? He was famous and maybe later made some bad decisions. And of course they was no Pavlina around to help him.

PS : I guess you read King's biography too.

[elucidate]

Originally Posted by ButterflyWoman

Where can see one? I love this sort of thing. Georgia O'Keefe and her erotic flowers enchant me, and the way Romans put phalluses on everything for luck, and sheela na gig figures... So blooming vulva birds sounds fantastic!

[edit] I see now that you already answered this. I'll go look in that thread, then.

Oh hey. Wow, Sheela na gig...I haven't heard that name in a while now. Gotta love her.

I don't have an image of the birds in the fun section art thread, and I wasn't allowed to put it up as my avatar last time. I guess it's legal to put it up in the Art thread though, so it's there now if you wanna lookie.

[Ken Benjamin]

Originally Posted by elucidate

Hi.

Firstly, no...my avatar is not my own work...I wish!

Mine is mainly on canvas. You can actually see a few I put up in the "Your Art" thread in Fun and recreation if you like...

Thankyou for the suggestion.

What I have planned with the blooming vulva birds is more for a shop when they are ready...and just word of mouth with friends and at parties etc. I do also have some collages that I want to print onto t-shirts and sell through etsy, so that's one or two things I have in mind.

I'll show you one design that I intend to make into a t-shirt now if you like...I will put it up as my avatar.

Thanks for sharing and you're welcome for the suggestion.

"Flocks" of blooming vulva birds. That'll be interesting to see. I'm curious to see how they unfold

[Ken Benjamin]

Originally Posted by mrthejazz

From a fiction writer's point of view, it seems he is saying to be Stephen King over a Herman Melville. I'm not sure I agree. Melville made little money and died thinking he was a failure. Years later, his work Moby Dick was widely received as a great work of literary art. He was literally a starving artist. King, on the other hand, is a great writer who knows his market and knows how to craft the kinds of page-turners that people are addicted to.

It's true that taking the King path will get you money, but what if you care more about your contribution to society? What if that true gem just waiting inside you that you have to write turns out to be initially hated by the rest of the world? What if you just write organically instead of trying to find a target audience all the time? What comes of the story then?

Of course, realistically you don't want to cut off your own legs. A starving artist can't generate much art, but given the stupidity of our society right now, I wouldn't put it past them to "not get" most intelligent writing in the world. Twilight may have sold a crapload of copies, but that to me isn't a measure of how skilled or artistic the writer is. It's a measure of how well she knows her target audience. Sometimes the public needs to see controversial material. Sometimes the public needs to be exposed to things they don't like or don't want to hear, and to ignore that because you want to make more money off your art is in my opinion irresponsible.

Perhaps a better option is to just have a day job or alternate source of income, that way you won't feel the pressure to taint your work just to satisfy people who don't necessarily understand what you are trying to do or who aren't necessarily in your corner.

The way I read it was that Steve was suggesting that you follow your heart but do so sometimes with an eye toward market acceptance. If, from time to time, you really feel the need to write something, write it. Maybe it'll hit, maybe it'll be a posthumous success, maybe it'll die in a pile of bits in the cloud.

I think there is a difference between selling out, say to write pulp fiction that you don't love, and finding a market. As writers don't we have different voices we can apply? Don't we have more than one book idea in our mind? Can't we write in a style accessible to an audience? Of course.

The other thing Steve was saying is that we need to hone our craft. Whatever our art, we need skill within our craft. If you want to succeed (have others value your work), you need to provide something of value. That doesn't mean pandering but it does mean high quality work. You have to put in the hours to develop the skill. The greater the skill, the greater the potential success.

One of those skills should be some marketing sense. If your only focus is on the art and you want others to value your work, then you aren't doing your best if you don't become more well-rounded and grow in both the depth of your art and the breadth of your abilities.

Look at Steve. Here's a guy who is constantly pushing his boundaries further out. Now it's music, before it was his sexuality. Before he started his blog, he had already worked to develop his business, computer, social networking, and writing abilities. Without all of these, say only good writing, we wouldn't be here now posting on this forum.

Herman Melville, presumably, was not the best he could be. Had he invested some time to learn the social and marketing skills he needed to succeed, he probably would have done so without having to rely on someone else 'discovering' his writing and marketing it after his death. The same could be said for van Gogh. Great artist, lousy businessman.

Like the Army ad slogan says, "Be all you can be."

Keep in mind that there is no such thing as "good enough" rather successful living comes from a constant expansion of being all you can be. Each day you are more than you were the day before. Yesterday you were all you could be then. What will you choose to be tomorrow? That is the question that you must ask.

[elucidate]

Originally Posted by Ken Benjamin

"Flocks" of blooming vulva birds. That'll be interesting to see. I'm curious to see how they unfold

Ha!

Nice one.

That's given me another idea actually...thanks.

[neilarthur]

If you are looking for ideas on networking in the Arts you might want to check out this article on Musician's Way called Ninja Networking

bloghttp://musiciansway.com/blog/2011/10/ninja-networking-part-i/

[Ken Benjamin]

Originally Posted by elucidate

Ha!

Nice one.

That's given me another idea actually...thanks.

Happy to have inspired.

[Starbuck]

Originally Posted by Savage

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Steve Pavlina's blog:

How to Make Money From Your Art

I wanted to write something very lengthy and intelligent in response to this post, but all I can say is: Thank you so much, Steve.

This post really 'came to me' at a time when I was feeling very down, confused and rather frustrated about the prospects of ever being able to live from my writing.

But you cleared up a lot of things for me and connected the last dots I needed to connect to understand what I was doing wrong. I have real faith that I will make progress now, and that is, as always, the real value of being privileged to benefit from the perspective and guidance from someone who has 'walked the path'.

Yeah, I know you probably get a zillion thank you's like this every week or so, and that you don't really hang around in the forums anymore. But if this message can add a little bit to your already excellent karma, to write this, then I wish it so!

Oh, and the next time you publish a product - like your awesome book, which I bought - and which can be enjoyed from a distance (i.e. if one lives outside the US) --- then I'll be the first in line to shop!

Don't want to be just a fan, y'know.

[Ken Benjamin]

Originally Posted by Ken Benjamin

Thank you, Steve, for doing what you do. You're an inspiration and while you may not yet count me as a customer, you certainly can count me as a fan (since 2007).

Oops, I forgot. I've purchased two copies of his book. I guess you can count me as a customer AND a fan.

[ohTen]

As a musician who has been following you for several years, I was really happy to see this article. Currently trying to figure out my own path to financial success as a musician. I seem to be getting better at it (I paid last month's rent with money earned from playing music, the second time I've been able to do that in a year), but I've still got a way to go before it's my primary source of income. So thanks for this article - i'm really enjoying reading about your 30 day music trial as well!

[ellie]

I am an artist, and I have to say I just fell into my art, and to be honest I haven't had to work that hard at it all. I definitely haven't invested 10,000 hours and my art work is getting more exposure everyday without much effort and yes I make money from my art. I think I have the potential to be quite successful actually. I get lots of request for people to represent me. People think I have had years of training, but I haven't. In fact, I started my art purely as an experiment, for something else. I wasn't actually setting out to be an "artist", at all. If you would of told me I would be now illustrating a few years ago I would of said "no way". My art found me.

The only thing that got me here, was trying lots of things art, music, design, fashion, stock market, domain buying etc, experimenting and failing, not specifically setting out to be "one particular thing" (although at the time I thought I wanted to be that one particular thing). It was because I tried lots of things (and failed at most), that a path began to unravel. What happens, when you eradicate all the things that you tried and failed in, you can tick them off your list, and then don't go down that same path again. Eventually that path becomes shorter and more clearer.

So personally for me (or for personality types like me) you need to try a variety of things, and don't put pressure on yourself to be one this or that, eventually you will 'hit' the right note. When the right note hits, it should be pretty easy actually.

Or it could be that I am one of those luckily one that has natural talent...and finally found it