Why do so many artists starve?

Discussion in 'Member Casual Chat' started by Le Chef, Apr 19, 2021.

  1. Le Chef

    Le Chef Banned at members request Donor

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    Everyone is familiar with Antonin Vivaldi, or at least you have heard his music, for example, La Primavera, in hotel lobbies and film soundtracks.





    The music is as elegant and beautiful as ever. It is still played all over the world, and forms part of every violinist's repertoire. He was among the most popular composers in Europe in the 18th century. Here's what happened to him:

    Shortly after his arrival in Vienna, Charles VI died, which left the composer without any royal protection or a steady source of income. Soon afterwards, Vivaldi became impoverished[48][49] and died during the night of 27/28 July 1741, aged 63,[50] of "internal infection", in a house owned by the widow of a Viennese saddlemaker.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Vivaldi


    I was thinking of him today in the context of the starving artist syndrome. If Vivaldi could starve, what chance do lesser artists have? It's a precarious to suicidal profession, even for the best. Why is this? How can you recommend art as a career to a child?

    My guess is that art is pretty low on the scale of things humanity really needs, after food, shelter, employment, intimacy, self-esteem, and security. It's also possible that the most reckless and irresponsible among us are drawn to make art.
     
    Last edited: Apr 19, 2021
  2. Dayton3

    Dayton3 Well-Known Member

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    Simple and easy answers:

    1) The quality of ones work and the economic viability of that same work is often far, far removed. A very high quality artist, writer, painter, musician, singer might never or even only sporadically reap substantial economic benefits from their work.

    2) "Art skills" and financial management skills are often far, far removed from each other.
     
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  3. Thingamabob

    Thingamabob Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    These days we have the Musicians' Union. If you live in a country that doesn't have one ..... you're xxxx'ed.
     
  4. The Rhetoric of Life

    The Rhetoric of Life Banned

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    because their skills don't pay the bills.

    It's one thing having talent, but you have to also have other talents, like business and work ethic as well as creative.
     
  5. The Rhetoric of Life

    The Rhetoric of Life Banned

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    In my country, the UK, I feel the MU's a con, as it's just an insurance policy capped at £1, 000.00

    Play your Gibson Les Paul and it gets damaged or stolen at work, you're screwed with the MU; it's just an insurance policy here that's no good to me.

    Your country's PRO (if it has one) is where it's at; they can protect your intellectual property.
     
    Last edited: May 4, 2021
  6. Arkie

    Arkie Well-Known Member

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    Speaking for myself....my art is a hobby. Just a hobby. I have to be "in the mood" to make anything worthwhile and that comes in spurts. Hence...starving artist. But not me. I was smart enough to not rely on that alone.
     
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  7. FreshAir

    FreshAir Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    you have to make small quantities of what the rich want, or high quantities of that the masses want
     
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  8. Aleksander Ulyanov

    Aleksander Ulyanov Well-Known Member

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    Up until the beginning of the 19th century, you just about couldn't make a living in the Arts at all and you had to seek the patronage of wealthy people or royalty which is why most art made up before then follows conventions so closely and changes very slowly if at all. Even after mass markets existed there was still very little demand for most art until the invention of movies and mass recording at the beginning of the 1900's
     
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  9. Le Chef

    Le Chef Banned at members request Donor

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    Cater to the classes and eat with the masses. Cater to the masses and eat with the classes.
     
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  10. Chrizton

    Chrizton Well-Known Member

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    I wouldn't have a problem supporting art as a career to a child but I would certainly guide them to not think they are getting rich off drawings that hang on the fridge. I would spend time telling them, reminding them, and getting them to think about things like horizontal integration so they would be in the mindset that they need to be more than just the creator in the process. That would get them open to the idea that they are going to have to look for other opportunities within the field like teaching or running a shop or whatever which will in turn get them open to the idea of doing something more profitable as a living and do the art on the side. The absolute most skilled painter I have ever met ran a photography studio taking the typical baby in the metal bucket type photos. Where he was able to integrate that with painting was in the photo restoration work he did. He would take a high quality photo of the damaged photograph, remove all the damage, hand paint the missing part to such a level you didn't know it was painted, and then create the new negative to do as many copies as they wanted.
     
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  11. Phil

    Phil Well-Known Member

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    People literally starve or almost starve because they won't surrender their dream in favor of the practical need to get a job to pay bills.
     
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  12. Le Chef

    Le Chef Banned at members request Donor

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    Right, agree, but the question really is, why isn't there more demand for art? Is there just too much of it? Or do we moderns just have no appetite at all for art?

    As noted in the OP, everyone knows and enjoys Vivaldi, but he died broke. They don't all go broke. J.S. Bach and J.S. Haydn were quite prosperous. And of course the Elton Johns, AC/DC's, Aerosmiths, Madonnas, and Paul McCartneys are fabulously wealthy.
     
  13. 19Crib

    19Crib Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    They didn’t have copyright laws for one. They had no easy way to duplicate music in such a way as to sell copies for listening at home.
    In short, they had no adequate way to monetize music.
     
    Last edited: Sep 27, 2021
  14. modernpaladin

    modernpaladin Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Art is an emotional outlet. The highly emotional tend to be the ones most driven to create art ...and the ones least driven to produce more 'useful' things. Lucky are the ones able to find a niche where what they enjoy creating has enough demand to be profitable.
     
  15. roorooroo

    roorooroo Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Because their daddy was never the President of the United States?
     
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  16. Lindis

    Lindis Banned

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    It rhymes - and has reason.
     
  17. VotreAltesse

    VotreAltesse Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I have some counter examples of that in mind, as far as I know Rubens and Elisabeth Vigée le Brun ended to be pretty wealthy (for the first until the french revolution where she lost a lot of goods). For music, as far as I know some compositors such Lully had a decent lifestyle.
    From what I red, a lot of painters where paid as skilled craftmans, and some did had a decent income, having a lot of assistants.
    It's true that you were dependant however of globally the nobility or the upper classes among the commoners.


    Yes but on another point, there was other advantages. Today, if we want, a single artist could have his picture in all houses of the world, because we could print a poster almost 9 billions times. Before the 19th century, copying was harder, for painting, there was no photography so artists had a monopoly on portraits and so on.
    There was no registered music, you wanted to hear music, you had no other choice to listen an artist. So everytime you wanted to hear (professional) music, you had to pay it. You couldn't just go to your cd player (and today that's old school).

    To answer @Le Chef, I'm not sure it was particular to artists in that time to starve, life was extremely harsh for all people, and I'm not sure they had that much a bad fate compared to many commoners.
    The other aspects is that art is often something that is pursued with a religious zeal. Many great artists valued their art more than their lives, beyond reason, a little bit like a religious zealot would pursue enligthenment or god favour at the risk of their own life. It's a passion that is burning your soul, against all "reasonnable" matter, but it has also it's greatest reward.
     
  18. Canell

    Canell Well-Known Member

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    Excuse me, what? Are you referring to the demons of abomination of today's so called music? Like the one with the painted teeth? Or other millionaire thugs?
    Well, while it could be called art, it's not music. That's why they call themselves "artists", not "musicians".

    Anyway, back in the day of Vivaldi, there were no copyright laws and record studios. Perhaps that's why he died broke. The Michael Jacksons and the Madonnas of today don't seem to have that problem.

    But it is shame that those little scums of today make so much money praising thug life and all the vices in the world in their music. So called music. Actually they can't sing. But they have the arrogance to go on stage and mumble their BS on Autotune.
    While real musicians remain out of the mainstream (see next message).
     
  19. Canell

    Canell Well-Known Member

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    Hey, VotreAltesse, how are you doing. :) Can you, please, tell us more about Dabeull and Holybrune? They seem like very gifted musicians. Are they popular in France? :)

     
    Last edited: Dec 6, 2021
  20. VotreAltesse

    VotreAltesse Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'm fine ! Thanks and you ?

    I never heard of them.
    Among the popular artists those last time I heard constantly about Orelsan, a little bit about Angele. I know that teenagers listen Wejdene and Aya Nakamura. Stromae is probably the french speaking artist I would listen the most, he is belgian however.

    I must admit that I listen mostly classical/middle age music, catholic music even if I'm no catholic.
     
  21. Le Chef

    Le Chef Banned at members request Donor

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    No, I'm not. (Are you willfully misunderstanding or just being insulting?) I was referring to artists over the ages in every medium.
     
  22. Canell

    Canell Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, sorry, I guess I overreacted. I'm very touchy on the topic of music. :)
    Anyway, apples and oranges. Can't really compare 18c and 21c. Different laws, different culture, different public, different technology (of producing and distributing music). Cheers! :hug:
     
  23. Canell

    Canell Well-Known Member

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    They are Parisian, as I understand.

    Good, much better than today's abomination of a music that is supposed to be pop-music. ;)

     
  24. Le Chef

    Le Chef Banned at members request Donor

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    It is highly likely to near certain that there are brilliant artists, from pop to jazz, working and composing today whose art is known only to their families and a small circle of friends. One of them came to my house for a little acoustic jam and sang a song with lilting melody and captivating lyrics. We were flabbergasted: "What in the hell is THAT?" He said it was composed by a friend of his who lives out in the country. It was as good as anything Willie Nelson ever wrote, but he'll never go mainstream because he isn't in Nashville or L.A. or New York. And doesn't want to be.

    I actually like the music -- if not the person -- of Billie Eilish. She annoys the hell out of me, but she and her brother are hugely talented and managed to make it commercially though they did not have any inside track. But obviously they are the exception.

    "The blood you bleed is just the blood you owe." I think that's genius.

     
    Last edited: Dec 6, 2021
  25. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    In older times, a musician's work could not be so easily reproduced. You would typically find one wealthy aristocratic patron to employ you. Advertising your musical skills was also not the easiest, since you would probably have to play in front of them. Occasionally some musicians like Beethoven and Mozart would find work for conducting operas, but that only took place in large middle class cities, which did not exist everywhere in Europe. (Vivaldi was not Austrian/German or Dutch so was out of luck) Music like that was often considered a luxury so the common people could not afford it. Some played music for large churches and cathedrals, but that did not pay the best, and the work was usually only one day a week.
     
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