As an art student I have noticed a disappointing trend: I am devalued, underestimated, and constantly belittled. No matter how good my creative work is, people scam me out of commissions, ask me to work for exposure, or even call my work “easy”. I think anyone who is perusing a career the creative arts: wether it be performing arts, writing, music, or visual arts, has had similar experiences. My main question is why are artists constantly belittled and scammed by the very people who claim they “need” our talent? How come young artists are excepted to work for free or low pay? It all has to do with nefarious myths about how and why we make art, as well as creative work being seen as unnecessary in our capitalist society.
- Making art is easy! Actually no. Art is not easy. In fact visual artists need to learn various techniques to completely master and manipulate whichever medium they’re working in and this can take years. The same can be said for writers, actors, film-makers, and musicians as well. Let’s also not forget the time and effort it takes to create a work, which can take between hours or years.
- This is a fun hobby for you! Artists still put their time and effort into their work regardless if this is a career or a hobby. Compensate them for their time or don’t contact and use their content at all.
- Exposure! In all fairness exposure doesn’t feed and help an artists survive and if you’re contacting an artist for the specific purpose of commissioning them, chances are they don’t need exposure since you already know of them.
- Artists are unintelligent. This is false, incredibly ableist, and if you use this to justify why you’re scamming an exploiting a creative artist please stop before no one wants to work with you, even for free.
So what should people, and companies do when approaching an artist for creative work? Don’t exploit them. Compensate them fairly for their time and let them prosper. While we love what we do; we need to eat, pay rent, and of course buy resources to fund our art. Which is why we should get paid and these myths need to be exposed for what they are: shoddy excuses that exploit and dehumanize all artists in order for someone lacking the skills to make what they want to get free work.
