Artists are a renewable resource. They often produce so much out of thin air that it seems like photosynthesis to me. And they seem compelled to produce creative ideas and objects regardless of the outcome, unable to resist some cellular imperative – kind of like salmon heading upriver to spawn and then to die. If given the right environment, an ecology of opportunity and assets, this creative potential – nascent knowledge capital – CAN renew and participate in sustainable growth and development for a lifetime. Or burn out and be lost.
Their diversity and resourcefulness make them adaptable to many environments, and they are good at camouflage – this makes it hard to spot some species.
Like many other resources, though, the creative output of artistic practice has been harvested by third parties who then resell or repackage it as their own. Many artists are complicit in their own exploitation. This is a story as old as time, and as clear as a wagging finger. Who you are and what you do are so tied up together that you can be overly vulnerable to the hooks of doubt, fear and desire.
How? By undervaluing our skills and our work, by believing that agents, commercial galleries, film producers, advertising companies, or broadcasters need us and thus have the artist’s best interest in mind. And through lack of self-marketing and career self-management skills – not taught or encouraged through the early years of career guidance in most systems – to ensure that a relationship with a third party is a partnership to be negotiated rather than a replay of the old Cinderella – Prince Charming fairy tale. And who knows how that really ended, anyway?
Stop clear cutting the creative sector. Stop overfishing the art product. Sustainability is possible, but knowledge and support, mentoring and training in marketing and management are needed. Where are the tree planters, the hothouse of culture? Why must nurturing artists be akin to a grow-op?
And where are the centurions of culture to guard the new plants as they grow?