money for art

should an artist (of any stripe) recieve a living wage from their work in the field of art or is that not a respectable contribution for one to make to society? i realize this question is somewhat mute as, of course, some obviosly do, but theoreticly is this appropriate.

A strange question - Even more difficult to answer. All work of any kind merits pay.

But it sounds like you may be questioning the purpose of art? Your role in this purpose?

Easy to answer that: Bring in new ideas to the planet.

[Why the hell am I talking like Yoda?]

Mike, I had to fight the California Department of Rehabilitation for years on this issue. When they said I should go back to college for voc rehab purposes, they asked me what I wanted to study and I said 'art' and they said 'the Department doesn't consider fine art as a viable vocational goal.' 10 years later, when I decided I wanted to go to UC Davis, I applied again, and they said no. So I 'assaulted' them with a bunch of complaints and paperwork, but the kicker was that I had the presence of mind to look up the federal labor codes: There are three for fine art. 1) artist - painter, 2) artist - sculptor and 3) artist - printmaker. So I challenged them on discriminating against the Department of Labor, since they receive a lot of federal funds. I won, I don't know if it was persistence on my part, or if I actually had a real legal issue. But one thing I had to agree to, and that was to aim at 'teaching' as opposed to studying to be a starving artist. It was pretty hilarious, actually. I had already enrolled but they hadn't approved tuition and books yet. My case worker and her supervisor both came to my house, and held the papers and pen in hand and made me promise to teach before they would sign off on me. I jockied them around a bit...'weeeelllll, I don't know....' but finally gave in. And I did end up teaching for about 10 years.

If you're a resident of the USA you should have been alive in the late 1930s when the artists were 'given' a living wage by the USA government under the guise of the Works Progress Administration - Roosevelt's socialist experiment to keep starving artists from doing just that in the depression years.

Check out this web site:

thanks, i guess for an artist, 'those were the days'...

art? what school level? i had a professor at a junior college who seemed to have the market cornered on sebaticals. europe was his destination of choice, and then the following art show of course: paintings and sketches of european places and things...

I taught on a Junior College level. No sabaticals, though. I rather enjoyed it.

Wait a minute...those artist's were 'given' nothing. The WPA and associate programs created jobs and they were hired. That's like saying that accountants are 'given' a living wage by the IRS, or actors were 'given' a living wage by MGM.

I should have made it clearer my end of the conversation dealt with broad patterns in society's relationship to art, trying to orient the relationship within intoxicating capital, consumer culture and market social values. Whatever that abstract relationship might be, an art object always has personal meaning to its artist, frequently her friends, and occasionally strangers too. I mean, my God, every painting tells a story, on and off the canvas. That is understood.

emphasize the difference between 'general' and 'particular': economic theory contains little useful information about how an individual should live their life, and less about its quality from one paycheck to the next. Some people think it contains no useful information of any kind at all.