Death Of The Artist And The Birth Of The Creative Entrepreneur

Roger,

I skipped to the bottom paragraph, the summary. The summary is a jumbled bunch
of generalities nothing more. Life can not be won on generalities.

Dave

The article didn't seem all that profound to me, just seemed to point out the obvious and was way too wordy, I think he could have made his points just as well with 25% as many words. I struggled to stay awake while reading it, but that may be just because I got to bed too late. Sorry the article didn't have the same impact on me as it did on you Roger, you've been a professional artist all your life so your reaction is probably the more correct one and I'm just too ignorant to see it. lol

I think it was an interesting read. My initial thoughts at the moment are this..

The article tries to say that the time of the "solitary genius" is gone and being replaced with "creative marketeer".
That doesn't really sound like much of a change to me. There have always been those who schmooze and those who lose.

The solitary geniuses of the past were generally unrecognized in their lifetimes, and that could certainly play out the same way today.
The only difference in my mind, is that with the extreme volume of content and stimulation that society is currently digesting these days, I wonder if the truly-brilliant-one-of-a-kind-work of the "solitary genius" will ever have a chance of rising to the surface, even after their death.

Joe Burgess
J.B. Imagery

There will always be the "super stars" which really are the "master marketers" Joe. The museum crowd will continue to prop up those that excel at assimilating into and promoting within that system. Outside of that the art world has finally been democratized, so has marketing, all thanks to the internet. The downside to the fact that now anybody can do it is that everybody is doing it. It used to be the challenge was to get past the gate keepers, now the challenge is to stand out in a crowd.

"...Professionalism represents a compromise formation, midway between the sacred and the secular. A profession is not a vocation, in the older sense of a “calling,” but it also isn’t just a job; something of the priestly clings to it. Against the values of the market, the artist, like other professionals, maintained a countervailing set of standards and ideals—beauty, rigor, truth—inherited from the previous paradigm. Institutions served to mediate the difference, to cushion artists, ideologically, economically, and psychologically, from the full force of the marketplace...."

"...When works of art become commodities and nothing else, when every endeavor becomes “creative” and everybody “a creative,” then art sinks back to craft and artists back to artisans—a word that, in its adjectival form, at least, is newly popular again. Artisanal pickles, artisanal poems: what’s the difference, after all? So “art” itself may disappear: art as Art, that old high thing. Which—unless, like me, you think we need a vessel for our inner life—is nothing much to mourn...."

Generalities, as David pointed out...Yet also sadly 'academic' and heady...
Perhaps "Art" will need to be mourned, I do not know, but from my grayed view point: 'When Art left the Heart and settled in the Head...it was dead.' I continue to search in the direction that took my interest many years ago and it continually extends the 'who' I am becoming...For myself, I would have it no other way because I never expected it to bring more than it has to my life...and it has been much. When the writer above notes that younger artists see themselves as multiple 'types' of artist I see hope. Hope because it marks that they are finding that they are more than a mere 'persona' and they are searching something more human, more inclusively alive and attached to 'all-that-is' and 'all-that-can-be'...Hope...the marker for 'potential...tdp

Agreed, David. But the question then becomes, is the superstar a star because they have the best product, or because they're better marketers?
It's all about entertaining the people. It's celebrity status. The product is secondary.

Selling the artist.

In regards to feeling lost in the crowd, we are just beginning to understand this social-networking-internet-sharing thing. It's going to get A LOT bigger.
You are one of the first in line.

Joe Burgess
J.B. Imagery

Really why bring this article up again? The whole premise is way off. I didn''t like it in January and it is just as much a bunch of bull now. Not even worth countering this. I do like the idea that artists, photographers ,musicians and the like were once put on a pedestal. I never tookit that very seriously. And sure there were some geniuses and many got there due. But we all have to eat. So Monet was on chocalate boxes and other artists have been sucking up to their sponsors since before the Vatican was hiring.

Interesting article Roger. What the article does not take into account is that long before the old masters and all that happy crap there was art. Art predates markets, predates the lone genius and all that. Art concerns itself with communication and survival of man as a species. Till the day we disappear as a species there will be art produced by humans. ( Do we disappear in September? can't remember.)

I think that the article is just a wordy statement about the growth in awareness.

As more people gain exposure to the idea of creating art, the mysterious grandeur of art faces a demise, and the practicality of its continued survival begins to take precedence.

This is the case with anything. As more people emerge into the world, and as more of these people become more knowledgeable of the world, what once was magic grows old and transforms into logic.

Proliferation of information transforms the mass mind.

Is magic dead, Robert?

Joe Burgess
J.B. Imagery

I always liked Rudyard Kipling, as an observer of human nature and many other things.

"Kim" is the best book I've ever read capturing the symbiotic relationship between "The Search" and "The Game."

Is magic dead, Robert?

In the sense that I believe some people used to seriously believe in it, ... YES.

As a metaphor for a sense of wonder, ... NO. We can still have such a sense of wonder, but I do not believe that it is as strongly cued by certain things and situations the way it once was.

Again, as civilizations as wholes have matured, the belief in Santa Clause has waned across a greater and greater proportion of the population.

Creative Entrepreneur? Photographers are now "A Dime A Dozen". Just a matter of who wants what when.

Back after some partying and entrepreneuring (trying to find the best way to make a buck with my book, "FERAL COOTS -The Saga of Modern Feralgenaria")


Now, in regards to William Deresiewicz's article in the Atlantic Monthly

I went through the article and pulled out some of the "Buzz Words, Terms,and Phrases",.

solitary-collaborate, rebellion, spiritual-secularization, technique, "Selling out", market, the Web, "Kickstarter", "Get your name out there", network, judged, "impressionism,imagism, Futurism", discipline, "Art as commodities", aesthetic, Amazon, Twitter, "democratization of taste, producerism, diversity, lifestyle

And finally "Art sinks back to Craft" and "Artist back to Artisans"


As I see it;

So much of that "BUZZ" can be found throughout this forum.



Edit: Oh, by the way, I felt that article was "Wordy" too...In fact, I wanted to make that warning in the original posting, but I didn't want to make it too wordy

Thanks for posting the article!

Just my quick thoughts....these and a few bucks will get you a cup of coffee at Starbucks....or 3 cups at wawa!

Wordy....yes. Food for though...yes...i think you can learn something from almost anything if you want to.

I don't think that the concept of 10000 hours is going away. There is a need for quality work...and a key ingredient for that is quality work.

The history of artisan to venerated artist and back again...interesting but doesn't worry me in the least. I'm not a trained artist....I'm a trained musician. In the context of the article I guess its similar..so I think the points below will apply. I have put in more than my 10000 hours as a musician. I'm good, but others are better. I love playing, can make money doing it but probobly not enought to live on. Luckily, I've put in my 10000 hours learning to teach music as well. I love doing that too...also good at it and I make enough money to support my family and get to pass on something I love to others! Oh and I still get to play music day in and day out, both in and out of school. I'm also a photographer....mostly self taught, more of a crafts person than an artist (to paraphrase the article) But I can also enjoy it, and make a little extra cash because of today's market. I'm not at my 10000 hours yet....but I'm on my way. And as my ability gets better I'll have a chance to sell more...if that's my goal.

I find it exciting that in today's world, you have the ability to be a creative Ian's combine a few of these skills to cobble together a job if youro choose. But I think this is where the article really lacks. The goal of the artist needs to factor into this. Some people want to be the solitary genius, some are fine with their "art" on mugs where others feel that cheapens it...just like some musicians only play classical because other music is below them. If an artist can figure out what and why they do what they do, the possibilities are pretty great in today's world!

Just my thoughts!

Matt

...but artists always were creative entrepreneurs???

I like to listen to classical music but I play my own music

" ... the object was to avoid the market and its sullying entanglements, or at least to appear to do so. Spirit stands opposed to flesh, to filthy lucre. Selling was selling out. Artists, like their churchly forebears, were meant to be unworldly. Some, like Picasso and Rilke, had patrons, but under very different terms than did the artisans, since the privilege was weighted in the artist’s favor now, leaving many fewer strings attached. Some, like Proust and Elizabeth Bishop, had money to begin with. And some, like Joyce and van Gogh, did the most prestigious thing and starved—which also often meant sponging, extracting gifts or “loans” from family or friends that amounted to a kind of sacerdotal tax, equivalent to the tithes exacted by priests or alms relied upon by monks."

And there are still those that believe that art should just be done for your 'souls' sake - never for filthy lucre or to make an 'honest living' from your creative art and craftsmanship - unless perhaps you are building furniture.

"Before we thought of artists as geniuses, we thought of them as artisans. The words, by no coincidence, are virtually the same. Art itself derives from a root that means to “join” or “fit together”—that is, to make or craft, a sense that survives in phrases like the art of cooking and words like artful, in the sense of “crafty.” We may think of Bach as a genius, but he thought of himself as an artisan, a maker."

"Indeed, the very concept of art as it was later understood—of Art—did not exist.

All of this began to change in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the period associated with Romanticism: the age of Rousseau, Goethe, Blake, and Beethoven, the age that taught itself to value not only individualism and originality but also rebellion and youth. Now it was desirable and even glamorous to break the rules and overthrow tradition—to reject society and blaze your own path."

So, if we accept the contention that prior to the late 18th century our current concept of the "artist" did not exist, does that make "art" produced before that time period any less beautiful, moving or important? I can't imagine that it would.

If being an artisan means honing your skill and perfecting your ability to create is that such a bad thing? Artisans worked hard to create and were paid for what they created. Was that wrong or somehow ignoble? I don't think so.

before I saw the check which was of $7921 , I didn't believe that...my... friends brother was like they say actualie bringing in money part-time from there labtop. . there neighbor haz done this for only about fifteen months and resently cleared the loans on there villa and bought a gorgeous Alfa Romeo . try this site ......................................................

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Very funny! Obviously, someone who is doing what is described in the post above is neither artist nor artisan. I would not even say that they are an entrepreneur!

en·tre·pre·neur
ˌäntrəprəˈnər/
noun
a person who organizes and operates a business or businesses, taking on greater than normal financial risks in order to do so.

Hey Random,

Do you know Spurious Gunter or Flagrant Geek? How about Plainol Dumass (that's pronounced, doo-mahs')?

Spamaritsan or spamartist? Let us launch into a deep discussion of the intricate differences. Now making money easily ... THAT would be magic.