Mark Evanier on freelancing
on May 25th, 2010I’m out today, but here’s something I hope you read, following up on Steve Bissette’s posts about the difficult life of Steve Perry and freelancing in general.
Mark Evanier is required reading for anyone considering the creative life as a profession.
While I don’t want to be the voice of reason that buzzkills your art dreams, the fact is few people can make a full- time living in this business. Fewer still can sustain a long term career in the creative arts.
A few days ago, I wrote about my difficulties financing A Distant Soil, and the debt I incurred trying to push the project forward (read comments section as well). It’s hard to know when to let something go. Or when to keep pushing through.
Many creators lie to themselves and everyone else about their professional prospects. Instead of getting a day job between assignments, they sit for months or years without paying gigs. They incur huge debts they can never repay, or take lousy assignments they’re ashamed of, always hoping for the big payday that never comes.
Not being a full-time creator is not some kind of art crime. Sometimes it is better to get that day job and do art on the side. You may even appreciate it more when you don’t have to rely on art for money.
This job has no benefits, no guarantees. Nothing. If you don’t make enough money to pay for every dime of your health care, your retirement, and all your business expenses, you are not making it as a professional creator. Getting by is not good enough.
Self awareness is key in this business, and few creators have it. We live on dreams.
But dreams don’t pay the bills.
It is possible to have that day job and have your dreams nights and weekends, you know. Let some other job finance those dreams with benefits.
Think about it.
The myth that only artists without day jobs are Real Artists™ is insidious and pervasive. Because if artists with day jobs were really talented and just worked hard enough, the reasoning goes, they’d be able to support themselves completely through their art.
It’s difficult to not buy into that idea.
(Argh, hit Submit too soon)
It’s difficult to not buy into that idea — until you see firsthand that talent doesn’t guarantee work. I’ve seen the financial havoc dry spells can wreak on a close friend who’s extremely talented. Top of his field, well-known, with a list of credits as long as your arm — and he still has periods where there’s nothing coming in. Seeing that is sobering, and is making me reconsider the idea of transitioning away from the day job to do art full-time.
I have to admit, the more I learn about how the comics industry works, and seeing what happens to a lot of the people who devoted their lives to it… I no longer feel so bad about not having the chops to break in. I can live with being a “weekend warrior”.
Every time I get a tad teary-eyed over making the “wrong” choices regarding my career when I was a teenager, I think back to things like this and feel not quite so bad. My life might not have been what I wished for myself, but at least I’ve always had food on the table.
Val, I really appreciate you posting. I have written about this before, but I think I need to muse on it periodically as a reminder to all. Including me.
I’ve known a few creators who went to great lengths to cover up the fact that they weren’t getting work, had financial problems, etc. I don’t really get it. I see no virtue in pretense. Faking financial success will not bring you financial success.
Many of the most talented people I know have had little financial success.
I just got back from out of town. I will ruminate more on this later.
Colleen, I think the thing about creators trying to hide the fact that they haven’t “gotten work” lately is that they are desperately trying not to seem desperate.
I’ve known screenwriters and artists who don’t want it known publicly that they haven’t worked recently. Because they don’t want possible employers to think … they are desperate.
I once heard someone refer to “loser dust”, the sprinkle of failure.
There’s a difference between not having paying writing work and being desperate.
I don’t know of any writer who is a good enough liar to pull off the act of not seeming desperate when they are clearly desperately lying about not bring desperate.
Remember the “ufo guy” link I send you last time? That guy falls perfectly into what this post warns about, but he takes it to the other end. He’s drumming and clanging about how his studio has no food in the fridge, how they are all struggling to keep “the dream and joy of making PRINTED comics a reality while they struggle against the snarling enemies who tell them to work harder at advertising and promotion art” PLWEEEZE!
this is exactly why I choose the paths I choose, no regrets. Just the wish to do it again, yes as a side job, the dessert in a good meal. I am having my own problems now, but my table always has food, my phone bill and electricity bill are paid, and I even enjoy cabe TV. Guess I didn’t made the wrong choice, as surviving comes first, but it did meant to sacrifice “creativity” for a while.
“Loser dust;” nice!
I’ve been thinking about the idea of making it as an artist, and freelancing vs. a day job, and how money relates to all this. So many things have to happen to make it in the arts (and by ‘arts,’ I mean all of them):
-You have to have the aptitude and talent for your art;
-you have to be disciplined enough to develop your skills;
-you have to get your ass in the chair and produce work;
-then you have to get your work seen;
-then you need to be able to follow through on deadlines and not shoot yourself in the foot by being a pain in the ass to work with;
-then you need to get paid well enough, and in a timely fashion;
-then you need either business sense, or enough common sense to hire someone you can trust to manage your business;
-you have to be able to keep on doing this for decades;
-and then you need to stay current, change, and grow artistically, in order to have a career, instead of being a fad.
Talent’s only one of many factors. It’s crucial, but only one. Work ethic, discipline, time management, and luck: you need them whether you’re doing art as a salaried monkey, or as a freelancer, or as a part-timer. Yet, there is this great schism between people who do art part-time vs. full-time. The part-timers feel like wannabes; the full-time people feel like they have some innate trait that sets them apart from lower beings who are not Real Artists.™ And this idea that Real Artists™ are able to completely support themselves financially in every way, and have no worries, because they’re Just That Good and can turn jobs down…
…well, that idea makes me stabby. The real distinction is whether or not you’re a professional; not how much time you devote to it, or how much money you make from it.
To use myself as an example — I do some sorts of art (art direction, design, and writing) during the day, as a full-time salaried gig. I do some sorts of art on the side (illustration, painting, design, writing). Regardless of what sort of art, or when I do it, 100% of my income is generated by art. It’s fair to say I’m a professional artist.
I make a decent living. Compared to some of my friends who are also professionals, I don’t make much. I envy their flexible schedules and in some instances, the insane money. Some of them envy the stability and insanely good benefits I have, because they often spend weeks between jobs every year. Couple of my friends are ones who you wouldn’t imagine ever being out of work. And yet, they too must scramble to cover the gap financially when pipes burst and cars die — so they work on smaller things to keep everything going as they look for more work. I know only one professional creator who doesn’t ever have to worry about money, and he’s totally blowing the curve for all of us.
What many people forget is that even someone who does art on a freelance basis full-time isn’t spending 100% of their time generating art. There’s looking for work, bills, invoices, taxes, client meetings, phone calls, conference calls, emails, research, and then the simple business of living the rest of one’s life. It’s not a glamorous gig.
POST MADE OF WIN! I would SO like to move this to the front page, if you have no objection.
I’ve written over and over again on this blog that income has NOTHING to do with being an artist. But I do think income has a lot to do with being a professional artist. Being a professional artist doesn’t mean you are better at making art then the non-professional artist. It just means you have a marketable skill set.
Val, of course you’re a professional artist! You’re an art director.
The pecking order cracks me up: if you make money, you’re a sell-out. If you don’t make money, you’re a loser. It doesn’t matter what you are doing with your art, or how much you are making, someone will figure out a way to take a dig at your for it.
If you’re going to be a professional artist, then you have to have everything going for you that you wrote on that list. You’ve got to have a skill set, a way to sell it, and stamina.
If you don’t want to make a living as an artist, you are completely free of those concerns. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Artists are conflicted about money, and are constantly lectured about how money is the measure of their art.
They are even told making money can be bad for their art. Many creators self-sabotage out of guilt about money. They don’t want to be sell-outs. And only sell-outs make money.
So, the artists who don’t make money feel morally superior about the lack of lucre taint, while the artists who do make money feel superior since their work must be good – it makes money!
Vicious cycle.
I wish more artists would realize that money does not have any bearing on the quality of the final work. The only measure of the final work is the work itself.
Now, I sure as hell produce better work when I get paid enough to take the time to do my best, but if I didn’t have the skill set to produce that work to begin with, it wouldn’t matter what you paid me. I wouldn’t be able to produce the work at all.
Money helps production, but it doesn’t make you an artist.
I do think the lack of it can break you. It costs money to make art. It costs money to live. Financing dreams costs.
But without the skill set, it doesn’t matter how much money you have thrown your way, you can’t make it as a pro.
I also think a lot of creative people have at least one good project in them. But it’s a whole ‘nother matter to have many good projects over many years.
I know very few artists and writers who have been 100% self supporting as creative people for the duration of their careers. I mentioned earlier how many creators simply lie about it. It’s a shameful thing to admit.
I recall some comics writer took a dig at Steve Bissette because Bissette wrote about how he went to work at a video store.
I don’t see how being a writer makes you innately superior to a clerk in a video store.
I used to know a guy who constantly lied about being a “full-time writer”. I knew him for years and he often held part time jobs. Last I knew, he had a salesman job. But he lied about how much money he made, how big his advances were, and how he was a “full-time writer”. It was utterly bizarre. Nothing but snobbery, in my opinion.
For the record, back in the day I worked at a veterinary hospital, in a library, and for my condo association.
And to some people, that’s a bad thing.
Sure, feel free to repost it (I did on my blog).
I’ve been entirely self-supporting as a creative person since I was… hmm, 20. Man. That sure explains the black circles under my eyes and caffeine addiction. More later, once I have had dinner and a nap!
These posts have been very illuminating. You guys have provided great advice. Prior to last year when I started to work as an independent contractor, I never really understood many of the pitfalls that freelancers must avoid.
The reality is that to be successful, you must be a good money manager. Unfortunately there are very few who are.
working for coppervale taught me the reality of how quickly things can tumble down. Even though I do want to write for a living, I’m wise enough to realize that even should I be fortunate enough to succeed, it can all end tomorrow. There are no guarantees. Unless you’re Stephen King.
I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ll probably be doing at least something else for a long while while I’m pursuing my dream. I may work at a gas station, or a grocery store, or maybe even be the guy that cleans toilets at Sears. I accept this as the price of pursuing my dreams. And if I feel I’ve gone as far as I can, there’s always something else I can do.
But I’ve had no choice but to see the downside of being an artist. I’ve lost everything once already pursuing this journey of mine. While I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, things like that force you to confront the reality of your dreams. I realized that chances were that there was always a chance of this happening again.
All it did in my case was make me hungrier. That said, I know that maybe one day I’ll have to do something else. Right now though, I keep on.
Great read, the link. Very true.
JP
I’m glad you are not giving up writing. A lot of people seem to think it’s an either/or thing. And when they can’t make a living at it, they give up.
As I said, I don’t want to be a buzzkill here. What I am trying to do is give creators a realistic picture so they have the life skills to deal with what comes at them in this business. I did not have this advantage when I was a kid.
If professional creators were more candid about how things really work, a lot of young people could avoid some serious pain. Many creators try to sugar coat their past. I know of several who chirpily blather in interviews that their career path has been strewn with rose petals. They think it makes them appear less able or talented if they are seen as having to work or struggle. They want people to believe that their great creations just made everything smooth and wonderful for them.
I think this is a great disservice, and terribly selfish.
I decided a long time ago I would be absolutely candid about what I have experienced. I want people to learn from what I have learned.
Don’t really care how ugly that looks.
I’ve shoveled enough cow manure down here on the farm to know that the best stuff grows out of the deepest shit.
Somewhat related: My buddy Scott Dutton is a terrific artist who did some indy comics work in the ’90s, but for various reasons was never quite able to make a career out of it. He talks candidly about the problems he ran into and the mistakes he made along the way:
http://www.thewaterworks.ca/?p=461
(this is part one…each post has a link to the next part at the bottom)