Artists. How can you give up your work?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

This is something that I have always wondered about. I in no way shape or form consider myself an accomplished artist. However, I have always had a yearning and an urge to create. I used to draw and dabble in paint and charcoal and come up with images that I felt content with and loved. Very rarely would I share these with people.

I used to paint miniatures though… fantasy minatures made of pewter and lead from role playing games mostly. I would study and paint these in excruciating detail sometimes with brushes containing no more the 2 or 3 hairs. For a miniature that was no more then an inch and a half tall I would spend a week worth of evenings and literally HOURS and hours painting the finest of details and realism. It was meditative and fulfilling. It was a feeling I yearn for and hope to have again someday. I noticed that my finished products where as equal or BETTER then those I compaired them of the “experts” in the magazines. I begain entering them in competitions (yes believe it or not they exist!) and one best of show in most.

I could not bear the thought of selling them although I tried many times. I worked in a hobby shop where we sold such things and I would set them up for display in a case and put outragious prices on them because to ME with the work and love and hours I put into them I could not sell them for less then a fortune. Of course I never sold a one, but I would relish in people delighting over them.

Obviously my QUESTION to the REAL artists out there is… How can you stand to sell your soulfull creations!!! I know many people just quickly create and sell mediocre items (mediocre according to their actual talent) that they can make and that other people still love and buy. How do you part with somthing that took so much of your time and your soul to never see it again??? Mine still sit individually wrapped in kleenax and in shoe boxes in my parents basement.

2

eek… god, so many misspellings… please don’t BEAR with me but BARE with me… and such. I suck at spelling, always have since gradeschool, don’t hate me.

3

Well, I don’t know how this sounds, but one of the main reasons I create (films, writing, drawing) is to touch other people. To make people see the world in a new or interesting way. By sharing some of myself, my ideas, my emotions, I hope I do that. I live to do that; to touch other people. Heck, making someone laugh is like music to me. Making someone think about something in a new way is beautiful.
This is how my artwork comes to life. It doesn’t just stay with me; it’s living. I may enjoy it, but it’s more important to me that I reach other people.
Another reason I create is to express myself, but that’s related to it. It’s hard to explain, but by expressing myself I’m giving some of my spirit away in the hopes that others will benefit.

4

See… I think just THAT may be the difference between me and a REAL artist… as different sort of passion and reason.

5

I don’t make any money from my artwork, but I wouldn’t mind if I did. The process of making stuff is just as cool as the end result, and if you can make a living from it, you get to have more time to do it. The need to make a living is a reality that most of us have to deal with. A lot of people work in jobs which require creativity, but the creativity is channeled towards the realization of other people’s ideas, and is bound by limitations of taste and professional image. So to get to a level of success with your art which allows you to do exactly what you want to do without answering to anyone seems pretty attractive to me.

6

I am an artist, not professionally, but all my life, people have asked of my art, “Oh, can I have that?” or “Could do a portrait of so and so for me?”

I struggle with this OP topic constantly. I recently did a portrait of my girlfriend’s daughter. She liked it so much that her and the daughter wanted me to do the rest of siblings’ portraits as well. Although I was very flattered, I can relate all-too-well to the “artist’s losing his baby” syndrome. As it is, I am currently in possession of the daughter’s portrait. Although they want it very much, it’s quite difficult to part with it. I am happy that they find my work so appealing, and that makes me want to give it to them, but it has become sort of an oxy-moron issue. It’s hard to see it as gaining something instead of as losing something.

When I was in high school, the only thing that made me popular was my artwork. I was constantly doodling throughout classes, and my fellow students always wanted a cartoon or a picture of some sort that I made. At one point I was making and selling handmade posters of a popular cartoon character of the time. I didn’t make a whole lot of money, but it was enough to feel accomplished.

I find it more difficult to part with my writings, than anything else. I have written some very personal and deep poetry, which very few have been allowed the privilege of sharing. The things I have written express my deepest and rawest emotions and feelings. Some of these are in remembrance of a love since parted, or just my feelings an individual. It’s very hard to be that open on a public level. You’re virtually like a person in open-heart surgery. Your heart, the most intimate and vital part of you, is exposed and vulnerable to the “medical team” or audience. The slightest “mistake” or criticism can mean “heart-failure;” or, the smallest praise can mean an exuberant recovery.

I speculate that many “could-be” mainstream artists, such as myself, possibly, not only fear criticism and rejection, but acceptance and success as well. Sometimes, as in my case, the latter is most feared. It’s bizarre, but true, and not even I profess to understand why this is.

Creativity on an artistic level for recreational, or professional means is a very delicate and potentially difficult area. This is especially true when a creative person is stuck in a position where their creativity is misplaced, or held back and not allowed to develop, grow, and flourish.

Ultimately, I feel that most artists, including myself, want to share their work, but above anything else, their fear is that in allowing publicity or sale, the true nature and significance of the piece may be lost.

For example: What an atrocity it would be if Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa were hanging in a seedy, drunken, billiard hall, instead of the Louvre!

Artists must use logical, reasonable, and sometimes less than tactful judgment in parting with their work. What may seem unreasonable to some, is actually quite good judgment. The recent Bruce Willis film, Unbreakable, contains such a scene. Samuel L. Jackson is the proprietor of an art gallery. But it is not any art gallery, it is original comic book art. A man comes in and asks to buy a piece that Jackson finds to be a very significant and rare work, and nearly sells it to the man. When the man reveals that the piece is for his elementary school age son, Jackson becomes enraged and explains to the man that the piece is a work of art, not a toy, and his store is not a toy store. He forces the man to leave without selling him anything.

Well, I have said enough, but this topic really caught my attention and I had to put my two cents in. I hope this is insightful.

7

Sometimes I sell my work, sometimes I give it away, sometimes I burn it, sometimes people pay me to do artwork, I don’t really have any set idea.

But often one has way too much artwork to store & so give some away.

8

I’m not much of an artist (I do draw sometimes when I have the patience and they look okay but never how I really want them to… then I lose my patience) but I am working on my writing. One thing I find is that I can share more of my writing with others online then I can irl. I rarely share stories with my family and never poems and what friends I do have don’t even know I write. For me it’s a bit of not wanting to bare my soul (my poetry just flows out mainly and is very emotional for me) and not wanting people to absolutely hate it. My stories are much less personal and some poems are less emotional though they still touch a chord in me. But everyone has their preference for what they do with their work.

has no idea what she meant to say before so leave it at that At least as a writer I know if I ever get published there will be lots of my work out not just one thing that is so close. And what things I do draw that I deem good I never give away and keep to myself. (Except for one picture which was of Pikachu who I drew so much and now I can’t even draw anymore. Some boy saw it and asked for it and I said sure since he liked it so much.)

9

I’m more in the category of “wish I had talent” artist. I have so many ideas, but very little follow through. I do paint with water colors, but am not very good and haven’t taken any classes or anything. One year for christmas I framed two of my paintings that I thought were appropriate and gave them to my parents and my brother’s family. They loved them. I was fine with that, giving something of myself (that’s what art feels like to me) to those I love.

Once while my mom was browsing through my paintings, she saw one and said, “Oh, I want this one.” and I was immediately struck. I didn’t want her to have it and didn’t give it to her. But its funny, I’m not displaying it or using it or anything, I just didn’t want to give it up.

I hope to be a real artist someday.

10

Sometimes when I do some art i don’t want to be reminded of that period anymore so give it away.

11

Well, on the other side of this… my dad is an artist. For a wedding gift, he let us choose one of the paintings of his own that he had on the wall of my parent’s home. We STILL feel guilty that we took such a big one and a nice one. I felt like we stole something from him. Silly really; it might have eventually ended up somewhere else, anyway, which means it’s nice to keep in in the family. But I still feel funny about it. BTW, one of his paintings was given to Bill Clinton as a gift from the state. (Not that we harbor any illusions about what an honor that isn’t–they get, what, tens of thousands of gifts? And the Clintons didn’t even TAKE this one when they left, snort.) Even if it’s mothballed somewhere, I think it’s neat that his work is “out there” and I wager other artists share that feeling.

Ann Arbor hosts a HUGE art fair every year and we get a kick out of finding something to add to our house each year. Anyway, we had a number of conversations with the guy who sold us a big piece of pottery last summer. I think he was thrilled to know his works go out to become a part of people’s homes and something they treasure and gaze upon every day.

What mystifies me are the artists who do “perishable” work. I mean, I get that it’s somehow made even more valuable because it won’t be there forever, but it’s so different from the urge to “make something for posterity.” Not only is it not going to be sold, it isn’t even going to last!

12

I have some of my favorite works facing me as I type this, but you are right, I do regret selling the others.

The main motivation for selling art was to convince my ex that I was a passible artist. She wouldn’t believe family and friends. So I had rented booth space at about a dozen art fairs over a couple of years. I won a couple of ribbons, and made a small amount of money, but I would dearly love to have most of those works back. All I have are photos of them, which are no real comfort because looking at them just brings back the regrets.

13

I draw, paint a little, and make beaded jewelry. I will often make things for other people as gifts, but I have never really sold my art. The only exception is when a friend offers me money to do a big project for her, or someone wants to commission a piece as a gift for someone else. In these cases I will accept money, but I never ask for very much.

People often tell me I should sell my jewelry, and I have considered it. Goodness knows I spend enough on beads that it would be nice to make some money back! But I just don’t seem to have it in me to do it.

A couple of years ago I made myself a large and elaborate gold beaded collar. It took about three months to do. Several people asked me what I would charge to make another one. I said I didn’t think anyone would be able to pay what I’d have to charge for something like that; the only reason I’d ever make another would be as a gift for someone I loved.

14

Wow, tshirts, you said it so eloquently. I have given away or lost my drawings and still regret it to this day. I guess that is why I switched to music. I can give that away over and over again without losing it permanently.

I suppose that Whammo still has a point in that I would surely like to get paid more often for my music although I so often give it away as well.

Oh well.