How to be an Artist Today

Mark Tansey, Action Painting II

Growing up with relatives in the art business, I never experienced the discouragement that many do when they express an interest to pursue a career in the arts. In fact, I think it was decided around the time I was in third grade that I would be an artist one day. After that it was just a matter of figuring out what that would look like.

The vagaries of the art world can seem intimidating to the outsider. Yet, the changes in the global and domestic economy means that many industries are looking more and more like the arts. What I mean is that it's rare to go to work for a company and stay there until retirement. It's getting rarer to have the protection of a union. Employees are encouraged to cultivate "transferable skills" that can make them an asset to any firm. Average tenure at an employer in 2008 was 4.1 years. More and more, Americans are required to map their own career trajectory. The career ladder of the 20th century has become more of a jungle gym today. Survival today requires creative thinking, communication skills, and strategic planning. But artists are used to these sorts of things, so as colleges change their curriculum to focus on divergent thinking and interdisciplinary collaboration (essential art-making skills) working as an artist becomes more attainable. The bottom line is hard work and creative thinking.

Essentially, being an artist today is being able to see things in new ways--and this is entirely learnable. Consider Beethoven. We know a lot about his creative process since the publication and translation of his notebooks. Beethoven was nuts about recording his ideas. He would keep them and refer back to them, reinterpret them and tinker with them. What's more is that many of his initial ideas were pretty lousy. In fact, scholars and commentators have puzzled over how he could do so much with such unpromising material. But he kept at it doggedly until he was able to shape them into something great. I think that's the key. Beethoven knew enough about himself and his abilities to know that his first ideas wouldn't be very good and would need some major work. Many think that if a person has talent, then music, art, football, or international finance should come easily and naturally. If that's true, then I would like to go on the record as saying Ludwig van Beethoven was untalented. To see a musical idea appear once, twice, three times, or more, makes it clear that Beethoven didn't have a knack for music. He had to work at it. I think that should give hope to anyone studying the arts.