The Exploitation of Art(ists)

Many things in this world are overrated, and even more are underrated. The problem is that often the things that are underrated are the ones that are vital for survival or quality of living while the ones that are overrated are superficial or even problematic for the same things (i.e. survival or quality of living).

For example, people employed in sanitation enjoy very low prestige with regards to their profession. If, however, they were to stop doing what they do, we would be dealing with a lot more plague than we currently are. There goes survival. And until then, we would suffocate from our pungent environment. There goes quality of life.

I won't go into what is overrated even though it makes our lives a living hell and our survival questionable. You can fill in from your own experience.

What I will go into is another vastly underrated profession: art. Excluding the outliers of very highly paid artists (which is arguable whether it is due to talent and not a different function) and the old masters, the staggering majority of artists are unable to make a living off their art, even if they are extremely skilled and talented.

Art is consistently undervalued or wholesale dismissed, despite the fact that without art daily life would be nearly unbearable: advertising would be impossible, seclusion (like during quarantine) wouldn't be mitigated by books, music, and movies. Art therapy would be impossible. Fashion, variety in different things that we use from cups and plates to our t-shirts would be sorely limited. Road trips would suffer without the radio. Decoration would not be a thing. And so on. Art is everywhere. And yet it's invisible, perhaps because it's so pervasive and constant.

It is a travesty that artists can't live off their art. That most writers, webcomic artists, comic artists, painters, poets, and the like have day jobs (unless they have trust funds). And it's something that we sort of accept about ourselves. I'm not blaming anyone. But what I am doing is to suggest that perhaps a change of culture within the art community in valuing our work and giving ourselves at least the minimum wage per hour spent creating art is a viable beginning to change peoples' attitudes towards artists and art as a whole.

Just a thought.

Don’t forget you can now advertise on DrunkDuck for just $2 in whichever ad spot you like! The money goes straight into running the site. Want to know more? Click this link here! Or, if you want to help us keep the lights on you can sponsor us on Patreon. Every bit helps us!

Special thanks to our patrons!!











Justnopoint - Banes - RMccool - Abt_Nihil - PhoenixIgnis - Gunwallace - Cdmalcolm1 - PaulEberhardt - dragonaur - Emma_Clare - FunctionCreep - Eustacheus - SinJinsoku - Smkinoshita - jerrie - Chickfighter - Andreas_Helixfinger - Tantz_Aerine - Epic Saveroom - Genejoke - Davey Do - Spark of Interest - Gullas - Damehelsing - Roma - NanoCritters - Scott D - Bluecuts34 - j1ceasar - Tinchel - PhillipDP - Teh Andeh - Peipei - Digital_Genesis - Hushicho - Sad Demon Comics - JediAnn Solo - Kiddermat - BitterBadger - Palouka - cheeko - Paneltastic - [https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/L.C.Stein/]L.C.Stein - Zombienomicon - dpat57 - Bravo1102 - The Jagged - LoliGen - OrcGirl - Miss Judged - Fallopiancrusader