The math of being a full-time artist (plus artist income strategies)

Are you an artist who wants to make a living through selling your artwork? For many artists this is the dream, to be a full-time artist, to be working in the studio, and to be selling your work regularly so that you can devote all of your time and attention to your art making. My name is Christina Kent and I'm a full-time artist based in San Francisco. I've been pursuing art professionally for five years and have been a full-time artist making a living through my art business for the past two years. And in this video I'm going to walk through some numbers showing why it is so hard to make a living through selling your artwork alone, and I'm also going to share some paths and ideas that you can take to make your art business more sustainable. So if that sounds good to you, let's check it out. And before I get into it, if you want to learn more about my art practice or my art business, if you have specific questions, or you want to see behind the scenes me working in my studio, then be sure to check out my Patreon. On Patreon, I share these videos early and ad-free, and I offer a lot of special perks like Q&A sessions and behind-the-scenes videos just for Patreons. So if you want to learn more, be sure to check it out. Okay, now let's get back to the video. So first, I wanted to walk you through the numbers and present sort of what it would really take to make a living through just selling your artwork alone. For simplicity's sake, let's assume you're a painter. This is also my background, so it's where I have the most expertise. But we're going to assume that you're making paintings in your studio. And let's assume that you don't want to just be a starving artist, but you want to be a successful artist. You want to make a good living. In the United States, the median income is around $80,000 a year. So let's make that our goal for this exercise. So you may be thinking, okay, if I want to make $80,000 a year, that means that I need to sell $80,000 worth of paintings. That would be selling, if your paintings on average sold for $1,000 each, which is a pretty respectable amount of money for each painting, that means you would have to sell 80 paintings in one year to hit that $80,000 goal. That's pretty ambitious. I'm a productive painter, and I know a lot of other artists, and for many of us, selling 80 paintings a year for $1,000 each would be a pretty ambitious goal. So already, you may be balking at that number. But we can't stop there, because making paintings, making art is not free. You have to pay for your supplies and overhead. For example, canvases, paints, brushes, maybe your studio space. In the U.S., also health insurance. All of these things are things you have to consider when you are setting your business goals. For my own studio practice, my overhead is around 30%. So if I want to make $80,000 in one year, then I really need to make around $115,000, $120,000 a year, so that once I take out expenses, I get that $80,000 number. So now to hit this $115,000 revenue goal, that means that we need to make 115 paintings a year, selling on average for $1,000 each. That means you're going to be finishing, marketing, and selling one painting approximately every three days. That's a very ambitious schedule. And if that's not enough to make you nervous, unfortunately it gets worse, because a lot of artists aren't able to sell all of their paintings on their own. You'll probably want to work with a gallery or another partner to help you sell the work. But galleries will take a cut of the sales price. Most commercial galleries take about 50% of the sales price. So that means if you want to make $115,000 in revenue, now you need to sell $230,000 worth of paintings. That's 230 paintings for around $1,000 each. I don't think I know any artist personally who thinks this is an actual feasible business plan. So what can you do instead? Of course, we have a few levers that we can pull here. One is we can reduce our expenses. So maybe you say, I don't need to make $80,000 a year. Maybe you have a lower revenue goal that you're trying to hit. Especially if you have retirement income or income from some other source, then you don't need to make as high a revenue. And that takes the pressure off of how much work you need to produce and sell. The next thing you can do is raise prices. If your average painting sells for $2,000 or $4,000 or more, then of course, you don't need to sell quite as many pieces to hit your revenue goal. I think realistically, for many artists, reducing their expenses and living more humbly is something that you can do in the short term and that you have a lot of control over. Raising your prices is something that's a little bit more difficult. And you need to make sure that the market and your collectors are able to continue buying at those prices for that to be sustainable. So I think that raising prices is more of a long-term strategy. And one thing to note is that even if you're able to pull off this strategy, you'll probably find that your income is actually very volatile. There are periods where you might sell a lot of paintings and periods where sales are really slow. And that can make it really hard to plan things out. It's so different from going from having a regular job with a regular paycheck to relying on self-employment income and something as volatile as art sales. So even if you're able to produce and sell enough paintings to make a good living, you might still find that the variability in your income is really stressful and you might look for other options to help smooth things out to make sure that you can pay your rent every month. So taking into account the difficulty of hitting revenue goals just from selling paintings, plus the instability that comes with art sales, I think that a key to having a sustainable career as a In my own practice, I like to do this in several ways. First, I take commissions for custom paintings. Commissions are great for business because usually you'll take a deposit up front. So you get paid some of the money before the painting is even done, and then you get the final payment once the painting is completed. This can help smooth out your income as you're not waiting for one huge payment once the painting sells. And you're also making the piece knowing that it's going to a home, so you don't have to worry about trying to sell it once it's finished. I also charge a premium for my commissions because these are custom products. These are paintings that I make specifically for a certain collector, and this allows me to charge a higher price than I would for my original works. The major drawback about doing commissions is that you do lose some creative freedom. The client will usually have a certain size or subject matter that they're looking for, and it's your job to accommodate that. Some artists really don't like this loss of creative freedom, but for me, I've found commissions that are really in line with the work that I'm already producing, and honestly it's been a joy to be able to make these pieces for collectors. So commissions are a really important part of my art business. The second great way to diversify your art business income is through teaching. And this is not just for people who have MFAs. Sure, if you want to teach at a college or university, you generally do need an MFA degree. But if you're open to teaching more informally, either through private workshops, private lessons, then you don't need a degree. You can just teach what you know. I'm a completely self-taught artist. I don't have any art degrees, but because I'm dedicated to my practice, because I'm always learning and growing in my own art practice, I'm able to share what I've learned with other artists. I've taught in-person workshops, live classes, online classes, and private lessons. And for all of these, I think about what do I know specifically in my practice, what worked for me as I was learning in my art journey, and how can I share that with students. Think to yourself, what's something that you really love about your art practice that you'd love to share with others, and then make a class about it. And you don't need to start with a full-blown class. You can start with something simple, like an afternoon workshop that's just a couple hours, to see if teaching is something you enjoy and something you want to keep doing. The other thing I really like about teaching is that it's somewhat decoupled from the unstable art sales. While art sales may go up and down, it seems like there are always people who are looking to learn. In my own practice, I noticed that the summer months tend to be slower sales-wise, so I like to teach classes then to help boost my income during that time. The third way to help make your art business more sustainable is through content creation, specifically through platforms like YouTube, HERE, and Patreon. On YouTube and Patreon, you can share content about your art making behind the scenes, you can share specific tutorials, or you can do art blogs. As your audience grows on YouTube and Patreon, that will give you some regular recurring income from those viewers. You can also work with sponsors who can pay you to demo their products or talk about their product on your videos. I think these platforms are great, but I will say if this is a strategy you want to pursue, be ready for it to take some time. I found in my own experience that growing my income through YouTube and Patreon has been a very slow process. It took me several years of posting videos regularly to YouTube before my channel was even monetized. And even now that it's monetized, I really don't get much from the channel each month. I also haven't worked with sponsors because I find most of them are not aligned with the videos that I want to make, but I have seen other artists working with sponsors and having good experiences. And even if you're not making much money from YouTube, it still can be a good way to connect with potential students or collectors. So I kind of see YouTube as a free marketing platform for my art, as a way to tell my story and connect more deeply with supporters, in addition to being a very small side income each month. And the last strategy for diversifying your income that I'm going to talk about today is through fine art prints. Making fine art prints of your finished paintings can be really great. They're a low cost entry point for your fans, a way for them to start collecting and engaging with your work. And there are a lot of companies out there that can make high quality prints for you, or you can invest in your own high quality printer and make your own prints as well. I've tried prints in the past and ultimately I don't do them anymore. I've found that they tend to have really low margins, especially if you want to make really high quality prints. And so the only way to make a good income from prints is if you're selling really large volumes. So for me, if I do make prints, it's usually just for marketing purposes, but I do know other artists who sell prints regularly and really recommend them. Also, if you're the kind of artist who makes only a small number of paintings each year and all of your original paintings have already sold, prints can be a great way for people to still be able to enjoy your work. And these are just a few ways to diversify your income. I'm sure there are many other things you can do as well. And if you are a working artist and have ideas, feel free to post them in the comments below. But these are the ones that I'm most familiar with and that I've tried myself. I think one of the great things about being an artist is that you are so creative, and so you're able to come up with solutions even to these really thorny business problems. So I hope that this video has given you a more realistic perspective on what it actually takes to make a living through selling artwork and other strategies that you can do to help make your career more sustainable. I think if you want to be a full-time artist, if that's your goal, then that's amazing. But I also think it's important not to romanticize what that would actually look like. That's why if you do have a day job that you like and that still allows you make your work, or if you have flexible work that you do on the side that can support your income, then I highly recommend keeping that and making space for both that and your art practice in your life. But if you're determined to be a full-time artist to focus exclusively on your art, then it is possible and there are ways to do it. The important part is to use your creativity, make a plan, and be ready to adapt as your business changes. And then you can create a Thanks so much for watching. I hope you found this video helpful and if you did or if you have any other art business ideas, please share them in the comments below. And once again, if you want to learn more about my art business or art practice, then be sure to check out my Patreon, where I have a lot of special perks for artists. Thank you so much to all of my current Patreon members for supporting this channel and making these videos happen. Thanks to all of you for joining me today and I'll see you in the next video.