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> Whales are nice to have but any financial model that includes them is gonna end up focusing on pleasing them I completly understand where you are coming from

> Whales are nice to have but any financial model that includes them is gonna end up focusing on pleasing them I completly understand where you are coming from, but most of our historical art is because of "whales", so all in all I don't think whales are bad for art. I am sure Leonardo would have preferred not to be under pressure from whichever prince he was currently working for, but did his art suffer? I am not saying a whale is required, van Gogh is a good example, but even van Gogh might have benefited from a whale.

scyzoryk_xyz 6y ago
This gets very tricky very fast though and not so simple. Those historical 'whales' you're referring to frequently would finance art for reasons bigger than just their own fancy or pleasure, for political reasons, for diplomacy, for communication, for power grabs. And then artists would have their own way with exerting their own power over the process as well.
- dd36 6y ago
  As a store of value to launder money.
egypturnash 6y ago
Did Leonardo's art suffer for being done for patrons? Maybe, who knows? What would he have created if he'd had some kind of Renaissance-era version of Patreon, with a thousand people willing to give him one measly florin a month to keep doing whatever he wanted to instead of painting the heck out of portraits of rich merchants and their families? As an artist, I feel that there is a sort of scale of priorities. Making money with my art skills is more fun than making money with any other way. But there are things I like to draw, and I'd rather make money drawing those instead of things I don't like to draw. And I'd generally rather make money by drawing whatever the heck my muse directs me to draw, instead of what I think is likely to sell, or what someone with a lot of money would like me to draw. Different people have different priorities, someone who's willing to draw whatever the hell comes their way probably makes more money than I do, and that's their choice. I have an artist friend who mostly dropped off the net for a few years because he was doing lots of very specific fetish art for a rich client who didn't want it posted anywhere, and was willing to pay handsomely for that. He was willing to do that, I wouldn't. He also had a kid to support, I don't. And... poor Vince certainly could have used a richer set of patrons, yeah. He could have used a lot of things. Possibly including some modern psychoactive chemicals. Dude was pretty fucked up.

scyzoryk_xyz 6y ago

This gets very tricky very fast though and not so simple. Those historical 'whales' you're referring to frequently would finance art for reasons bigger than just their own fancy or pleasure, for political reasons, for diplomacy, for communication, for power grabs. And then artists would have their own way with exerting their own power over the process as well.

dd36 6y ago
As a store of value to launder money.

egypturnash 6y ago

Did Leonardo's art suffer for being done for patrons? Maybe, who knows? What would he have created if he'd had some kind of Renaissance-era version of Patreon, with a thousand people willing to give him one measly florin a month to keep doing whatever he wanted to instead of painting the heck out of portraits of rich merchants and their families? As an artist, I feel that there is a sort of scale of priorities. Making money with my art skills is more fun than making money with any other way. But there are things I like to draw, and I'd rather make money drawing those instead of things I don't like to draw. And I'd generally rather make money by drawing whatever the heck my muse directs me to draw, instead of what I think is likely to sell, or what someone with a lot of money would like me to draw. Different people have different priorities, someone who's willing to draw whatever the hell comes their way probably makes more money than I do, and that's their choice. I have an artist friend who mostly dropped off the net for a few years because he was doing lots of very specific fetish art for a rich client who didn't want it posted anywhere, and was willing to pay handsomely for that. He was willing to do that, I wouldn't. He also had a kid to support, I don't. And... poor Vince certainly could have used a richer set of patrons, yeah. He could have used a lot of things. Possibly including some modern psychoactive chemicals. Dude was pretty fucked up.