>Painter used to be a trade where you could sell your painting skills as, well, a skill applicable for other than purely aesthetic reasons, simply because there

>Painter used to be a trade where you could sell your painting skills as, well, a skill applicable for other than purely aesthetic reasons, simply because there were no other ways to document the world around you. Source? If anything I suspect there are more people making a living as painters now than at any point in history.