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> created solely for myself; I never had the intention of making it [...] mainstream This is how many artists have worked. They make something for themself, an

by mmooss 11mo ago

> created solely for myself; I never had the intention of making it [...] mainstream This is how many artists have worked. They make something for themself, and one day they show it to someone else ... or they just get the urge to share it more widely, often without the hope that anyone will really be interested. Or they keep it for themself. I think Tolkien is in that group, for example. But don't get the wrong idea from an extreme outlier: much of the time, others aren't interested, or not many are. Sometimes, nobody is interested until after you've forgotten about it or passed away. Who cares? That's one reason you need to make it for yourself. Also, I think that otherwise it provides much less expression and insight into another person, which is at the core of art. There is a fundamental human need to 'externalize the imagination'.

alsetmusic 11mo ago
Several years ago, I wrote an angry email to loved ones about something I’d seen in national news (USA) about my city. A friend replied saying that he thought I should submit it to a local paper. Ended up as an op-ed. Not a major claim to fame, but I was still pleased that someone cared enough about my words to publish.
nospice 11mo ago
> This is how many artists have worked. They make something for themself, and one day they show it to someone else That model depended on personal wealth or (more often) patronage. Because the supply of wealthy patrons was limited, it meant that you had fewer artists pursuing their visions. Everyone else needed to find menial jobs. Now, we democratized access to patronage, but it means that to support yourself, you need to deliver what gets you the most clicks, not what your soul craves. I sort of wish we still had both models, but I think that wealthy patrons have gone out of fashion in favor of spending money on crypto and AI.
- eikenberry 11mo ago
  > That model depended on personal wealth or (more often) patronage. "They make something for themself, .." For the vast majority of people this means doing it on the side, in addition to their day-job. I've known a lot of artists in my time and we all have day jobs. You do art for yourself because you love to create, not expecting to make any significant money on it.
  - nospice 11mo ago
    Right, which works great if your daytime job is being a professor at Oxford, but maybe less so if your only opportunity is farm labor or other physically exhausting job. Today, more people have the opportunity to dabble in art than ever before.
    - frutiger 11mo ago
      He started writing his stories long before he was a Professor. It was while he was a young man fighting in the First World War.
      - nicbou 11mo ago
        Right, which works great if your daytime job is fighting in the trenches, but maybe less so if your only opportunity is software development or other mentally exhausting job.
        pdmccormick 11mo ago
        Bravo lol
    - mrec 11mo ago
      Personally I've found it much easier to sustain creative stuff on the side while doing a non-knowledge-based job than a knowledge-based one. Mental exhaustion is much more of a drag than physical. (Though the knowledge-based hours were longer too, which I'm sure was a factor.)
- mmooss 11mo ago
  There are plenty of impovrished, struggling artists - it's a cliche - and especially unknown ones creating for themselves. > Everyone else needed to find menial jobs. That doesn't mean you can't create art. Anthony Trollope worked for the post office. Einstein, who externalized imagination in somewhat different way and attributed much to art, was a patent clerk. New York and LA are filled with waitstaff-artists. A friend hired a moving company that almost exclusively hired artists as movers (I know - they weren't too skinny?).
  - irishcoffee 11mo ago
    I sincerely never understood the “starving artist” thing. Everyone needs to be able to provide for themselves. The whole starving artist thing always came across (to me) as someone who refused to work because… art? Art, like anything else, lines up somewhere between a hobby and a career. Similar to athletes, somehow the cream just rises to the top. You never hear about “starving athletes” I guess is what I mean.
    - mbg721 11mo ago
      You do sometimes hear of Olympians in the non-big-pro-league sports whose families make enormous financial and lifestyle sacrifices to let them train and compete.
      - mmooss 11mo ago
        That was true for all Olympians before they allowed professionals to compete.
    - corysama 11mo ago
      There are definitely athletes who spend their entire prime years working in the minor leagues trying to get their big shot in the majors and never quite getting there. It’s a life of constant travel, crazy hours and very little money.
    - mmooss 11mo ago
      Those are big assumptions ... > Art, like anything else, lines up somewhere between a hobby and a career. Says who? Are you an artist? Many artists say - and I'm know nothing to doubt them - that they can give up art like you can give up food. > Similar to athletes, somehow the cream just rises to the top. No idea where you get that about art. Many complain that a lot of shlock rises to the 'top'. And how do we know about the cream that didn't rise? Many artists aren't discovered until they're old or dead - Van Gogh being the over-repeated example. But even Van Gogh! It's easier in sports - you can win on the field; there's frequent, objective evidence. But that applies to clearly superior elite, who have access to training. With access Messi would probably be on top regardless, but the number of Messis is a statistical error. People who are professional-level but lower down the pyramid, whose names you don't recognize but who make up the overwhelming majority of athletes, often say it depends mostly on relationships. There are plenty of people like them, and if they get a job depends on their relationships with coaches, agents, etc. You hear about athletes that seem perfectly capable, some even good or very good, but getting no calls.
samdoesnothing 11mo ago
Kafka is another.
ChrisMarshallNY 11mo ago
> or passed away A certain one-eared Dutchman comes to mind...
- mmooss 11mo ago
  Somewhere online I saw photos of where The Dutchman lived while creating some of the paintings - dirty, dreary, lifeless, depresssing places. To see that all around and to imagine and create the mini-worlds in those painting - with their vivid, wild use of color and texture - is wondrous and wonderful.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 11mo ago
    I think he sort of lived in his own world. He was def pretty neurodivergent, in some way. I [sort of] remember a movie, once, that had a kid basically doing a "Don Quixote" on the world, where his vision of everything was kind of wondrous. Don't remember it well enough to recall its name, though...
- ChrisMarshallNY 11mo ago
  I have to assume that someone has no idea what I was talking about, and thought that I was making some kind of ethnic slur. Sheesh. What do they teach, these days? Do people think Moby Dick is some kind of STD? For elucidation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh He died a pauper, but his work is some of the most valuable in history.
  - mmooss 11mo ago
    No complaining about downvotes! lol Yes, sometimes I can't even guess why. Drunk and missed the target? Those little arrows are poor GUI.
    - fuzzfactor 11mo ago
      Actually there has been a request to report suspected downvote-a-bots.
lutharvaughn 11mo ago
If you are actually making it for yourself then it shouldn’t matter. I think sometimes people tell themselves they are doing it for them, but then they start thinking “well what would so and so think”. I know I’ve done it, but once I started actually making things for me, I could feel the difference.
- dansjots 11mo ago
  If you make it for yourself and no one else likes it, it is of value to you still. If you make it for others but no one else likes it, it is of value to nobody at all.
rikroots 11mo ago
This explains my entire drive with my work on my canvas library. I wanted to do something different with the way I was presenting my poems on my poetry website, so I went away and built something which would help me do just that. I didn't expect the library to take over the majority of my spare time for over a decade, but then I was having too much fun to stop. The library's on GitHub and I could spam a link to it here, but it's much more exciting to spam a link to a poem that finally gets to use it - https://rikverse2020.rikweb.org.uk/poem/flaw https://rikverse2020.rikweb.org.uk/poem/flaw

by mmooss 11mo ago

alsetmusic 11mo ago

Several years ago, I wrote an angry email to loved ones about something I’d seen in national news (USA) about my city. A friend replied saying that he thought I should submit it to a local paper. Ended up as an op-ed. Not a major claim to fame, but I was still pleased that someone cared enough about my words to publish.

nospice 11mo ago

> This is how many artists have worked. They make something for themself, and one day they show it to someone else That model depended on personal wealth or (more often) patronage. Because the supply of wealthy patrons was limited, it meant that you had fewer artists pursuing their visions. Everyone else needed to find menial jobs. Now, we democratized access to patronage, but it means that to support yourself, you need to deliver what gets you the most clicks, not what your soul craves. I sort of wish we still had both models, but I think that wealthy patrons have gone out of fashion in favor of spending money on crypto and AI.

eikenberry 11mo ago
> That model depended on personal wealth or (more often) patronage. "They make something for themself, .." For the vast majority of people this means doing it on the side, in addition to their day-job. I've known a lot of artists in my time and we all have day jobs. You do art for yourself because you love to create, not expecting to make any significant money on it.
- nospice 11mo ago
  Right, which works great if your daytime job is being a professor at Oxford, but maybe less so if your only opportunity is farm labor or other physically exhausting job. Today, more people have the opportunity to dabble in art than ever before.
  - frutiger 11mo ago
    He started writing his stories long before he was a Professor. It was while he was a young man fighting in the First World War.
    - nicbou 11mo ago
      Right, which works great if your daytime job is fighting in the trenches, but maybe less so if your only opportunity is software development or other mentally exhausting job.
      - pdmccormick 11mo ago
        Bravo lol
  - mrec 11mo ago
    Personally I've found it much easier to sustain creative stuff on the side while doing a non-knowledge-based job than a knowledge-based one. Mental exhaustion is much more of a drag than physical. (Though the knowledge-based hours were longer too, which I'm sure was a factor.)
mmooss 11mo ago
There are plenty of impovrished, struggling artists - it's a cliche - and especially unknown ones creating for themselves. > Everyone else needed to find menial jobs. That doesn't mean you can't create art. Anthony Trollope worked for the post office. Einstein, who externalized imagination in somewhat different way and attributed much to art, was a patent clerk. New York and LA are filled with waitstaff-artists. A friend hired a moving company that almost exclusively hired artists as movers (I know - they weren't too skinny?).
- irishcoffee 11mo ago
  I sincerely never understood the “starving artist” thing. Everyone needs to be able to provide for themselves. The whole starving artist thing always came across (to me) as someone who refused to work because… art? Art, like anything else, lines up somewhere between a hobby and a career. Similar to athletes, somehow the cream just rises to the top. You never hear about “starving athletes” I guess is what I mean.
  - mbg721 11mo ago
    You do sometimes hear of Olympians in the non-big-pro-league sports whose families make enormous financial and lifestyle sacrifices to let them train and compete.
    - mmooss 11mo ago
      That was true for all Olympians before they allowed professionals to compete.
  - corysama 11mo ago
    There are definitely athletes who spend their entire prime years working in the minor leagues trying to get their big shot in the majors and never quite getting there. It’s a life of constant travel, crazy hours and very little money.
  - mmooss 11mo ago
    Those are big assumptions ... > Art, like anything else, lines up somewhere between a hobby and a career. Says who? Are you an artist? Many artists say - and I'm know nothing to doubt them - that they can give up art like you can give up food. > Similar to athletes, somehow the cream just rises to the top. No idea where you get that about art. Many complain that a lot of shlock rises to the 'top'. And how do we know about the cream that didn't rise? Many artists aren't discovered until they're old or dead - Van Gogh being the over-repeated example. But even Van Gogh! It's easier in sports - you can win on the field; there's frequent, objective evidence. But that applies to clearly superior elite, who have access to training. With access Messi would probably be on top regardless, but the number of Messis is a statistical error. People who are professional-level but lower down the pyramid, whose names you don't recognize but who make up the overwhelming majority of athletes, often say it depends mostly on relationships. There are plenty of people like them, and if they get a job depends on their relationships with coaches, agents, etc. You hear about athletes that seem perfectly capable, some even good or very good, but getting no calls.

samdoesnothing 11mo ago

Kafka is another.

ChrisMarshallNY 11mo ago

> or passed away A certain one-eared Dutchman comes to mind...

mmooss 11mo ago
Somewhere online I saw photos of where The Dutchman lived while creating some of the paintings - dirty, dreary, lifeless, depresssing places. To see that all around and to imagine and create the mini-worlds in those painting - with their vivid, wild use of color and texture - is wondrous and wonderful.
- ChrisMarshallNY 11mo ago
  I think he sort of lived in his own world. He was def pretty neurodivergent, in some way. I [sort of] remember a movie, once, that had a kid basically doing a "Don Quixote" on the world, where his vision of everything was kind of wondrous. Don't remember it well enough to recall its name, though...
ChrisMarshallNY 11mo ago
I have to assume that someone has no idea what I was talking about, and thought that I was making some kind of ethnic slur. Sheesh. What do they teach, these days? Do people think Moby Dick is some kind of STD? For elucidation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vincent_van_Gogh He died a pauper, but his work is some of the most valuable in history.
- mmooss 11mo ago
  No complaining about downvotes! lol Yes, sometimes I can't even guess why. Drunk and missed the target? Those little arrows are poor GUI.
  - fuzzfactor 11mo ago
    Actually there has been a request to report suspected downvote-a-bots.

lutharvaughn 11mo ago

If you are actually making it for yourself then it shouldn’t matter. I think sometimes people tell themselves they are doing it for them, but then they start thinking “well what would so and so think”. I know I’ve done it, but once I started actually making things for me, I could feel the difference.

dansjots 11mo ago
If you make it for yourself and no one else likes it, it is of value to you still. If you make it for others but no one else likes it, it is of value to nobody at all.

rikroots 11mo ago

This explains my entire drive with my work on my canvas library. I wanted to do something different with the way I was presenting my poems on my poetry website, so I went away and built something which would help me do just that. I didn't expect the library to take over the majority of my spare time for over a decade, but then I was having too much fun to stop. The library's on GitHub and I could spam a link to it here, but it's much more exciting to spam a link to a poem that finally gets to use it - https://rikverse2020.rikweb.org.uk/poem/flaw https://rikverse2020.rikweb.org.uk/poem/flaw