The question is one that has vexed artists for as long as money and prestige have been attached to art. Some artists seem to rise above it, others are crushed by it. And, others still find their way to make peace with the fact they can create work from their vision and passion, make themselves wealthy, do good deeds for others and let the critics be damned.

One such artist who has accomplished this is Yuri Gevorgian Yuroz. Best known by his last name, Yuroz, the Los Angeles based artist has been a fixture on the art scene for three decades. A cover story in the Los Angeles Times Magazine titled, Never Mind the High Praise. How About a Little Ink?; His Work Is Priced as High as $150,000. He's Been Commissioned to Paint by the U.N. But There's No Place in the World of Fine Art for Yuroz and Others Like Him, provided the motivation for my post.

The gist of the Times piece came down to this: despite becoming wealthy and having the support and friendship and being collected by powerful and well-known people, and also having raised more than a million for charitable causes, Yuroz’ work was stymied from reaching the museum level. Seems the cabal of curators, gallerists and media that compromise the fine art cognoscenti had deemed him to be “too commercial.” Apparently, it is quite a sin to become too successful outside the anointed path to art glory. Being washed over with money from unapproved sources taints certain artists and they become scorned for their success. Yet in the odd dichotomy, we regularly celebrate record sales of artists whose work has met the cognoscente’s criteria for posterity. I’m not naïve; I realize talent and a host of other factors contribute to who gets picked. But who picks the pickers? Still the track record for experts picking talent in all kinds of fields is spotty. Whether is sixth round draft picks like Tom Brady becoming perhaps the best NFL quarterback ever, or musician Chris Daughtry defying the odds of being a fourth place American Idol loser to go on dominate the record sales charts in 2007. Those in the know, often pass on talent that later proves them shortsighted.

It seemed unfair to me then and does now that a small handful of soi-disant tastemakers hold the keys to an artist’s entrée into the world of museums and other acclaim that seals a legacy beyond his or her mortal years. But, the simple fact is life ain’t fair and decisions are made in ways not to be confused with democratic practices. We all live by rules someone else made up and mostly unelected others enforce. It’s the price of living in a civilized society. Still, delightfully sometimes we find the worm turns.

Recently, I received an email from Yuroz. He wanted to reply to my reporting of the LA Times Magazine article:

Dear Barney,

Many artists read your articles. Please find a way to give them a little light and hope too, so they will continue to create.... we need them. The article in L.A. times was totally misinterpreted and created an image of me (Yuroz), which is very far from reality. It is a long conversation which is important to me as an artist to make it right. One day I hope we can have a glass of wine and talk more about this subject. But, the very short version of all this is – Without artists there is no gallery, no museum and no critic.

Unfortunately the machine (galleries, critics, and museums) has become too dominating on the artist’s mind and life and this affects what they create. An artist's obligation is to create and support his love ones. To me, the person is considered to be successful if he can afford to wake up in the morning and do what he loves to do. Successful or not, I wish there were more artists in the world. I don't remember any time in the history that world suffered because there were too many artists

With regards,

Yuroz

p.s. I have good news to share with you. In 2008 I will have the pleasure of working with four museums around the globe to share my UN murals with public.

So, despite long odds, Yuroz is proving his detractors wrong as his work is finds its way to museums. I reiterate here the ending of my initial post:

The bottom line is that as an artist, if you are selective and effective in how you market yourself and your work, you can have it all, both prosperity and posterity. So, why not strive to do both? There’s no romance or nobility in being a starving artist. Focus on prosperity with flair, dignity, and style—with a dash of luck your reputation will precede you into posterity.

Ambition Is Not A Dirty Word
First published as a blog on Absolute Arts in December 2006

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Every artist was first an amateur.” If you examine any professional artist who paid the bills from their creative output in his or her lifetime, you’ll find each of them made peace with making commerce. Most were or are salespeople in their own right. A few may have had family or management to take on the task for them, but even then they were implicitly, if not directly involved in getting the art to market.

If there is a shame in embracing commerce, it is only that it violates the quaint overrated sappy notion of the starving artist. To my mind, starving is a bleak situation that cannot possibly help the creative process… lead eating mad genius’ aside. That doesn’t mean a well-fed artist can’t be hungry. Virtually every “known” artist got that way in part by being hungry. But it was hunger for food; their hunger was for recognition and validation. What fuels that hunger was ambition.

Someone emailed me recently to say they had seen a quote from my book, How to Profit from the Art Print Market, posted on blog penned by artist, EC (Lisa) Stewart, aka Creative Goddess. It is apropos for this blog as well:

Ambition Is Not A Dirty Word

If you lack this, get a publisher. It's that simple. Either you possess it like you possess artistic talent, or you don't. Ambition is not a technique you can study to improve upon. It's either or it's not - simple as that. It's an innate trait built into your DNA. Yes, we all have it to some extent, but you know what I'm talking about - the burning desire to enjoy success and be somebody come hell or high water. – Barney Davey

I swear this guy took the words straight from my mouth. "Come Hell or high water" is my trademark. :) – EC Stewart

There will always be a line between what is considered “fine art” and what is not and what is considered “museum quality” and what is not. I previously blogged here about posterity versus prosperity and the difficulties encountered by artists who dare to have it all. It’s interesting how some artists are seen as greedy and too commercial when others who are baldly and openly ambitious are celebrated. Fame is fickle, there is no denying that. One thing those “museum bound” artists and those who are stuck doing shows like ArtExpo New York have is they are all ambitious.

To a degree, ambition helps some artists separate themselves from the pack when talent alone would not. How often do we witness artists with far less talent and far more ambition than most climb to the top of the heap? That is not to say some of the most talented haven’t received appropriate accolades; they have. Still worthy others lacking good fortune or ambition or both remain in the grey abyss of the unknown artist.

There is no scientific method measuring talent or ambition. Yet, even casual observers have no trouble recognizing either attribute. When you find ample quantities of both in the same person, likely only bad luck or adversity keeps that person from enjoying great success. Find someone lacking in either, especially ambition and they may be living the life of the starving artist, or hobbyist artist.
Speaking of ArtExpo, it was recently announced by show management that the Decor Expo component was moving out of the Javits Center in Manhattan to the Baltimore Convention Center. Further, the dates for the latter show are now slated for April. This is not a good development for the art tradeshow scene.

The synergy of having the two shows running concurrently in New York was what helped make both shows successful for nearly 30 years. I wrote about this in detail on my Amazon blog. I mention it here because I was reminded recently when I saw the Picture Framing and Art Industry Event Calendar published by Vivian Kistler.

Vivian is a dynamo who has been conducting educational workshops and seminars for galleries and picture framers since the 1980s. If you haven’t seen her speak, you’ve missed a great opportunity to learn valuable information about running a gallery or picture framing shop. Go to her site www.columbapublishing.com for an idea of what she does.

What strikes me when I view the Event Planner is the lack of tradeshow opportunities for fledgling artists and art publishers. The tradeshow circuit is where most of the successful artists and publishers in the print business learned the tricks of the trade. They learned from their customers and each other.

At one point, not that long ago, there were eight Decor Expo, nee ABC shows, two PPFA shows, two or three ArtExpo shows available to help promote the wholesale art and picture framing business to the retail base. That dynamic is gone. What is left is a question mark. Getting one’s art to market has always been difficult, but at least the roadmap was fairly well defined. These days, it takes more pioneering than ever to figure out how to make a go of it.

Imports, the Internet and big boxes are roiling the retail base. How an artist navigates the current situation is the subject of another blog, or book for that matter. But one thing will be constant regardless of the terrain needed to travel to destination success and that is ambition.

Costco, the giant warehouse retailer, recently and suddenly halted all its fine art sales. The chain store had received considerable favorable press by selling Picasso crayon drawings. The pieces were priced around $140,000. But when a Picasso heir claimed they were not authentic, Costco immediately got out of the art business. Perhaps that’s a good thing for the art business…and you can take that statement anyway you want to decipher it.

The company providing the art to Costco had been doing so successfully for nearly 10 years and had a good record of accomplishment of bringing in quality art that sold at substantial prices. One could regularly find Chagall, Miro, Dali and other artists’ works on Costco.com. According to sources close to the provider of the works, the piece in question had been vetted by trustworthy sources and at least one prominent auction house that reported it would have sold the piece. Still, Costco didn’t need the bad press.

Thomas Kinkade made the news recently when he lost a lawsuit by former Signature gallery owners. He was ordered to pay $860,000 to the gallery as a result. The owners claimed Kinkade’s company forced them to make bad business deals, undercut them by selling at deep discounts on QVC and misled them about the success of other Kinkade Signature galleries.

An art publisher in Scottsdale lost a lawsuit brought by one of Renoir’s heirs. It was forced to turn over mold and sculptures from them that it planned to sell in the mass market. Turns out that they although they were working with another Renoir descendant, it was not the one with the rights to the master’s works, or at least his sculptures.

Glass artist, Dale Chihuly, is battling in a lawsuit that is testing the limits of copyrighting art. The renowned master, who hasn’t blown glass in years due to injuries, has a team of surrogates that make glass to his specifications. Some of them have broken away and begun to make glass using styles and designs developed under Chihuly. A bylined article from Maureen O’Hagan in The Seattle Times reported this:

When does inspiration cross the line into imitation? That's the question at the heart of a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle claiming two glass blowers have copied Dale Chihuly's designs and are selling knockoffs at several local galleries. The copyright-infringement suit, filed Oct. 27 by Seattle-based Chihuly Inc. and the world-renowned glass artist's publishing company, is asking for at least $1 million in damages.

Neither side has fully laid out its case yet, but because copyright lawsuits involving fine art are relatively rare, especially in Washington state, it's raised some interesting questions.

How does an artist go about proving — or disproving — copyright infringement? How do you differentiate between Chihuly's influence on other glass artists and artistic plagiarism? Can he claim exclusive rights to designs that are modeled on things such as Navajo blankets and sea life? And what does it mean for the world of art glass?…Proving copyright infringement, however, is tricky. Legally, it's a two-part test: The accused artist has to have had access to Chihuly's work and the work has to be "substantially similar."

The first part is easy. Who hasn't seen Chihuly's work? The second test involves literally putting specific pieces side by side. That's impossible at this point because the lawsuit doesn't name specific works of either artist — a point of contention between the two sides.

"If the plaintiffs cannot identify the ... infringing work, then they have no business bringing a copyright-infringement claim in the first place," the lawyer for the defendants wrote in a court filing asking that the case be thrown out.

This report amid a myriad of stories and network broadcasts on Chinese oil knockoffs already roiling the art market. Daily, we are surrounded and assaulted by fake stuff everywhere. Is that a real Rolex? Are those lips and breasts natural? Does he wear elevator shoes and a toupee? Is Donald Trump’s hair real? Did you really rip 5,000 mp3s from your CD collection or legally download them from Itunes? Is that art print real? Local lifestyle magazines are filled with ads from dentists, surgeons, physicians, physical trainers and gurus who all want to transform us into unearthly Botoxed specimens.

Recently, a well-traveled friend from the art business mentioned to me that every town of any size has galleries with prints by Chagall, Picasso, Dali, Miro and others. Far too many in his estimation for them all to be real…kind of a thin-slice of the sort that Malcolm Gladwell describes in his best seller, Blink. The book describes how some people make expert decisions in the blink of an eye with seemingly little information. His first example is how Thomas Hoving of the Metropolitan Museum in New York immediately knew a marble statue being bought by the Getty Museum was not the real deal. Read the book to learn how he knew. Gladwell tells of another expert on Greek antiquities who had the same reaction for different reasons when she saw the piece. These quick and correct decisions came despite a serious and expensive vetting process by the Getty before purchasing the work.

What does all this mean to you? As a buyer, caveat emptor. As an artist, you must be asking yourself how do your ensure your work is authentic to your galleries and collectors. I’m not talking about some gimmickry like aforementioned Thomas Kinkade who signs his prints with his DNA pen, whatever that is. I’m talking about something more real and yet more ethereal as well. I don’t have some one size fits all magic solution for this problem. I am more posing this concept of authenticity as something artists need to consider in the creation of their pieces, and in the reproduction of their works if they choose that as part of their business plan and marketing mix.

Already fourteen states have laws on their books detailing how Certificates of Authenticity need to be handled. This is yet another indication that there has been far too many ill deeds done in the name of profit when art is sold and for the need to be authentic in every way for artists, publishers and galleries.

Futurists, Watts Wacker and James Taylor in their seminal work, The 500 Year Delta, talked about the sweeping changes coming over us now and how there is a yearning for authenticity. I couldn’t agree more with them. I love the possibilities that the digital press has created for artists. At the same time, its development has opened the door for even more potential fraud. It is in part why I continue to champion for open editions of digital prints. It’s a false pretense anyway, built on a legacy of printmaking from another time. Purely limiting digital prints is solely done for marketing purposes...so why keep it up when everybody knows it is unnecessary. I contend collectors will still pay premiums for good art, even if it is unlimited. I don’t care if some Broadway play has been performed 10,000 times before I see it. If I want to enjoy, I buy the ticket.

There have been some attempts at creating databases and registering art prints. None have really taken off for a variety of reasons. Mostly, artists and publishers don’t see the need for the additional expense, as most consumers are not demanding such stringent measures before buying. And, gaining enough influence to truly matter for such for profit companies is a huge struggle.

It seems to me that it comes down to integrity, thoroughness and uniqueness, and a healthy dose of creativity to be truly authentic. The devolution of the Decor Expo New York show is a window into what happens when creativity is no longer valued by the marketplace, at least those who control the volume buying of prints. The show is rumored to be possibly on its last legs. Its swift decline mirrors other changes in the art print market.

If it weren’t enough to have Chinese knockoffs to deal with, print publishers are increasingly relying on fewer outlets with larger open to buy budgets. The buyers at those outlets have very specific demands, which are quite limiting. It’s not unlike what has happened to free radio, which is a serious dumbing down of the creative process, at least at the outlet level. Even though there are thousands upon thousands of tunes to play, most stations have 600 songs in rotation and actually play half or less. This fact comes from Steven Van Zandt, in an interview in a Denver Post article titled, “Rockers turn tables – Musicians grab radio microphones, spin their favorites. The article reports that Alice Cooper, Eminem, Sammy Hagar, Tom Petty, Snoop Dogg, Charlie Daniels and others have all launched shows. You can thank satellite radio for this development.

Van Zandt, aka, “Little Steven” from Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, and of The Sopranos fame, hosts a weekly radio show using a playlist of 2,600 songs. The article goes on to mention that none other than Bob Dylan is getting ready to air a weekly show with music and Dylan musing on music, lyrics and life. That’s as authentic as something can be. Whether it will be entertaining is yet to be seen, but it certainly has my interest.

When I went to my first Artexpo New York in 1988, there was a palpable rebellious, outrageous creative bent to the show. That streak no longer exists. Sure, even then there was plenty of safe homogenous art to go around, but there was still a spirit there, not unlike the early days of FM radio when a jock might play Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant” even though it was 17 minutes long. Or a whole side of the Allman Brothers at the Fillmore East despite extended jams, just because it felt right. There was no corporate decision maker wheedling down and dictating the playlists.

I mention the development about the breakout of rockers as jocks playing what they like to hear because I have hopes that a parallel of sorts might happen in the art market. That is, with new distribution channels and yes, digital prints, among other things, that the art market can loosen up and find a way to be free of stifling decisions about what is good to print and publish. I trust the public is far more eclectic in its taste in both music and art. Though I don’t see the path clearly yet for the art business, I remain optimistic that in this age of a desire for authenticity that the art market will find its own way to embrace and fulfill the desire for it.

Arnold just turned 92 and is trying his darndest to deny the truth of that Latin phrase mentioned above. According to a recent newspaper story, he still paints seven hours every day. How's that for loving what you do for as long as you live? I couldn't have written my book without including something about him in it. You can read more about him in a lengthy article in the Salt Lake Tribune at this link: http://www.sltrib.com/lifestyle/ci_3663657. Talk about inspiration for any artist who wants to make a career in the print market. He has certainly managed that and much more.

I recently read 80% of the goods found in a typical Wal-Mart store are made in China. Whether the figure is accurate or not, it would surprise few consumers these days to read it. China has become the manufacturing floor for the world. Could there be a more telling event than venerable Big Blue, i.e., IBM, announcing earlier this year the sale of its Personal Computing Division to Lenovo Group Limited, a Chinese company?
 
The Chinese manufacturing skill has now risen to make them formidable in highly technical areas such as computers and chip sets. Even Nikon has cameras manufactured in China. In the art and picture framing business in recent years, Asian manufacturers have had a profound effect on moulding distributors and picture framing equipment manufacturers.

Those distributors and dealers who haven’t adjusted to lower cost Chinese manufacturers have come on hard times. Chinese manufacturers are now making high-end furniture and home accessories. It should be no surprise then that the art market is feeling the impact of Chinese imports.
 
You know the story is reaching critical mass when it is covered in the New York Times. Here is a quote from “Own Original Chinese Copies of Real Western Art!” in an article by the Times China business reporter, Keith Brasher:
 
“China's ability to turn what has long been an individual craft into a mass production industry may affect small-scale artists from Rome's Spanish Steps to the sidewalks along Santa Monica's beach in California, as well as many galleries and art colonies in between.

Artist groups in the United States are starting to express concern, questioning the originality of some Chinese paintings and whether they comply with American copyright laws.”
 
The November 17 broadcast of ABC World News Tonight ran this story: Chinese Counterfeits Pose Threats to U.S. Industry - Rip-Offs Include Everything From Golf Clubs to Van Gogh to Airplane Parts. It showed villages where Mona Lisa’s and Van Gogh’s are painted en masse.
 
So far, the competition has been in the form of oil paintings…by the pound, as some derisively refer to them. Until recently, there have been a relatively small number of Asian companies selling oil paintings to the semi-annual Decor Expo tradeshow that serves art galleries and dealers, picture framers, interior designers and the middlemen who job to big box retailers, contract designers and furniture stores.
 
While high profile industries such as software and entertainment have had an ongoing front-page battle over piracy issues with products being illegally manufactured in China, the relatively low-profile fine art reproduction and wall decor industry has not been immune to knock-offs. Nor is the growing threat less serious to them. For years, art publishers who produce fine art prints, art posters and giclées have sought to keep illegal copies from importers of flat oil paintings out of the tradeshows where they compete. Due to banding together to form the Art Copyright Coalition www.artcc.org, and to more vigorous individual defense of their intellectual property rights, publishers have had limited success in keeping copies of their work being displayed at shows.
 
According to a new item on his Website, Thomas Arvid, a popular and very successful print artist who specializes in painting wine, had knock-off works removed from the booths of offending companies at the combined Decor Expo and Artexpo Atlanta shows in September. Arvid also made news when, with the help of the U.S. Marshall’s office, he seized 146 counterfeit pieces of his work from a gallery in the resort town of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. A visitor to the gallery tipped off Arvid’s office. The pieces, apparently produced in China, were selling for prices of $20 -$60. Arvid’s fine art prints typically sell between $1,000 and $2,000. His originals sell for more than $60,000.
 
Now as framed art sales are trending to big boxes and the Internet against a backdrop of rising Chinese manufacturing gains in markets that seemed unconceivable just a few years ago, the number of companies marketing very inexpensive oil paintings has greatly increased. The larger numbers create a growing threat to the U.S. art reproduction market.
 
Incredibly, these Chinese companies use an assembly line approach to creating art. The result is oil paintings produced at very low prices. In the past, a lot of this art was sold in hotel ballrooms to customers responding to shrieking television commercial pitches selling art from “starving artists.” Much of it was destined for commercial contract design orders for hotels and offices. Today it’s wending into the mainstream, where consumers want passable quality art at cheap prices, just as they like cheap apparel and electronics. For example, Fashion Square mall in Scottsdale, Arizona is home to top echelon retailers like Neiman Marcus, Gucci and upscale tony boutiques. Right along side them is Painted with Oil. A gallery selling oil paintings at great prices from Chinese sources. Galleries like this one are springing up in malls everywhere.
 
Reports from the recent Atlanta Decor Expo and Artexpo tradeshows (arguably the largest art and picture framing tradeshow worldwide) revealed that the art sector is experiencing dramatically increased competition from Asian companies, primarily Chinese. However woeful for their competitors, it is no surprise Chinese companies seek a larger slice of the U.S. decorative art and wall decor market. They have incredible capacity, low costs and are voracious for sales in every market. To make matters worse, the quality of the knock-offs has continued to improve.
 
For those readers who have not been to a Decor Expo show; imagine flat, unmounted oil paintings on canvas stacked two feet high, side-by-side on numerous eight foot tables. In the past a handful of companies marketed flat oil paintings. This year, aisles upon aisles of these companies exhibited. They spread canvases on the floor in bazaar style for buyers to browse through the stacks. Go to www.oilpaintings.com to get an idea of the scope. Wholesale prices are low with about $60 for a 36” x 48” canvas. Stretched and nicely framed, a finished piece might wholesale for $200 and retail for $450-600. These oil painting exhibitors still make up only a fraction of the hundreds of artists, publishers, picture framing distributors and equipment manufacturers that comprise this huge show.
 
Traditionally, even though most publishing companies looked askance at these low-end producers, as there were relatively few of them. Publishers always were aware of piracy of their images and made mostly unsuccessful efforts to police them. Over the years, there have been many heated exhibitor-to-exhibitor exchanges and exhibitors engaging show management. Aggrieved parties were looking for an immediate cease and desist of the other company selling their copyrighted work. Most often, they were left wanting as show producers could not act as legal authority even when the knock-offs were obvious.
 
The dissatisfaction many publishers with the situation led to the formation of the Art Copyright Coalition, www.artcc.org. Many in this group are also members of the Art Publishers Association, http://apa.pmai.org. Firsthand accounts from this year’s Decor Expo Atlanta show repeatedly told of knock-offs this year that were most egregious. Police were called to the Georgia World Congress Center to take reports. Justifiably angry publishers and artists who saw knock-offs of their copyrighted work being openly sold at the show obviously took no consolation in the improved quality of the knock-off work.
 
Piracy is a considerable problem in doing trade with China. Below is a quote from an March 2005 article in Inc. magazine titled, How China Will Change Your Business: “Piracy is a problem. Foreign companies have little defense against even outright theft of their technology in China. China's failure to police intellectual property, in effect, creates a massive global subsidy worth hundreds of billions of dollars to its businesses and people. By investing in the country's manufacturing infrastructure, by providing the expertise, machines, and software
 
China needs to produce world-class products, the world is also helping assemble the biggest, most sophisticated, and most successful "illegal" manufacturing complex in the world.Seen another way, China's loose intellectual property rules turn the tables on the Western colonial powers and the Japanese who throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries violated China's land and people. As China grows into a great power, the wealth transferred into the country by expropriating intellectual property will propel it forward.” Download the full article at: www.inc.com/magazine/20050301/china.html
 
While the Decor Expo show spotlights the situation on the reproduction end of the art market, there is growing evidence that contemporary fine art by Chinese artists will continue to make a major impact on the high end of the market. Prices for top echelon Chinese artists are on the rise at shows and auction houses. Fine art shows in Sinagpore and Hong Kong are taking on increasingly global importance. Given China’s enormous population and the sheer number of art students it annually produces, it is almost a given master painters will rise from among them. Some to dominate the art scene.
 
It’s been said the 20th Century was the American Century and the 21st Century will be the Chinese Century. If that is true, then certainly the visual arts will feel the effect. Time will tell. In the meantime, if you are an artist, make sure your work is properly documented at: www.copyright.gov. Be as vigilant as possible in defending your intellectual property rights, but don’t let the problem eat you up either. If you are a publisher, consider joining the Art Copyright Coaltion. If you are a collector, avoid the temptation to buy the cheap oil painting reproductions. Sites like Absolute Arts are full of great original art created by deserving artists and much of it is priced quite attractively.

The Problem Worsens – this just in

The December 2 issue of the Robert Genn Twice Weekly Newsletter (I don’t know how he does it and still find time to paint as he does) had a subject line: International Theft. He tells about being informed by another artist that a Chinese company has many of his art pieces online selling giclees and photocopies for $16 - $46 apiece. Naturally, he is outraged and has contacted the Canadian authorities to get help. He offers advice and a list of artists from the offending site in his article. You can read it at: http://www.painterskeys.com/letters.asp?let=051202

The life of an artist is full of many challenges, by becoming a collector you also become a benefactor of someone who has chosen to add creativity and beauty to the world often at the cost of making a living in some other more financially rewarding pursuit. Your support is vital.
 
This blog is reprised in part from the November issue of my free digital newsletter, Art Print Issues that reports on all aspects of the art print market.

I have been blogging on Amazon and Absolute Arts for the past year and have decided to include those ramblings here as well. This is a semi-blog because if you want to comment, you'll have to send them to me and I will post them. Not quite as high tech as other blogs, but good enough for this space.  Enjoy!   Barney
 "I'd asked around 10 or 15 people for suggestions. Finally one lady friend asked the right question, 'Well, what do you love most?' That's how I started painting money." - Andy Warhol

A question that particularly vexes visual artists, especially those who work in prints, is should they create for commercial success or attempt to create a museum bound legacy. If I try to make my art so people will buy it, am I selling out? If I try to make my art for the ages, can I live off it now?

Compared to other arts, visual artists have the ability to wrest more control of their careers than actors, writers and musicians, especially those in the print market. How so? An artist with the drive and wherewithal can choose to self-publish their work and effectively and independently guide his or her career in the process. The other arts are far more reliant on a host of agents, managers and decision makers who exercise enormous control over the fate of their careers. The opportunity to exercise more control is a unique benefit for visual artists.

Of course, it's not that easy. No artist is going into any museum without having some powerful help to champion them in. Few, if any, make success as print artists without a good support staff. Still, the enigma is the more successful an artist becomes, particularly one who is self-published, the more likely they find themselves on the outs with the critics, curators and opinion makers who drive decisions on who is anointed as worthy and brought into museums, et cetera. Nonetheless, visual artists have more control over their careers should they have the resources and choose to employ them.

Mention starving artist to anyone and the image is conjured of a person sitting in tattered clothes in front of an easel. Sure, it's true waiters in New York and Los Angeles are passing time until their big break on stage, but it's rare to think of actors as starving artists. More importantly, when actors do make a breakthrough, no elite consortium of taste making arbiters is ready to knock them down for being too successful or making too much money.

I pointed out in a previous blog here that visual artists are the only ones who are required by arcane marketing tactics to limit how much they can make from reproductions from their originals. The practice grew out of physical and financial limitations imposed by printmaking techniques that dictated only a certain number of quality prints can be produced. Now in the age of digital printing, those constraints no longer apply, but the marketers still believe they need the crutch of limited editions to be able to effectively sell pieces. I say have the courage and audacity to rid the industry of this practice and take the lid off earnings for artists selling digital or offset prints.

A photographer recently said he expects his prints of the same images to get better over time. He reasons he'll be constantly improving his printing techniques and that software; inks, substrates and printers will improve in time as well. This makes sense to me. It reverses the concept of the first prints in an edition will be the best. Think about that alone as a reason why not to limit digital prints.

Back in the days when rock n' roll was still relevant, the idea of a band having a corporate sponsor for a tour was one way to get uncool with their fans fast. Somewhere along the way, bands were co-opted by the money and took the chance their fans would understand. So, the likes of the Rolling Stones and virtually every other top recording act now has tours sponsored by beer companies and credit cards, etc. Neil Young with his then controversial 1988 hit, This Notes For You, famously satirized this change in attitude toward corporate sponsorship,

"Ain't singin' for Pepsi
Aint singin' for Coke
I don't sing for nobody
Makes me look like a joke."

I believe Neil Young still tours without sponsorship. If there were one popular rock artist to evade sponsorship, it would be the mercurial Young. He has eluded all efforts to define him or his music. So, it shouldn't be surprising he has steered clear of sponsorship, too.

Can you believe it's been more than 10 years since the Stones allowed Microsoft to use "Start Me Up" as the anthem for Windows 95?

Still the rock bands that have given over to the power of corporate dollars were right; their fans forgave them for taking the dough. And, it was more than just money that drove the decision for many rock acts. They have found getting radio airtime increasingly harder to come by and corporate sponsorship and advertising has become another channel to expose their music to their fans. I ultimately think most fans knew in their heart of hearts they wouldn't turn down millions either so they begrudgingly forgave them when the ticket prices skyrocketed to more than $100 for many acts.

Speaking of actors, no one feels Dustin Hoffman who made a measly $17,000 for his career-making starring role in "The Graduate" became a sellout because he went on to become a multimillionaire by continuing his successful feature film actor career - even though many of his films were purely commercial vehicles. Yet, when visual artists seemingly mismanage their careers by becoming "too commercial," they can be assured the art world muckamucks and many collectors will shun them. How did this happen? How is this fair?

A Los Angeles Times Magazine article on the very successful artist Yuroz detailed the problem in a 4,100-word article titled, "Never Mind the High Praise. How About a Little Ink?; His Work Is Priced as High as $150,000. He's Been Commissioned to Paint by the U.N. But There's No Place in the World of Fine Art for Yuroz and Others Like Him." This may be the best piece about this subject you'll ever read and I can't recommend it highly enough if you want more insight into this conundrum.

The gist of the 2002 article, which is still available from the Times' archives, for a small fee, is that Yuroz stayed too long at Artexpo, the long running consumer/tradeshow held each spring at the Jacob Javits Center in Manhattan. Over the years, Yuroz has made a fabulous income and still does, but the article says the Fine Art community ostracizes him. So, Yuroz' dreams of art immortality are dashed as he realizes his in not going to be collected by the best museums.

Yuroz has managed to become wealthy selling art, and he has that to fall back on when he thinks about what might have been. It's of no consolation, but still he might consider this; the gatekeepers to Fine Art heaven are notoriously capricious and fickle and he might well have slaved away in obscure poverty and still not made the right impression on the right people. A scathing follow up letter to the editor regarding the article, (also available for a fee download on the Times Website), viciously attacked him for his commercialism and irrelevance and typifies the art cognoscenti's opinion of many artists who do too well; Yuroz included.

I say if you have the chance to make real money and become commercially successful, take the opportunity to do so and let the future decide your legacy. Just as Yuroz had no guarantee he would make it into the museums he covets, sometimes those that are "hot" in their lifetime go "cold." Some suggest Julian Schnabel's career typifies this scenario.

There is no getting away from the fact that success in business is part of being a successful artist. True enough, anyone can and should make up their own mind as to what success means to them and then try to attain it. However, from the outside looking in, there are standards we all apply to art careers. Being able to consistently sell one's work for increasing prices is for many the gold standard. Price points, competitions and prizes all add luster to a career, but having a viable growing body of interested collectors willing to pay to own one's art is tremendous validation that goes beyond ribbons, prizes and accolades.

I don't believe an artist has to sell out to become successful. In my book, How to Profit from the Art Print Market, I refer to Calvin Goodman's superb Art Marketing book. In it, Goodman explains how he disdained posters as a practical means for an artist's career involvement until he saw how Arthur Secunda, the brilliant painter, colorist and collage artist, had managed to have both a top tier gallery career and still have his work produced and sold by poster publisher, Haddad's Fine Arts. According to Secunda, while having his images made into posters did not make him wealthy, it did help pay for studio costs in California and France. He also believes it helped him gain a wider recognition for his work.

The bottom line is as an artist, if you are selective and effective in how you market yourself and your work, you can have it all. So, why not strive to do both? There is no nobility or romance in being a starving artist. Focus on prosperity with flair, dignity and style and with a dash of luck, your reputation will precede you into posterity.

Studying successful self-published artists reveals similar traits and attributes, including: Talent; Art that resonates with a large group of collectors; Financing; Dedicated and capable marketing personnel, (usually in the form of a spouse, relative or close friend); Willingness to prodigiously produce art in the same vein; and Ambition. Lacking any of these, most artists should choose first to work with a publisher.

Publishers have a Wish List for the ideal artist. It includes: Work has commercial appeal; Work is consistent; Easy to work with; Is Coachable on specific design requests; Is dependable and reliable; Is available and easy to contact; Is flexible and versatile. The reality is no artist exactly meets that criterion. Equally important, no publisher exactly meets all the needs of artists. As with all business agreements a quid pro quo is in evidence in the artist publisher relationship. The most satisfying arrangements are where parties understand and respect the needs and goals of each other.