Making a Living
Making a Life
Last month I had the great pleasure of being part of this roundtable with 5 other artists of all ages. We talked about how we can live sustainable artistic lives, how to build community, not burn out, not go bust, nor sell out, prevent isolation – all those brilliant, tricky questions at the heart of practice that no one ever discussed with me at art school.
Thanks to the excellent Geska Helena Brečević, artist and project manager at Konstnärernas Riksorganisation, and also to Dougald Hine, convener extraordinaire, writer, podcaster and friend-sower. Both Dougald and Geska kept the converstaion going, asked great questions, and allowed me and my fellow artists to think aloud in a useful way.
The transcript and subsequent translation into Swedish has now made its way into many thousands of artists’ homes and studios, and we do hope it will be of use, especially for younger artists stepping out into the world. For me it is also lovely to see this copper acetate and iron gall ink dragon gyre drawing I made as the cover. It was based on Norse creation mythology and was originally comissioned by Paul Kingsnorth for Little Toller’s excellent online magazine ‘The Clearing’ a few years ago, in response to writing by Andreas Kornevall .
The original artwork is with the folks at Little Toller. I gave it to them for a fundraiser but I have no idea what became of it. That’s art-life too. Your work leaves home and has its own life, just as we do.
