It is all "well and good" to say that you are an artist... and to make living an artful life and making things part of your daily routine... and another to be able to "make a living" at being an artist.
There is alot of very hard work that is involved in this.
Marketing.
Promotion.
Logos.
Branding.
Licensing & Copyrighting.
Packaging.
Mailing lists.
... and so on.
It is very conceivable to be working a 10-12-16hr day and do nothing but marketing, sales, photographing items, writing descriptions,
sending emails and such... and still not get to the business end of actually making things.
It's a fine line... and somewhere in there is a balance of making things and the business of art.
Even though I have been in business for myself as an artist since 1998; I still find it a very challenging thing to balance it all...
and often-times; I do not succeed at that balance.
But having struggled with my inner voices these past several months; I find, however...
that I have no other choice in life than to be an artist.
A working artist.
I feel like Tim Gunn... and am having a sort of "make it work" moment, here...
But there it is... and here I go (again).
If you haven't seen this clip making the round on the internet; I highly suggest you see it.
And... you can see the whole speech HERE.
"You can fail at what you don't want. So you might as well take a chance on doing what you love."