“Oh, you are so talented!” ” I love your work” “I wish I could draw”
Yeah but …… just how talented?
I live in the UK where there are 67 million of us.
In England last year around 200,000 took GCSE Art and design, in a population of around 1,500,000 16/17 year olds - that is around 13%.
So 13% of that population have some talent in art and design.

13% of the UK population is 8.7 million. - does that mean there are 8.7 million potential artists in the UK?
Looked at another way - there are over 30,000 Creative Arts graduates in the UK every year. If their working lives span 40 years, there are 1.2 million such graduates around in the UK.
So the number of potential artists in the UK is between 1.2 and 8.7 million! If the same ratios apply to the U.S. population, there are over 40 million budding artists there - and China, and India - thanks to the www, art is a global market.

It is obvious to anyone trying to sell their artwork that there are many many more people trying to do exactly the same.
Thinking about this, the comparison with cookery popped into my head.
Just as anybody can pick up a pencil and make a mark, so too anybody can put butter on bread.
Some can make toast, or even boil an egg or heat up beans. Does this make them a ‘cook’?
Why is it that there are some of us among the makers of marks who think of ourselves as ‘an artist’?
Lots of people show their children and grandchildren how to bake a cookie, some produce delicious dinners for their friends. When does this progress into a realm where that person is ‘a cook?’
The art world has some significant differences from cookery of course.
Social Media - “Look at this lovely drawing little Henry did yesterday. He is only 3, isn’t he talented?” Followed by dozens of Likes. Facebook Groups full of ‘My latest painting’ and every one of those swamped with ‘Oooh lovely’ supportive comments (nobody wants to say anything negative), all persuading all of us who post that we are ‘sooo talented’! ), and those vanity indicators make us feel good.
This doesn’t happen when little Henry bakes his first cookie or when I cook something delicious.

Money - Some paintings sell for mega buck millions. Art is apparently a great financial investment, everybody wonders if that old picture in the attic, or the print we bought 25 years ago for £20 might be worth a fortune.

None of this happens with cookery.
Fashion - People seek out new or different tastes in what they eat, but most of the artwork on their walls has been there for decades or might have been brought from their previous home. Food is literally the classic consumable whereas art is at the other end of the spectrum - it lasts.
There is a (justifiable?) suspicion that some products are made with built-in obsolescence - the battery runs out, the fabric wears through, the technology is overtaken by faster, better new stuff - but that picture on the wall stays there forever, much longer then the new car, or carpet, or furniture.
Walking around a large department store, I came across their art section. Full of very low-cost pictures printed onto canvas to make them look like original paintings. At first I was offended by all this - those customers could buy one of my unique original paintings for just a little bit more, but then, as the thinking progressed - why not?

Why not treat art as short-term decor to go with the new cushions?
And when the cushions wear out, or fashion moves on so you buy cushions with different vibrant modern patterns, why not buy new art to go with them?
The interior of my Granny’s home didn’t look like the one I now live in, the clothes I wear don’t look like those my Father wore, I can guess when an old photo was taken by looking at the design of the cars in it.
Fashion changes.
But does the artwork we buy develop as quickly?
I had the pleasure of wandering around the galleries in Carmel-on-Sea (California). Some were forcefully ‘contemporary’ - they sold pictures which would not have suited my Granny’s house, but others, equally forcefully, specialised in cleaned-up, freshly presented ‘traditional’ art which was probably older than my Granny, and yes, each of those styles was distinctly different.
Clearly some customers keep one kind of gallery in business and others do the same for the others. Some people love spicey food, others chew on raw steak, and huge numbers eat donuts and burgers.
I feel hungry, I think its time to paint again.

Artist's Blog

Posts tagged with Commercial-art

Cookery and Art