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Making a Living out of Painting

I have sometimes participated (almost always as auditor) in conversations between artists and art critics about “painters that make a living” from painting, and the thesis that always won, which is in my believe wrong, is the one that says that the aim and at the same time the dedication of the artist is to live from his art. I respect this idea though I totally disagree on the idea that making a living out of art makes you an Artist “with a capital A”.

The painter artist must live “for” the painting; and if he also lives from it, even better so. And if anyone wonders about the reason for these lines on this topic, I said it at the beginning; because I have red many interviews with painters that repeat this proudly, and since… make a living from painting with an absolute dedication. And I ask myself where is the freedom of not having to depend on that making a living out of it.
 
Why can´t an artist work (as in fact many do), make a living for himself and his family and also paint? Is there no time? There is time for everything; plenty of time. If you totally dedicate yourself to art will you create better? Wrong! Only the GOOD one creates, whether he works or not; and the bad, the mediocre one, even if he wakes up and goes to bed only with the task of making art, he will still be bad or mediocre.

    So I draw the conclusion that just as clothes do not make the man, dedicating oneself to Art does not make you an artist.

The artist, as I have said in some other occasions, is born; then he has to discover that he is an artist and, afterwards, learn how to develop that gift he has been given; not forgetting that it is a gift and not an award.


Jorge Rando, Malaga, Christmas 2005