Myself, I'd go easy on amateurs. There's still a serious point to be made in that amateurs literally perform their art or craft for the love of it - to be paid and to have that as your main source of income immediately changes the deal. Amateurs have the freedom to be as trivial (macrame and fan fic about Star Trek) or as serious and out there as they like because they're not depending on their efforts for their income. The moment you make your art or craft the main source of your income I think other factors such as having/developing/maintaining an audience and people who are willing to sell your work come in. I could play devil's advocate and say that professional work is less free and sometimes less challenging than it could be, because it's a product for a fee. ;) We all love to mock 'hacks' as much as we like to mock the person who does night-classes in a daggy craft. 'Artist' is a tough word, and the Romantic movement has a lot of answer for. People get this maggot in their head about artists somehow being above filthy lucre and the market, or that art is 'inspired' rather than more like what we traditionally associated with a craft - you learn and you produce. I think the christian is right about the role of Medieval artists - they weren't seen as especially inspired or special, so much as the work they did glorified someone else, either their master or ultimately God. They were firmly within and reinforced the hierarchy of their world. They didn't necessarily paint what they themselves believed - they painted what they were commissioned to paint, usually propaganda of some kind, religious or political. They almost never left their names on their work. They were of the artisan class, not artists. Far more like our ideas of graphic designers, advertising and film industry folk today. It was with the Renaissance that the idea of an individual artist with a name worth preserving started to develop. But the idea of artists as somehow outside the boundaries of class and the contracts of employment comes directly from the Romantic movement, along with the idea that you 'wander lonely as a cloud' until inspiration strikes and you suddenly churn out a master-piece. The Romantic poets, writers and artists were trying to describe their experience - as a rule they were male, sometimes they were already of independent means (and almost always of middle class), so they didn't have to scramble after patrons and publishers. They were often literally 'amateurs' and gentlemen to boot, set apart from the hoi-polloy and all demeaning commercial considerations. Irritating that the very ideas of class that we treat with such wariness or disdain also infiltrate our ideas of art. To stand and say 'There's never been anything like this before. I have made it. You will love it (and buy it) Because It Is Art.' is a peculiarly Western notion born over the last hundred years. Artists who now go out of their way to produce art that no one can 'use' but are still expected to buy such as installations involving ox hearts and jello are the ultimate expression of this. You're right. It's fascinating.
Arty types
We all love to mock 'hacks' as much as we like to mock the person who does night-classes in a daggy craft.
'Artist' is a tough word, and the Romantic movement has a lot of answer for. People get this maggot in their head about artists somehow being above filthy lucre and the market, or that art is 'inspired' rather than more like what we traditionally associated with a craft - you learn and you produce. I think the christian is right about the role of Medieval artists - they weren't seen as especially inspired or special, so much as the work they did glorified someone else, either their master or ultimately God. They were firmly within and reinforced the hierarchy of their world. They didn't necessarily paint what they themselves believed - they painted what they were commissioned to paint, usually propaganda of some kind, religious or political. They almost never left their names on their work. They were of the artisan class, not artists. Far more like our ideas of graphic designers, advertising and film industry folk today.
It was with the Renaissance that the idea of an individual artist with a name worth preserving started to develop. But the idea of artists as somehow outside the boundaries of class and the contracts of employment comes directly from the Romantic movement, along with the idea that you 'wander lonely as a cloud' until inspiration strikes and you suddenly churn out a master-piece. The Romantic poets, writers and artists were trying to describe their experience - as a rule they were male, sometimes they were already of independent means (and almost always of middle class), so they didn't have to scramble after patrons and publishers. They were often literally 'amateurs' and gentlemen to boot, set apart from the hoi-polloy and all demeaning commercial considerations. Irritating that the very ideas of class that we treat with such wariness or disdain also infiltrate our ideas of art.
To stand and say 'There's never been anything like this before. I have made it. You will love it (and buy it) Because It Is Art.' is a peculiarly Western notion born over the last hundred years. Artists who now go out of their way to produce art that no one can 'use' but are still expected to buy such as installations involving ox hearts and jello are the ultimate expression of this.
You're right. It's fascinating.