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Rant Warning: Free (Request) Art
9 years ago
So this is for a few people over the years who have ultimately sent me into a state of fire breathing rage. My art is my profession, and has been my profession that I've been working very hard to improve in the last couple years. I live month to month when it comes to paying my bills and sometimes I get so close to overdrafting my account that I have to ask friends for a little bit of forward pay for pictures they plan on getting. I try to conduct myself in a way that is .... genuine and true to my nature but when it comes to your art I am a professional about it. I don't often even post personal art anymore because I would much rather display in my gallery what I have done for you rather than what I have done for myself.
That being said, one of the things that bothers me the MOST beyond people thinking I, a professional, need a 'challenge' are people who ask me directly for or joke about asking for free art. As a small business owner who provides a product of increasingly high quality and effort to my customers, I find it downright insulting for someone to approach me asking for such quality but being completely and utterly unwilling to pay for such. It implies I'm not worth your money when I have made every effort to be otherwise.
There's a local bakery here in my area that I really like. They make fresh paleo diet breads as well as delicious scones and all sorts of fresh baked goodies, but they are (justifiably) more pricey than if you went to a normal grocery store, by a couple dollars. Now you know as well as I do they provide a product that's never going to make them a ton of money. They do it because they love it and because they want to. I go to that store to get a product I like, and I would never disrespect a small business owner who is likely just trying to get by doing something they love by walking up and asking them if I could have a ten dollar loaf of home made fresh baked whole grain 7 seed bread for free.
In the same respect, I grind my teeth every time I hear a joking 'oh, well I'd get your art if it's free' or 'do I get a discount on that for being funny?' or get a long, expansive note of someone requesting free art and wanting me to read all their crap when they don't even have me watched or have never even attended one of my three times a week streams.
It isn't funny, it is rude and a little bit hurtful. In return, just warning ahead of time, I will respond to such messages in kind, by being just as rude. I know morally I should turn the other cheek, but I only do so with people I feel deserve second chances, not people who blatantly ignore the LARGE CAPITAL LETTERS on my profile on the front page of my gallery.
Now sometimes, out of the goodness of my heart I will simply do a free request stream because I like making people smile, and I love love LOVE! doing them when I can afford it. They are so much fun and they make people so happy, especially those who actually watch me frequently and even though they can't afford to get pictures show up in streams anyway just because they like to be involved. YOU people are awesome, and I appreciate you and sometimes I want to reward you for honoring me in such a way.
Sorry for the grump fest, but thank you for listening.
That being said, one of the things that bothers me the MOST beyond people thinking I, a professional, need a 'challenge' are people who ask me directly for or joke about asking for free art. As a small business owner who provides a product of increasingly high quality and effort to my customers, I find it downright insulting for someone to approach me asking for such quality but being completely and utterly unwilling to pay for such. It implies I'm not worth your money when I have made every effort to be otherwise.
There's a local bakery here in my area that I really like. They make fresh paleo diet breads as well as delicious scones and all sorts of fresh baked goodies, but they are (justifiably) more pricey than if you went to a normal grocery store, by a couple dollars. Now you know as well as I do they provide a product that's never going to make them a ton of money. They do it because they love it and because they want to. I go to that store to get a product I like, and I would never disrespect a small business owner who is likely just trying to get by doing something they love by walking up and asking them if I could have a ten dollar loaf of home made fresh baked whole grain 7 seed bread for free.
In the same respect, I grind my teeth every time I hear a joking 'oh, well I'd get your art if it's free' or 'do I get a discount on that for being funny?' or get a long, expansive note of someone requesting free art and wanting me to read all their crap when they don't even have me watched or have never even attended one of my three times a week streams.
It isn't funny, it is rude and a little bit hurtful. In return, just warning ahead of time, I will respond to such messages in kind, by being just as rude. I know morally I should turn the other cheek, but I only do so with people I feel deserve second chances, not people who blatantly ignore the LARGE CAPITAL LETTERS on my profile on the front page of my gallery.
Now sometimes, out of the goodness of my heart I will simply do a free request stream because I like making people smile, and I love love LOVE! doing them when I can afford it. They are so much fun and they make people so happy, especially those who actually watch me frequently and even though they can't afford to get pictures show up in streams anyway just because they like to be involved. YOU people are awesome, and I appreciate you and sometimes I want to reward you for honoring me in such a way.
Sorry for the grump fest, but thank you for listening.
There, see how awesome that sounds now? ^^
For style points, put a disclaimer next to your 'no requests' info, mentioning you'll do just that. Pretend they're telemarketers.
~ Heath Ledger as 'The Joker'
To this day I maintain a healthy "Fuck you, I don't need you".
I read this and my thought goes to three things I observed that annoy me. This is what the most generic person does.
One. They don't read. It's not that they can't not that they are illiterate nor have a hard time comprehending what is written before them. No. The fucks are never given and a good journal like this will completely blow past them without any scent of it ever crossing their nostrils.
Two. It plays back to something JB (EvilArt), Doffa, and a couple more within that group once said about people and maintained communication of it. People will also want high quality work done to look like X artist by Y artist who is dirt cheap just to on one hand make a simple forgery and say that it was done by X and on the other, because they're selfish pricks. They don't ever want to think about the time and energy Y puts into their own art, let alone X's style which, Y will 99% of the time refuse (unless they're that 1% that doesn't know any better).
Three: Artists have feelings? Since when?
Okay, maybe I can be excluded from the sarcasm of number three, since after all I don't have a heart and I don't give any fucks for greedy mother fuckers who deserve to be castrated to prevent them from breeding and making even more greedy stupid fucks. I guess the illusion is that some of them hope they can prey upon the feelings of the artist by either hoping that they are desperate, hoping that they are bleeding hearted (care about people way too much) or that they don't have many friends, which is part of why 99% tend to refuse in the first place.
We do have friends, we do have many other things we could be doing with either more constructive purposes or destructive purposes. We do art because we are creative. It's one of our callings in life to work as visionaries. Point is, all of it falls under one word: Entitlement. Most people of today feel far more entitled than they should.
Not something I'll ever say, I actually have a moral understanding of what is at stake for some artists and I'm happy to support while working around my own life.
You told me flat out ages past how you felt Blu. And I agree with it. You're also someone I call a dear friend despite my hermit nature, and even if I couldn't do much, don't feel afraid to pop me when you see me if you think there is something I could lend a hand with.
To that end, you shouldn't feel a need to apologize about venting your frustrations, particuarly to those of us who do listen and hear. As you mentioned, this is your business. It is your livelihood, and frankly, you have a right, if not an obligation, to protect it. And that's what you're doing.
Ugh, I'll try to contemplate something a little more coherent when I'm not swimming in a fog, but long prattle short.
Fuck the wankers who won't listen or learn. K_K