I actually disagree with being an artist as a full time job and am really conflicted with the idea of being treated as a worker. On one hand, paying people and treating them as workers is vital for art to be made and to make sure it's not only done so by the privileged. But...

That's only because art in its current structure is capitalist as fuck. Creating art is fulfilling. It's a first choice "career". When your back is up against the wall you don't say "I'm gonna write a play", you get a bar job. That knowledge is used to exploit art workers.

Art has always and will always be made simply for the sake of making art. The issue is capitalism. I often feel that these (entirely necessary) fights for worker rights just buy further into the idea of art as a commodity and workers being paid to generate wealth.

I've created a company in the arts that pays people. Always. And somehow that's rare. I am all for paying everyone a fair wage but I think we need to put less focus on the fight for fair pay which is a short term win and more focus on the fight to dismantle capitalism.

I end up talking about paying workers an awful lot in the arts because I pay everyone a living wage (even though I've never paid myself) and I pay for people to join trade unions. But I can never quite find the right words to express how I think whole thing is broken.

Whenever I've attempted to explain this opinion, people think I'm saying that being an artist isn't real work or deserving of real pay. That's not the case but there's other factors to be considered and, ultimately, the system which it's built on (capitalism) is exploitative.

And while I understand, I find myself increasingly frustrated by this attitude in the arts that I occasionally see that "I've chosen to be an artists and therefore deserve to be paid" because choosing any career is a privilege that isn't acknowledged when so many have no choice.

They have no choice because the real world, much like the art world, is subject to the same exploitative capitalist system. What I'm basically saying, is that any work for a wage is stupid but it feels particularly stupid for art because it has other non-tangible benefits.

I think about the non-tangible benefits to mental health that comes with creating art. I think about art therapy. And how creativity can heal the soul. And I think about how many people I know who struggle with their mental health making art. How does that make sense?

It makes sense because creating art is being treated as a job instead of the magic that it is. Art isn't being created to create. It's being created to be exploited and so are the workers and that's how the system is designed. And yet people keep choosing art as a career.

And I do wanna reiterate that I recognise that this knowledge is too often used by people in power to exploit art workers to get them to do shit for "exposure" and preying on the fulfillment they receice from working on creating art. Fuck those people. They're leeches.

So, yes, the fight for fair pay and workers rights must continue but that shouldn't and can't be the end goal. There has to be more and if you want creating art to be truly accessible to all then every structure around it needs to be fucked up.

I dunno if any of that makes sense. I've tried threads on this a number of times and had art workers job on me to be like "but it is a job" and "I've got rent to pay" and I get it. I do. My teeny tiny company does more that most to address that. But there has to be a bigger goal.

I don't think my thoughts on this subject are ever super coherent but it essentially boils down to everything is too capitalist but art especially and, when we're involved in other fights, we shouldn't lose sight of that and the problems it causes.