People’s Reaction to Me Being an Art Student

I have had my own photography business for years but decided to go back to school to further my skills. Those who don't know me and learn that I'm an Art student.... well I love when they ask me how I'm going to make money. I always repond "off of you". This confuses them sometimes until I explain.
Do you buy newspapers or magazines? Do they have pictures in them? Do you get family portraits done or your kids portraits done? Did you hire a photographer for your wedding? Do you order your kids school picures? Do you see ads everywhere whether people or objects even in catalogs your ordering from? Do you look at covers of CDs or Movies? Do you see photos on webpages? Someone took these images. Everytime you buy one of these products that helps the photographer make money. We are just the behind the scene person you don't think about.
Same goes for interior decoraters,clothing designer, furniture designer, movie makers, chefs even, graphic designers, website designers, architect, musicians, movies and plays have to have actors, music videos all comes back to an artist.
Artist jobs are everywhere, we are just behind the scenes and are taken for granted by most of society.

is this from the onion?

I think more artists just need to take more of a industrial/architectural/sustainable design route. Take the creativity and visual skill and combine it with a bit of technical know how, then hang out with some engineers of some sort and build something.

I wish I majored in Photography, but I wanted to avoid that "How are you going to make money?" question. So I studied Communications instead. But then people were all like "Oh so you want to be on TV?" So I picked up minors in things that actually interested me (Sociology and Linguistics)...but after all of that I still want to study photography.

Great pie graph!

haha i'm a theatre major and can relate to this graph almost too much. love it :)

It's all perception.

This is true of many "status" jobs, that are considered somehow cool. All the performing arts, anything to do with media or fashion, and anything in the media or fashion have this problem. It's all supply and demand, an therefore marketing. It used to be not tha hard to get a job as a forensics specialist till CSI came out. Then thousands of people got degrees for a profession with maybe a fifty to hundred openings a year nationally. "Six Feet Under" did the same thing for the mortician business.

One of the oddest ones IMHO is clothing buyers. Because of the Fashion mags, every little girl grows up being told they want to be in fashion. Clothing buyers are a particularly funny set. They compete tooth and nail to get a job they will have to work 60-80 hour weeks at, earning less than would doing retail, and they are doing something someone who doesn't read fashion magazines would think is completely inane, like sourcing material in the far east to make men's jockey shorts.

I'm an art major, and I work my ass off. It's not easy. It's just different... Just because we dont have our nose in a boring ass book 24/7 doesn't mean we aren't "working" in school... there are many ways to learn and many ways to apply knowledge. And I plan on making bank when I graduate, even business or "money making" majors can get the short end of the stick... The only fool proof degree is a medical degree... but really, it's not the piece of paper in the end... its the person and how they carry themselves in society.

I sooo agree with the statement "Dream", l@mpx.

However, the language used.. about "clinging to the pragmatic aspect of things" vs Dreams (so to speak), although I feel you there, I think feeds into the same delusion ultimately (the programming implied).
It labels "practical consideration" (pragmatism) as contrary to "consideration from our dreams"... but after all, isn't the argument pointing to the idea that
the pragmatic aspect of things
seems a bit devoid of value
when not rooted in our dreams?

We might add " ...resulting in the withering of what we care for and love in the absence of the nurture of inspiration from our dreams."

Anyway, love your post ;^)

Nicely done.

Can you draw me?

You can make good money in anything except for some of the more trivial degree (ceramicists rarely do well).

The major issue is that you have to be really motivated about it, and have all the necissary skills to be your own boss, marketer, accountant, etc.

- My girlfriend is a jewelry smith and makes about what I do as an engineer. She also works weekends though.

Music majors are equally as ridiculed.

I majored in Music Technology in undergrad, made a heck of a lot of abstract electronic music, then got my Masters in Entertainment Technology and now I spend my workday making sound effects for video games and other interactive experiences. I work with tons of former art majors and we are all quite happy. :)

Computer graphics/gaming is a good place to apply "profitably" REAL artistic talent. Minor in computer +,graphics, animation, architecture, ....something,...whatever. Just a pragmatic note.

Im an art major and I make money working for Current and making things pretty :)

Whats most people dont understand is that there are a lot of fields within the art community aside from just painting or sculpting. Theres graphic design, motion graphics, advertorial design, interior design, 3D modeling, textile design, packaging design, animation, etc etc. Commercial art is a huge industry and a very lucrative one at that most artists do commercial art for a living (which is still extremely creative) and do fine art for fun in their free time.

hmm...question for all the art majors. What HAVE you accomplished/done that's significant? how do you live off of that major.?

Oh, sir, I feel your pain. Being an artist in a world of mostly none artistically talented people is a huge up hill battle. People don't get art, thus why it's subjective.

I WAS a art major but then for me I realized that's kinda useless. what're you gonna do with it? Draw goofy pics of family's at six flags till your 60? It's hard going into any sort of job with a art degree sadly. So, I change it to Graphic Designer/Illustrator. I still take art classes, though. Got to get my fill in.

This is the MOST TRUTHFUL thing I have ever read :D

I'm going to school to become an Art Therapist, and when it comes up in conversation people are like, "... that's not even a real profession ...". So usually I end up just saying something like "I'm getting my Masters in Counseling Therapy stfu."

Art Majors unite

I'm a graphci designer, i make descent money, blast my music out of 2 tower speakers and torch some good alternative herbal cigarrette, (if you know what i mean). All while i make cool pictures all day long... I wouldn't like to have any other job in the world... did i mention i'm HAPPY????

This is a cruel unimaginative world

To leahl:

I posted it in the green group because I thought we needed some positivism, looking at dreams as the main driver for any kind of revolution and change we wish to bring in this world.
The green revolution and environmentalism is one of them.
In my opinion posts like this one wouldn't need to delineate such implying.

Not a big deal, just trying to say that there are exceptions to the rules :)

My daughter has a BA in art and she is now teaching in school in Northern Cali. She is'nt rich but she is doing something that she loves. Money is'nt everything. You have to do something that you love and not listen to these people.

the funny thing is while i was in art school i did hundreds of hours more work and was hundreds of times more stressed and hard on myself because of what i was doing than those that were in business and 'money making majors' and i think i'm a lot happier now because of it. but it was anything but easy

lol i love graph jam.

I'm an artist and I win more then some engineer and lawyer I know. It's call VFX, you can paint realistic environment, design all sort of cartoon character, create new world, etc. And it's a lot of fun too.

That is sad. Why should we have to pay to live anyhow? I majored in government instead of photography like I really wanted because of that very question- how are you going to make any money? With all the competition out there, I'd be lucky if I could afford to keep up my equipment... But it is still my favorite hobby.

Hey folks,
Interesting topic, I think it's a bit far reaching to place it on the green channel though :), so am going to remove the group tag~

Art- IS - Cult,.........(it had better be, "hobby" is insufficient motivation to quit the day job and live on ramen noodles and local music).

So very very very very very true.

Yeah, I hear you! I majored in Art in college. I happened to mentioned to my husband how odd it was that I noticed that Art majors and English majors got along so well. In fact a lot of the time the English majors were actually more bizarre than Art majors. His comment was they're 2 majors were you don't actually have to do any work!!!!