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| Beautiful, unique snowflake of creative talent awaits discovery by millionaire patron. |
“There's one mistake a lot of us make when we start out.” says Anitha, an independent illustrator and animator. “We truly believe that we just need to do great work, and before long someone - maybe a boss, maybe a client, maybe some millionaire with incredibly good taste and foresight - will ‘discover’ us, and one morning we'll receive an e-mail containing an offer of unlimited patronage, and we will be catapulted into a world of freedom and joy and coolness.”
Anitha agrees that it is important to believe in yourself, and to be confident. But many young design graduates do have a sneaking suspicion that they are, in fact, “The One,” and that it's only a matter of time before that big break.
Don't bet on it, she says.
If you do, you may find yourself following a sad and well-trodden path into frustration and obscurity:
“You'll join a firm and get ghisso-ed until you are sick of it. Eventually you'll quit in a dramatic gesture of self-respect, and say
I'll do my own thing! and try to hack it as an artist. But then you'll find out that it's really tough, and you won't be making any money, and then you'll move back in with your parents and eventually maybe try to get hired again somewhere. But that's hard too, if you haven't built up a track record of work.”
So how do you avoid this? “
Don't procrastinate! Develop two tracks of professional development: artistic and commercial.”
Artistic:
- DO Have some continuity in your output. Take time out and produce at least one piece of independent work a year.
- DO Develop a personal narrative about your growth as a creative professional, and be able to talk and write well about yourself and your work. Remember that your grant applications will get read by administrators, not fellow artists or creatives.
- DON'T forget to connect your work to some amount of relevant theory.
- DO Make sure you are building a portfolio of work that can be identified as YOURS.
- DON'T rely on collaborative work. Collaborating is cool, but it is tough for award committees to figure out how much of a collaborative project is actually yours. It's not easy to get grants off the back of collaborative work.
- DO take advantage of the fact that many grants are meant for creatives under 35.
- DON'T wait for the big grants to come your way. Be willing to apply for small grants to do small projects
Commercial:
- DO Collaborate; find a big fish and swim along with them. Leverage other peoples' wisdom, experience and connections.
- DON'T assume that bidding processes are always going to be fair and transparent, or that the "best" submission will win.
- DO make sure you are doing commercial work on a regular basis, and building up a professional narrative about your evolving skills and interests.
- DON'T rely on your artistic output to get your foot in the door with commercial work (and vice versa).
“Everyone wants to be hyped and rich by age 35, but there's no guarantee that this will happen.” But if you make sure you are building a portfolio and building a profile, you will at least have a bankable track record.
And good things may follow. As we speak, Anitha opens her e-mail and discovers an offer of an all-expenses paid jaunt to a book fair in Europe.
