How can you make money with your art?
Who wants to work as a professional full-time artist must be able to earn enough money with his/her artworks to pay the bills.
But how is that possible? How can you make money from your drawings and paintings? This is a very common question, that people who want to make a profession out of their hobby, ask themselves. Especially friends, relatives and/or parents hardly believe that this will work out for their children or friends. However, even if, at first, it may seem unrealistic to sell a product that has no concrete or practical benefit, there are, actually, many ways to do it.
Here are some ideas:
Galleries
The majority of the artists, who want to live from their own artworks, will sooner or later work together with an art gallery during their career. Galleries are often taking the initiative by recruiting artists on their own or offer artists the possibility to apply with their portfolio. Galleries give artists the possibility to show their works by organizing an exhibition of their paintings. They also take care of the promotion and selling of the artworks. In exchange, galleries get a fixed percentage for every artwork sold.
Illustrators and designers
Another possibility for a regular income is to work as a freelancer, as an illustrator or a designer. In this case, you are not going to work on your own ideas, but you´ll have to do what your customers wish. The projects you may work on can vary greatly. The illustrator can work for newspapers, magazines, websites, TV programs, games, books and a lot more. As a freelancer, you can specialize in one field but most likely you would work for various costumers. As a designer or concept artist, it is not uncommon to get a full-time job at a company for example in the movie production, gaming industry, or in TV shows. They design costumes, fantasy creatures like aliens or even entire worlds.
Social Media
The newest trend to earn money with your own art is to promote yourself on the internet and, in particular, on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, etc. Nowadays the self-promotion is a very important part of your job, maybe, even as important as the creation of the artwork itself. There are many artists, who exclusively earn their money by selling their artworks on the internet. Even if you work with a gallery or as a concept artist or a designer you should have a strong presence on the internet to show and promote your work through social media.
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