Arty Business Ep. 12: Scams & Bad Deals pt. 1 (Patreon)

Howdy friends and Patrons, and welcome to another episode of the Arty Business series, where I share some of the helpful things I've learned in the process of building my own Arty Business. For this 12th article in the series I wanted to issue some WARNINGS *dun dun dunnnn* about potential scams and bad deals you should try to avoid as a working artist.

An equally good and bad element of being a freelance artist is that most of us work alone at home. We don't have a water cooler to chat around, our coworkers aren't leaning over our cubicles to give advice. Social media can be that a little bit, but it's use is primarily for advertising how awesome your goods and services are to potential clients and customers.

With this article I want to be your coworker, sitting next to you at lunch and saying, "Hey, welcome to being an artist. It's an awesome job, but if someone comes to you and offers you one of these deals, think twice."

I'll be breaking this article down into six sections for you:

• LIES - Pervasive lies about being an artist that can keep you susceptible to bad deals.
• CAUTION - Possible opportunities that could either be great investments or huge wastes of time and money.
• BAD DEALS - Deals that sound good but take advantage of hopeful artists.
• SCAMS - Outright scams that literally just take your money and run.
• BAD BOSS - The worst deal of all: becoming your own boss just to be your own worst boss ever.
• RED FLAGS - Signs that a bad deal or scam may be incoming!! Weewoo weewoo alert! 

And as usual some resources for you to look into in the future.

I also want to warn you that after typing this up it is a HUGE article, so for your brain and eyeballs' sake(s?) I'll be breaking this up into TWO PARTS! Pt. 1 this week and Pt.2 in the beginning of October. And in November I plan to share an opposite Arty Business article on GOOD DEALS & INVESTMENTS, so don't get too bummed out by this one!

Alrighty fellow Artists! Let's gather in the lunch room and talk Lies, Caution, and Bad Deals!

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Artists can be susceptible to scams and bad deals especially because of a couple lies that are told explicitly or tacitly to artists throughout their lives. You might not be thinking these lies consciously, but see if any of them have embedded themselves deeply into your mind and affected your actions.

1. Art is passion, not labor. (Artists shouldn't be paid well because they're lucky to be doing it at all.)

2. Artists have to suffer to make good art. (If you're happy then your art is shallow, devoid of deep meaning.)

3. Artists are all in competition with each other. (Compete with each other to be paid the lowest price.)

4. Anyone can make art, it's not a skilled trade. (Disregard the 10+ years experience you have when setting your price.)

5. Art isn't a necessity or adding anything valuable to the world. (You're not a plumber, dentist, doctor, lawyer...)

6. Pure and good art is sullied by asking for money. (Sell out! You're just in it for the money.)

7. Artists have to overwork themselves to make a living. (Work on the weekends, don't take vacations, work through the night, that's just the job.)

8. Artists have to take any job that comes their way at any price. (You never know when the next job will come, so you can't say no.)

9. Only successful or well known artists deserve to be paid well. (It doesn't matter your skill level, you work won't be valuable until you're well known.)

10. Artists choose a life of subsistence living. (You will never be able to afford to have a family, take a vacation, travel, retire, buy a home, or pay for healthcare because you chose to be an artist.)

Oof, did any of that hurt to read? Cause it hurt me to write. Even though they are all LEGITIMATE LIES that keep artists from their most fulfilling work and careers, they are so deeply ingrained that I was almost second guessing myself as I wrote. 

These are the lies that whisper in my ear when I'm feeling vulnerable -  when I'm negotiating with a client, when a product or post of mine doesn't do well, when someone leaves a disheartened comment on a post. These are the lies that we use to batter ourselves down, to ask for less and give more, and then to batter other artists down too.

In November's opposite Arty Business article on Good Deals & Investments I'll share an antidote to this list, a list of mantras to remind yourself of your worth as an artist. But for now, think about these and see if any of them are particularly stuck in your head. Tell the lies that they're not welcome.

+ "Partnership" Clients 

Hi! I have an awesome project idea and I need an awesome illustrator like you. I can't pay you now though, so I'd love to be partners - we make my awesome project together and we split profits 50/50. I think it'll be great and sell SO WELL! We'll be rich!

You know this one, tell someone you're an artist and they'll "I have a children's book idea" you out of your mind.

I'd say 99% of the time this is a bad deal that requires tons of time and effort from you with absolutely no promise of a return. Getting paid upfront (or at least after delivery of your work) is standard practice, because you are doing real and actual labor and need to be paid.

I'd say this is a more realistic partnership is if the person offering a partnership does this work professionally already - like a jewelry maker who partners with artists for lines - but generally they will either offer you upfront payment anyway or offer to use art you've already made so it's less work for you (or both.)

+ Questionable Markets

We're starting a new market for creative people like you to come together and sell your wares to the community!  It'll only cost you $60 for a space, you have to bring your own table, and since we're new we would super appreciate your help advertising to get the word out! Make a post about it and tag #NewMarket !

This may just be my experience, but in 2018-2019 I did a lot of these smaller markets and they were never financially successful for me. Often hosted in bars or restaurants where none of the patrons would look our way the whole time, I rarely made more than $200

+ Art College 

RagoniaCAD - We'll take your hands and make them Make Art Good so you can Career Work Job Profession.* **

*No promises, it's actually still up to you, it was kind of up to you all along. But it sounds good and hopeful, doesn't it? You parents will like it, go tell your parents.

**Also it's $300 a month for the next 25 years. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

An extremely contentious FAQ of artists is whether they think art school is necessary or worth it in the US. So here's my opinion: Art school is not worth the cost or time. I went to art school, my parents paid for most of it, it was very expensive, and I majored in something (Architecture) that I ended up hating because I was 18 and what does an 18-year-old know. 

But I have a lot of friends who studied exactly the careers they wanted to work in and they're still flopping around like little floppy millennial fish because who isn't?

Art school isn't evil, you can learn great and useful things and make great contacts and friends... but you can also do all that for a hell of a lot less money.

If you're paying for it, or your family is paying for it and it's going to be a hardship on them, I think there's almost nothing art school can give you that you can't learn on the job or from the internet. Save $50,000 and just start working, take individual classes and workshops, choose your own books to read... 

You know your own circumstances, though, so just proceed with caution!

+ NFTs 

You gotta get into NFTs, I have a friend who made $2,000 on an NFT of his digital painting of a horse astronaut doing a kickflip on Mount Vesuvius.

NFTs are complicated, so here's how I understand it simply: A non-fungible token (NFT) is a small piece of unique data, stored in a digital listing called a blockchain, that can be assigned to a piece of media, for example a piece of digital art, that can then be sold and traded. Basically, artists (and famous people and corporations) are selling limited run digital receipts for their digital art. And people are sometimes taking those receipts and trading them for higher and higher sums of money, which all looks very appealing. 

However, NFTs take a huge amount of energy to create and maintain (so they have a terrible environmental impact), costs money to the artist to create and sell (so by participating you are paying into the system) and unless you are very lucky or already super successful it's unlikely you'll get a sizeable return. 

On top of all of this, I hate the way NFTs are portrayed as the savior of little artists everywhere when the art is usually inconsequential to the NFT market. It could be, and has been, just drawing of cats, or rocks, or an X-Ray of William Shatner's teeth. It doesn't matter what it is, it just uses artists as a piece in this game of moving money around, with little benefit to the artist.

NFTs are a bad deal for artists, the art industry, and the planet.

For more on this, check out this video by Cat Graffam. 

+ Calls for Art 

We want a new logo for our company, and we think one of you could be our new artist! Make an awesome logo and submit it on our website. One lucky winner will get paid AND we'll use your logo for our company!

Also called "spec work". This sneaky tactic takes advantage of hobbyist artists and artists hoping to "break into the industry" by asking artists to make sketches or finished work for their project. The company then gets to browse through a selection of options and choose a "winner", who then either gets paid (often a small amount), and then gets to profit off of your free or cheap labor.

I've submitted to calls for art like this, especially to local businesses. It feels really appealing to have the "possibility" to make $100, and the business isn't trying to be exploitative. Now I feel like the compensation is vastly too low and would only submit existing drawings I've already made, if that at all. It might be a good deal if you're reeeally hunting for opportunities to make some art, but you could always use that time to make something for yourself as well.

I think this is particularly egregious when the company is asking for a huge amount of work or a finished product, and then directly uses it to profit- like as a logo, on a shirt or enamel pin they then sell. Also pay attention to the rules on the call for art - often times just by submitting your agreeing to the company's ownership of FULL RIGHTS to your PIECE!

In general, these "opportunities" seem shiny and hopeful, especially when you're a new artist or really struggling. But as a whole, they devalue the art industry by asking artists to compete against each other and provide free labor with the high possibility of no pay.

+ Social Media (That Doesn't Pay You)

Come one, come all to the best social media platform on the web! You can build your business here, sure, but we're also building our business on you. And you better believe we won't be paying you. In fact, we'll punish you if you don't pay us!

Alrighty, I've built a lot of my business on Instagram. Got a lot of clients, gained a lot of Patrons, customers, inspiration, new favorite artists, and friends. 

HOWEVER, I've decided that spending as much time as I do working on my Instagram is a bad deal business decision, and probably has been for a while. Everything about Instagram makes you want to tend to it above all else. Follower counts, comments, messages, likes, stories, FOMO, new trends and drawing challenges - it's a constantly churning cycle that keeps you attached to making sure your INSTRAGRAM is running smoothly, and not necessarily the rest of your business or art.

And as we all now Instagram punishes it's small business users more and more by tweaking the algorithm, prioritizing paid advertisements, and of course changing the content focus to video over still images. Some artists love it, but many artists are sharing that they're feeling manipulated to make TikTok-like content that feels unnatural to them.

What I've come to realize is that making content for Instagram has vastly overtaken the rest of my business. And that is unsustainable for me. And a bad deal.

Just remember that while social media can help, it isn't necessarily going to be the sole way to make income for your business. Just because some artists strike big on one platform or another, doesn't mean it can be the only thing you prioritize. 

+ Fiverr (And other cheap gig sites!)

"Building your business? We'll connect your artistic talents to customers for the price that you deserve... $5."

Fiverr, and cheap gig sites like them, present the possibility of connecting potential clients directly with designers and illustrators, by providing a listing where you can upload your pricing and/or portfolio. As you might guess, this means artists are directly competing with each other to offer the absolute lowest price (and lowest quality) to customers. Even if you do think you could work quickly enough to make only $5 worth it for your services, you'd have to work a ridiculous number of those jobs with the fastest turnover possible to have any return at all.

To reach Seattle's minimum wage of $31,200 a year using $5 gig jobs, I'd have to book and complete 520 projects a month. That's 130 projects a week, or 3.25 projects an hour working 8 hours, 5 days a week, no sick time, vacation time, personal art time, admin time, no health insurance or retirement... It's impossible.

Respect your own time and skills, don't build your creative skills and career on an absolutely unsustainable foundation. Spend your time making projects that matter to you and get clients who actually respect you and your work.

+ Working for Free (Or Almost Nothing)

We're a big powerful company with tons of customers and fans, and we'd like to offer YOU the opportunity to showcase your artistic talent. Do this project for us and we'll sell or otherwise use your art. Ooh unfortunately we don't have a budget to pay you, but we'll put your name all over the place and lots of people will see it.

orrrrr

We're a local non-profit doing something very selfless and good, and we need an artist for a project. Unfortunately since we're a non-profit we have only a very small amount of money to pay, but we're all doing this because we're passionate about it and we hope you will be too. And we'll put your name on everything!

Oh buddy, the ole' exposure. We've all heard it so many times, but once that big cool company comes into your emails talking about all the cool things they can do for you (besides pay you,) it seriously becomes so tempting. It really does FEEL like they're doing YOU a favor. 

I've done many jobs where the "exposure" is a factor - they have my name written next to wherever it's used - but I have yet to get ANY new clients from that type of exposure alone. It seems like most people don't care who the artist is, and there's a very small chance that a client or art director will notice your name and take it down for later. There's a possibility, but you simply cannot pay your electric bill with a possibility. 

Tons of people have talked about why you generally shouldn't work for free or very very little, so I won't go too much into it. But I will link in the Resources to some articles other people have written about why you shouldn't work for free.

One more thought on working for free - if the organization is a charity or non-profit, it feels even trickier. Currently, my stance is that I am barely making enough to live on with my paid jobs, and since I have a limited amount of time to give to my art career, I want to use any spare time to make the personal art that I haven't been making. 

Perhaps if I was making enough of an income that I could afford to donate some work time I'd consider it, but I still think that type of donated time should come from you and your interests and values, not from others. I have two professional artist friends who volunteer with an affordable housing organization in their city, and they donate some of their time to making illustrations and web designs for the group. It's working for free, but it's something that is important to them, they have complete control over the designs, and they can decide how much time they can put into it.

Another example is gifts. I say I don't do free work, but I do love to give custom art as gifts when I can. Or if there's a creator or podcast or whatever that I'm loving and want to show my appreciation I might do a little drawing for them. Again, it's coming from me and my values, there's no strings attached, I can take as much or little time as I have.

Just be aware! The work for free/cheap arguments can be really sneaky and convincing... Your time and skill is valuable.

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+ Freelancer's Union - Also they have a great Twitter!

+ Graphic Artist's Guild - And their handbook that I HIGHLY RECCOMEND

+ Art Inc. - "Lies" section partially inspired by the "Starving Artist's Mindset" section of this book by artist Lisa Congdon 

+ Artist's Beware - This article series is inspired by this super helpful YouTube series by painter Cat Graffam!

+ Working For Free? - Video by illustrator Holly Exley 

+ Tips for Illustrators - Video series by Holly Exley, she's excellent at discussing boundaries and sustainable careers for illustrators

+ Working for Exposure/Free - Blog post by illustrator Marlowes De Vries 

+ Should creative ever accept unpaid work? - Article by It's Nice That

+ 3 Reasons Not To Use Fiverr - Article by Art + Marketing

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And I think that's a great place to wrap up part ONE of this article! Like I said part two will be released next month with the sections on SCAMS, BEING YOUR BAD BOSS, and RED FLAGS.

This may be my spiciest Patreon article yet, and I'm normally terrified of getting spicy. Spicy because... you may disagree with me, gasp! You may have done some of these things and had a great experience, and think other artists should do them, or you may have seen internet people talking vehemently in favor of them. If you disagree with me on any of this, that's awesome! Go for whatever feels right to you.

But what do you guys think? I definitely found this to be an excellent reminder of the mistakes I've made in the past and the reasons to avoid them in the future.

Did I miss anything in this part? Anything that particularly hit home with you or that you want me to discuss in part 2? Any resources you think I should add to the list? Any experiences you've had with lies, so-so opportunities, or bad deals that you hope others can avoid? Leave a comment!

As always thank you so much for reading this and your support. I'll see you in a couple of days for my September newsletter. 

Stay confident, buddies!