PART |
The Artist’s Work |
No question may be more difficult for you to answer than this deceptively simple one: What is your work as an artist?
This is not an academic or a trivial question but a core question, the answer to which an artist undertakes to live. Artists without a sufficient answer to this question, even if they never articulate their doubts and uncertainties, are likely to block and flounder. But even artists who do possess a rich, sustaining understanding of their work will sometimes face crises of doubt, developmental turning points, and other natural road markers on their journey. Therefore all artists can profit by taking some time to examine this question, which can be reframed as, “Why am I an artist?”
Reflect on the following questions. What is your work as an artist?
• Is it the novel you’re working on now, the play you’re in, the preparations for your upcoming concert tour?
• Is it attending gallery openings, reading the latest psychological fiction from eastern Europe, learning audition monologues?
• Is it everything that you are and that you do, everything art related and life related, so that your work and your life are inseparable?
• Is it as much about negotiating the six months between shows as the two months that the show runs, as much about surviving the two years of trying to get your novel published as the two years of writing it?
• Is it only your personal work: your performance pieces but not your voice-over work, your experimental novels but not your genre fiction?
• Is it maintaining a certain stance as outsider, rebel, witness, trickster, wise woman?
• Is it networking, self-promoting, marketing, wheeling and dealing?
• Is it more your inner process or more your products or performances?
• Does it defy description or understanding? If so, what sort of problem or challenge does that raise?
Why are you walking the artist’s path? Please expand on any of the following that seem true to you, with an eye on ending up with a robust, personalized sense of why you have committed yourself to a particular art discipline.
I am walking the artist’s path:
• because I must.
• because art has tremendous value.
• because every other job pales by comparison.
• because it gets me — or may get me — things I want, such as sex, recognition, power, money, love, adulation, glory.
• because it allows me to communicate what’s in my heart.
• because I’m talented.
• because other pursuits seem ordinary and run-of-the-mill.
• because doing art suits my personality.
• because it’s a family tradition.
• because it helps me heal.
• because it’s great work for a deranged person like me.
• because it was expected of me.
• because, as a child, I fell in love with my medium.
• because I’m not really suited to do anything else.
• because it is the very embodiment of freedom.
• because it has social utility.
• because the bug bit me.
• because it’s as noble a calling as a saint’s or a hero’s.
• because it lets me get up late.
• because . . .
You may have never attempted to define your work before or tried to think about it in exactly these ways. You may even believe that such exercises are wrongheaded. If so, you still may profit from learning why you feel this way. Try to spend some time looking at these issues with a fresh eye.
Can you define your work with a single adjective? Look at the following list, and select the word or phrase that resonates for you. Define each one you select, and give an example, either from your own work or from that of another artist.
I see my creative work as:
• dignified
• sacred
• courageous
• idiosyncratic
• willful
• socially relevant
• escapist
• existential
• playful
• entertaining
• professional
• passionate
• career-oriented
• important
• culturally relevant
• useful
• innovative
• marketable
• personally relevant
• beautiful
• political
• true
• controversial
• simply mine
Your definition of the work you do as an artist may include apparent or real paradoxes and contradictions. Comment on whether any of the following seem to you contradictory or paradoxical. For those you select, answer the following two questions: 1) Is the contradiction merely apparent, or is it real? 2) If it is real, should I embrace it or work to unravel it and effect some changes in my life?
1. I want to do highly personal art that nevertheless reaches a large audience.
2. I am both a truth teller and a trickster.
3. I want to do work that is socially relevant and that is also entertaining.
4. I want to work in solitude, but I also want to be part of a community.
5. I want to be on the road as much as possible, but I also want a home life.
6. Performing makes me very anxious, but I want to perform as much as possible.
7. I am not sure about the value of art, but I also think that there is nothing more valuable.
8. I want to do the art of my choosing, but I also want to make money.
9. I want to do classical art that nevertheless reaches a contemporary audience.
10. I see the following as a contradiction or a paradox . . .
A mantra is an incantation, imbued with meaning, that resonates powerfully for you. In traditional Hindu practice brief hymns or portions of Vedic text were chanted as mantras. Try out the following phrases, making each into an incantation, and see which of them have power and meaning for you. The goal is to hit on a mantra that points to an important source of your work and that serves to remind you of that source. If any of the following mantras have meaning for you, use them by memorizing them and regularly repeating them:
• “I have something to say.”
• “We must never forget.”
• “See me.”
• “Come with me.”
• “Beauty matters.”
• “Truth matters.”
• “I am a mystic.”
• “I stand alone.”
• “You are in me.”
• “I am a hero.”
• “Be happy.”
• “I sustain life.”
• “What I do is needed.”
• “I serve in this fashion.”
• “I will be no less than fully alive.”
• “I am unafraid.”
• “If not me, then who?”
• “I must.”
• Your own mantra . . .
For a more in-depth look at how you can make use of mantras and incantations, I recommend Ten Zen Seconds: Twelve Incantations for Purpose, Power and Calm, in which I marry ideas from Eastern practice with strategies from cognitive and positive psychology.
What inner qualities must you possess in order to do your work? It will pay you great dividends if you develop strategies to meet the needs that you select from the following list:
1. I need sufficient peace of mind in which to work.
2. I need fewer worries about how I’ll survive financially.
3. I need a better idea of what art I want to create.
4. I need to be more consistently creative.
5. I need to be more deeply motivated.
6. I need to take more risks.
7. I need to take fewer risks.
8. I need to feel more connected to like-minded people.
9. I need a willingness to do commercial work.
10. I need a more competitive attitude.
11. I need to accept the flaws in my work.
12. I need a more appraising (but not self-critical) attitude.
13. I need to better balance my commitment to art and my commitment to life.
14. I need to learn to accept praise.
15. I need to learn to tolerate criticism.
16. I need to better manage my impulses.
17. I need a better understanding of the art marketplace.
18. I need to recover from my addictions.
19. I need a more assertive attitude.
20. I need a less cocksure attitude.
21. I need to find my voice.
22. I need a better understanding of my personality.
23. I need a better understanding of my place in the world.
24. I need limitless faith and courage.
25. I need . . .
All artists have practical needs that must be met. They need canvases and gallery representation, quiet time and a receptive publisher, appropriate head-shots and a well-connected agent, a singular violin and a recording contract, and so on. Can you name your practical needs? Can you say how you mean to meet each one? Select at least ten needs from the following list and indicate how you intend to meet each one:
NEED LIST
1. more business savvy
2. practical coping skills
3. an art buddy
4. new business opportunities
5. inexpensive suppliers
6. some inspirational reading
7. a college degree
8. an advanced degree
9. marketable products
10. advanced technology
11. better technical skills
12. agency representation
13. a plan and a schedule
14. more training
15. an assertiveness class
16. an advocate
17. ongoing financial support
18. good books on the business
19. career counseling
20. a work space
21. a better filing system
22. a better mailing list
23. an award or two
24. a break
25. a change of place
26. less clutter
27. a residency
28. a grant
29. a mentor
30. a new teacher
31. health insurance
32. a second career
34. new markets
35. more connections
36. a financial planner
37. a sponsor
38. a union
39. like-minded friends
40. more time
41. short-term goals
42. a new long-term plan
43. a golden opportunity
44. a creativity coach
Write a one- or two-page job description that takes into account the many aspects of your job as a writer, dancer, photographer, painter, actor, director, singer, and so on. What does it take to be effective in your art discipline, both as an artist and as a salesperson? Include all of the following:
• skills (including marketing skills)
• training
• experiences
• personal qualities
Do you know who is who in your particular art marketplace? To ground this question, let’s focus on the world of writers and the people with whom they must deal and interact.
For most writers, even those who publish occasionally, the publishing world remains opaque and mysterious. While you’re sitting alone in your studio, staring at your computer screen, it feels as if the world is made up of you and others like you, anonymous and mostly unpublished, and a huge, amorphous, indistinguishable “them out there” made up of hotshot agents lunching with up-and-coming editors, celebrity authors and their fast-talking publicists, readers lining up to meet their favorite author, all these folks swirling together in a surrealistic, agonizing vision of good times and merry laughter.
Let’s get a clearer picture than that! Who’s who in the world of publishing? Here are twenty categories of people (in alphabetical order) involved in the publishing world, with a short description of each. If you are a writer, make it your business to understand what they contribute, how they affect you, and how they’re related to you.
Consider the functions and responsibilities of the role they play and the sort of personality that is likely to go with those functions and responsibilities. Best of all, get to know some of these people firsthand: begin to transform your vision of the publishing world from surrealistic to photorealistic.
As you read, think of how you would answer the following question: “What do each of these people need from me?” An alternative way of framing this question is the following: “What do each of these people need me to bring to the table so that they will want to work with me?”
1. Accountant. “Accounting” is a state of mind having to do with maximizing profits, minimizing expenses and losses, keeping an eye on the bottom line, and acting “businesslike.” Accounting plays a role in keeping your advance down but vanishes when a publishing house wants to hold its semiannual sales meeting in Maui or gets the itch to pay a $4,000,000 advance to a celebrity. Everybody at a publishing house acts like an accountant sometimes and refuses to act like an accountant at others.
2. Acquisitions editor. The person, whatever her title, at a publishing house who buys books, usually with the advice and consent of others at her house, including the publisher, editor in chief, marketing manager, and so on. Her other jobs often include improving the manuscripts she has purchased by editing them, stewarding manuscripts through the publication process, and sorting through the hundreds (if not thousands) of query letters, query emails, synopses, proposals, and manuscripts that come her way.
3. Assistant editor. This may be a junior editor who functions as an editor, buying and editing books, it may be an administrative assistant who handles secretarial tasks, fields phone calls, and so on, or it may be a person who does both. An assistant editor is likely to become a senior editor one day (if she doesn’t become a literary agent, book doctor, book packager, or writer first) and already, even in her junior position, can get a writer’s work read by the right people at a publishing house.
4. Associate publisher. This sort of title and others like it refer to a person who has climbed up the ladder in a publishing house and functions as an administrator and manager, minding the bottom line, handling day-to-day crises, and sometimes finding the time to think about the company’s future. He or she is typically also involved, at least peripherally, in the acquisition of new titles, may still read manuscripts and buy books, demonstrates and generates enthusiasm for individual titles, and usually has a real role in deciding what sorts of books and which individual titles the house will publish.
5. Book doctor. A book doctor is a freelance editor who tries to turn a book that is currently not strong or publishable into one that is. His role may also be to help sell the book; very often he works with well-known writers who are guaranteed the sale or who have already made the sale but who need help turning their current idea or manuscript into something decent.
6. Book manufacturer. Book manufacturers, many of whom are in the Midwest, in Europe, or in Asia, are the folks who literally make the books. They are employed by publishing houses and by authors who choose to self-publish, and they can print a few thousand books (or even a few hundred) or zillions. With new technologies like print-on-demand and e-books, book manufacturing is changing dramatically; but there will always be someone who fulfills the role of actually making the book.
7. Book packager. A book packager is a middleman or -woman who helps authors put together books, often dealing with the graphics, design, “high concept,” and the like, and who presents busy editors with already strong and even already manufactured books to add to their lists. Book packagers often associate themselves with highly designed books like coffee table books, specialty books, books with lots of photos and design elements, ans so on, but may collaborate on any sort of book, being of service (ideally) both to author and editor.
8. Bookstore manager. Each independent bookstore, each chain bookstore, and even each cyberspace bookstore is managed by someone, and that someone has his or her own taste. Individual bookstore managers can help make a book successful by prominently featuring it, inviting the author to speak, suggesting it to local reading groups, and so forth. You will often find that a book that became a bestseller had the support of an author who micromanaged her book by visiting scores of bookstores and chatting with scores of bookstore managers.
9. Bookstore events’ coordinator. Many bookstores now employ a person whose prime or even sole job is to book authors for book signings, lectures, and other events, sometimes sharing the expense of the event with the publishing house but more often than not absorbing the expense as a cost of doing business. A bookstore newsletter may go out to tens of thousands of customers and serves as an excellent way for potential readers to learn about books. Even if the event is not well attended, a little more name recognition has been garnered for the title.
10. Chain store buyer. Chain store buyers determine which books will be stocked systemwide and in what quantities, as well as which books will be featured and which pushed. The next best thing to having Oprah select your book for her book club is to have your book appear in the window of every Borders or Barnes & Noble nationwide. Since such an appearance is so important in the life of a book, chain store buyers are very influential players in the publishing game.
11. Conference organizer (and lecture booker, public events’ coordinator, corporate events’ coordinator, and anyone else who arranges for writers to give talks, lectures, and workshops). To generate sales and publicize their books, writers will often speak at conferences (their editors certainly hope that they will). The conference organizer is the person whom the writer contacts to garner an invitation or who invites the writer to speak because the writer’s work has become known to members of the organization. These and other speaking engagements can supplement a writer’s income in important ways and turn books that otherwise might sell ten thousand copies into books that sell tens of thousands of copies.
12. Copy editor. Copy editors are employed by publishing houses. They look at a manuscript after the book’s primary editor has done his or her work and the book is considered to be in (nearly) final form. The copy editor works on the book’s grammar, but he or she also works on its voice and logic, often peppering the manuscript with scores of questions designed to make the book clearer and more logical. So, although an author may feel as if her book is finished once her primary editor signs off on it, she will still have a copy editor to interact with.
13. Freelance editor. Freelance copy editors and developmental editors are often employed by publishing houses as independent contractors on a book-by-book basis and sometimes in a particular area of expertise. In some cases they are employed by authors themselves to help get a manuscript in shape for publication. It is not that unusual for an author to hire a freelance editor to help hone his manuscript, then get assigned an in-house editor when the book is purchased, and then be assigned yet another editor, a freelancer selected and paid for by the publisher, who works on the book in conjunction with the in-house editor.
14. Literary agent. Literary agents are primarily salespeople. Of the manuscripts and proposals they read, only a small percentage of them, perhaps 1 or 2 percent, seem to them saleable (which is not the same as good, valuable, or interesting). They then represent these saleable ones. Their sales techniques are extremely simple: they write, email, or phone editors they know personally or know of and indicate that they have something the editor may be interested in. Editors, recognizing that agents play an important screening role, tend to respond to these notes and calls promptly. Often an agent is the most valuable person in a writer’s professional network. To be sure, in some cases the writer could do what the agent does and save the 15 percent commission. But the short answer as to whether a writer wants and needs an agent is a fairly resounding yes.
15. Literary lawyer. Writers tend to let agents look over the contracts that publishers proffer. Agents advertise themselves as capable of construing and negotiating these publishing contracts, and in general this is true. But a writer who works as his or her own agent, who has a special copyright law or libel question to answer, who wants a special collaboration contract drawn up, or who otherwise feels in need of a specialist, can turn to literary lawyers. Their numbers are small, but they can be found in New York, Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay Area, and elsewhere; even if they are geographically far from you, most affairs can be handled via phone or email.
16. Publicist. Publicists tout books and authors. Publishing houses have in-house publicists, and writers sometimes also hire freelance publicists on a book-by-book or retainer basis. Publicists attempt to get an author’s book reviewed in the print and broadcast media, try to set up author interviews and book signings, and work to get their authors on radio and television. A freelance publicist may charge an author $15,000 to $40,000 for a single campaign, which is at its most intense during the six months before and the few months after the book comes out; or the publicist may be hired on a piecemeal basis and get paid for each interview, review, book signing, or media appearance garnered (often at thousands of dollars for a television appearance).
17. Publisher. According to an old saw, editors hire writers, and publishers hire editors. A publisher is an owner or, in a large publishing house with many imprints, a division manager. At a small house the publisher and the acquisitions editor (and the publicist, secretary, and so on) may be the same person, but even at a medium-sized house the publisher will be one person (often with his name on the line of books), and editors will come and go under him. The publisher balances the demands of the sales force against the desires of the editors, adds and drops titles from the list, and often still buys books himself, should they come to his attention and catch his fancy.
18. Reader. Every reader has something to tell an author, and the early readers of a manuscript — friends, writing buddies, agents — can genuinely help a writer figure out how to improve her manuscript and increase its chances of being sold to a publisher. At its best, the relationship between writer and reader is so intimate and profound that it borders on a love relationship, making readers qualitatively different characters in this otherwise business-oriented cast.
19. Sales manager/sales rep/marketing person. The publisher’s salespeople are concerned with pricing books competitively; choosing titles, subtitles, sizes, formats, and covers that will sell their books; servicing their accounts; keeping returns as low as possible; and in general winning the marketplace game. They tend to predict future performance from past performance, so the fact that a forthcoming book is actually better or worse than the author’s last is hard for them to factor in. Similarly, they tend to write off authors who don’t perform the first few times out of the gate. The sales force does not quite dictate to editors or demand that certain books be bought and others avoided, but their influence is enormous and must be reckoned with by editors and authors alike.
20. Smart and savvy buddy/fellow writer. One of the more important people in a writer’s life is a friend with common sense, wisdom, and some understanding of marketing and sales. That friend may listen to the writer’s initial ideas and give useful feedback, read the writer’s proposals and manuscripts and offer suggestions, and keep on the lookout for publishers interested in what the writer is writing. A good agent also does these jobs, but a smart, savvy buddy can provide a level of intimacy and a continuity of interest that agents rarely can.
Look back at your responses to the exercises in this section. Highlight the most important points. Incorporate your conclusions into a single tentative definition:
My work as an artist is . . .