I graduated from San Francisco Art Academy. Now what?
“I graduated from the San Francisco Art Academy with a degree in illustration and now I have mounds of student loan debt and I’m not sure how I will repay it. I have no steady job prospects. What am I going to do?”
This is what my former art intern was forced to ask herself.
“I know that you learned how to make art at the San Francisco Art Academy, did you learn anything about how to make money from it?”
I knew the answer but I wondered if anything had changed since I graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Art.
Her $3000 semester course “LA291 Designing Careers” did not even come close to giving her the answer.
Why? Emphasis on the word career. Fine artists and illustrators do not have careers, they have businesses.
Yes, businesses. You heard me right. This understanding is fundamental to an artist’s success.
The problem. Art school does not orient artists to be entrepreneurial. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.
How do I know artists don’t have careers? Because we don’t receive a regular paycheck.
Now if you are a commercial illustrator, and you are an employee, that’s a rare horse of a different color.
“What was the focus of the course, career or business?” I asked my former intern. “Both.” “Both? You’ve got to be kidding! No damn wonder you’re confused.”
So I read through her course reader “LA291 Designing Careers.” The spiral bound, hand numbered, ¾” tall, I measured it, mish mash of assorted documents, that looks like the shabby product of a hasty trip to Kinko’s.
In fact, there was no design involved in this course. And it includes a confusing array of jumbled information about careers and business.
The good thing, it helped inspire my course, Making Art/Making Money.
If students want to enroll in art school and incur student loan debt and graduate, or not graduate, without a skill set allowing them to earn a decent living, no one has a gun to their head.
But the current and past return on investment in an art degree would not earn a five star rating from Morning Star.
In the interest of full disclosure, we must have an honest and open discussion about the business of art.
It’s only fair that young and hopeful artists, who are poised to fund their education with student loan debt, make these life-altering, and inescapable, decisions with their eyes wide open.
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Comments (3)
Andrea
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I never knew you went to The Cleveland Institute of Art! I went there from 1994-1996 and decided I didn’t want to end up in Cleveland with a pile of debt and no job opportunities (they never taught business class which doesn’t make sense to me, not sure if they do now)…The only company anyone ever talked about working for was American Greetings, unless you were in Automotive or Industrial Design. I barely knew how to turn on a computer at that time because the computer program was not a focus, and for the amount of money they were asking for it should have been, whether you were a fine artist or not, so I saw that as a sign to get out. I’m sure it’s changed drastically since then, I hope!…So I picked up and moved to Redondo Beach, CA, taught myself everything I could to be fluent in all graphic design software and got a job illustrating for a publishing company, and am now the Creative Director and partner for an Entertainment company – no degree, no debt! :0)…The School of Life is priceless…What has helped me is to set goals, take risks, and never stop learning…And trust your gut.
Andrea
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Ann Rea
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“set goals, take risks, and never stop learning…And trust your gut.”
Great advice!
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Mari Vega
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Lo, I did not avoid the trap. My parents had an arts magazine when I was growing up, and most gifts I received were art supplies. When I graduated college prep HS and started at ‘normal’ university, I found how much happier I was painting on my shoes than being in lecture and so started over at art school. While terribly interesting for content and philosophy, it did not prepare me for making my livelihood in practical terms.
My disillusionment with not somehow magically being successful with my artmaking probably put me off of art making. After all, how many pieces does anyone really want to store in their closet?
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