How To Become A Successful Artist?

In other words, when it's difficult to objectively determine what's good, the people you know and the institutions that support you can have an enormous influence on your success. He later wrote a book called How to Become a Successful Artist, which explores many of these same ideas. We started chatting, and after complimenting my work a few more times, he said, "There's no reason why you shouldn't be selling half a million dollars of art every year."

I didn't really know what to say. I don't currently sell half a million dollars of art a year. But that would certainly be nice! He told me again that my work was really good and that I should have no problem selling it. Then he said something that stuck with me: I was like a soccer player who knows how to score goals but isn't taking any shots. That was a little hard to hear, but it was both a criticism and a compliment, which I can certainly appreciate.

Eventually we went our separate ways. About twenty minutes later, I looked across the party and saw Magnus talking to Kate. I walked over to join them, and they said, “…oh, we were just talking about you." Kate explained that Magnus had told her how much he liked my work, how he thought I should be selling half a million dollars of it every year, and how even after complementing me several times, I’d never even bothered to ask for his contact information.

My first reaction was to get defensive. I knew Magnus was someone who might be able to help me, but we also had three days of the conference ahead of us. We were both speakers at the conference, and I knew we'd cross paths many times over the next few days. But my approach to these things tends to be more organic. I like to let most things unfold naturally, and I've never been comfortable being pushy or aggressive or salesy. That said, there are opportunities that are asking to be seized, and it hadn't occurred to me to do that.

The following evening, at a conference dinner, I saw Magnus again and asked if he'd be willing to have lunch or coffee so I could learn more about his ideas and how they might apply to my work. He said yes, of course. The next day, after a walking tour of the Aspen Institute, we headed to a cafe around the corner from the gallery.

Over lunch, Magnus explained to me what he tells a lot of working artists. Artistic success has surprisingly little to do with the work itself. There are lots of artists making good work. What separates the financially successful ones is often their ability to share that work, build relationships, and develop a network of collectors, galleries, museums, and other people who can help advance their careers.

His research also suggests that the art world is remarkably concentrated. A relatively small number of galleries, museums, and collectors have an enormous influence on which artists become successful and which works become valuable. Artists who don't gain access to those institutions relatively early in their careers face long odds of reaching the very top of the market.

Of course, becoming part of art history isn't really my goal. My goal is to keep thinking about and making art. Thinking about art is easy. But to keep making art, you've got to sell art.

Magnus explained that, as an older white male artist who hasn't shown in top-tier galleries or museums, and who didn't get an MFA from Yale, my only real path forward is to cultivate my own network. His advice was to organize small, focused, intentional art events, carefully consider who to invite, and continue building relationships with those people. He also encouraged me to use Instagram to share the work and develop that community.

The prospect of this is a little daunting, partly because I live in a small town with a limited number of buyers, and partly because I don't love Instagram. I look at it, of course, but whenever I try to post something, it turns into a time suck. Minutes and hours disappear into staring at that little screen. So while I think there's a lot of truth in what Magnus told me, I'm not entirely sure what to do with it.

I also think there are lots of ways to define success as an artist. For some people, success is simply finishing the work. Selling it might not even be part of the equation. For me, I've always loved not just thinking about and making work, but sharing it. I also love installing works in their new homes. 

Later that afternoon, Magnus was scheduled to speak on the main stage with Lucy McRae, an artist whose work spans sculpture, film, performance, science, and speculative design. Their talk was called Making Money as an Artist. Lucy has built a career working with museums, galleries, and commercial clients, which made her an interesting counterpoint to Magnus's research about how artists make a living.

One of the slides Magnus showed illustrated his argument about where value comes from in the art world. He put two photographs on the screen. Both showed a cowboy riding a horse through a landscape. They looked almost identical, with some subtle differences in color, and he asked the audience to guess which one was worth more.

One was originally photographed for a Marlboro advertising campaign, worth around $15,000. The other was an image appropriated by Richard Prince, a famous contemporary artist whose work has been shown in major galleries and museums. Prince had essentially rephotographed an existing advertisement, but the resulting artwork was worth around $4 million. I couldn’t find the exact image he used in his talk, but this is the same idea: on the left is the original (by Sam Abell) and on the right is the Richard Prince.