Advice for New Working Artists Or Aspiring Ones

Start referring to your art as “work” as soon as possible. 

As in, “I can’t hang out tonight, I have to work.” 

Not, “Oh nothing, I’m just weaving [or insert your art or craft here].”

When you have an outside job and you are scheduled to work and someone invites you to do something, you can easily say, “I can’t come, I have to work.”

When you are doing your own creative work as your livelihood it is a lot harder to stick to saying “I can't, I have to work.” I think it's because there's this idea that like, okay, you work for yourself so you make your own schedule and therefore you are available do anything whenever. You can really easily fall into the trap of letting just anything pull you away from making your art.

Early on in my business and even until recently, if I had a night where I just wanted to be weaving, but someone invited me to do something last minute, I would have trouble saying “I have to work tonight” because at that time it felt intimidating to call my art my “work.” I was literally just making it up as I went along, playing around on my silly little loom with some silly little yarn. Who could call that work? Right? 

Only if I had continued to have that mindset. If so, my weavings might have just stayed silly little projects and I’d probably have abandoned it as a hobby after a while. But beginning to see my weaving as work, and using words that aligned with that vision, I believe helped me make my way toward the point where fiber art is both my Work (my higher purpose) and my work (a significant part of my livelihood). 

So, if you aspire to be a working artist someday, or are one already, I encourage you to notice the words you use around your artwork early on. Start calling it “work” today, both to yourself when you’re thinking about and talking about it, and to others. 

Using this language will help you and others take your work seriously. As it deserves to be.