A Diatribe Against the Starving Artist
- melissabondar
- Jul 16, 2014
- 3 min read
Updated: Oct 15
There are very few things I get really excited about, but good theater is one of them. Actually, it’s why I picked my entire career path. I was entranced by the magic of theater, the audience’s suspension of disbelief and the feeling that you can make happen onstage. I think a lot of people (though not all) choose their careers like that. I think they have some sort of romantic notion that acts as a trigger, pushes them through their studies and spurs them through different interview processes. Here’s the thing that I think is unique about theater (and the performing arts in general), I think we’ve romanticized the notion of what we’re doing so excessively, that it almost seems shameful to be paid. We’ve invented the starving artist motif. And we did it to ourselves. I can’t think of any other career where the people in the occupation can claim to be living on welfare, rooming in a studio apartment with 8 other people, working for and we, as a community, say crap wistfully like “they’re doing it.” Doing what? In any other career path, that would be a sign of failure. The performing arts are the only place where people don’t bat an eye as they tell you wages that are blatantly underpaid or even ask you to volunteer. You know. For the art. Or some sh*t like that. And we all know who incredibly, endlessly, under-funded the arts are. I get it. You get it. We all get it. Maybe, though, producers, instead of focusing on the magic and passion of theater, you should figure out how to properly fundraise before trying to put on a show. Or you should only expect a volunteer, community theater level production. But this post, this rant, isn’t actually geared toward producers. It’s geared towards us. And this crap known as the starving artist syndrome. It’s not romantic. And it’s not ok. And for the most part, we’re to blame for it. Because we accept next to the nothing for the “privilege” of creating art. You do realize you’re actually incredibly skilled, right? And accepting next to nothing wages for whatever you do to help make art happen means that’s all they’ll offer the next person as well. And the next person. And the next person. Unfortunately, I realize this is a lost cause because we would all have to stand up together and refuse to accept less than minimum wage. Benefit-less jobs. Insane, long hours without adequate compensation. Because as long as someone is still willing to work for less than their worth, that’s the person who will get the job. So not only will we all remain stuck in the cycle of unfair wages and poverty level living conditions, we will also destroy art. Because when the jobs are just going to the lowest bidder, you’re also getting the lowest quality. Furthermore, because we have some crazy notion that we’re expected to starve, at least for a little while, no one in the arts community seems to take any time to educate themselves on personal finance. Seriously, as a whole, I’ve never known such a large group of otherwise intelligent folks who just sort of shrugged their shoulders and accepted that this is the way things need to be. Considering that we’re also the same group of people who perfected the side hustle, you’d think that we’d also be more conscious that this way of life - without budgets, emergency savings and retirement accounts – is not acceptable. Demanding a living wage – a real living wage, one that realistically let’s you pay rent, buy food set aside at least 10% in savings is not an unreasonable demand. It’s what people in nearly every other career path expect. Don’t get me wrong, for a long time I thought the starving artist was just a necessary stop on the path to success – I mean, there’s an entire musical about it that I was addicted to in high school (I’m looking at you, ). Now I’m far more convinced that silly notion is the tuberculosis of the arts – weirdly romanticized and killing us all. < / rant > See also:Why A Theatre Degree is Not Useless
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