At the Art Walk last Friday, a man who had been drinking came up to my booth and made an interesting accusation. He claimed that because I use my personal stories and struggles to draw attention to mental health awareness, I was “selling out.”
But am I?
Let’s take a look at what selling out actually means.
I represent no organization or corporation. Nobody is paying me a large amount of money to control what I paint, write, draw, or record. Nobody owns my story. Nobody tells me what subjects I am allowed to discuss. My artwork, books, and music come directly from my own experiences, imagination, struggles, observations, and beliefs.
Yes, I sell my work. I advertise it. I tell people the stories behind it. But does making money from a personal story automatically make that story less sincere?
Consider Taylor Swift, probably one of the most commercially successful musicians of our time. Much of her songwriting is famously personal and autobiographical. Relationships, heartbreak, anger, ambition, friendship, and the strange experience of fame all become material for songs. Her listeners often feel that they are getting pages from a musical diary.
That intensely personal approach has also helped make her enormously successful.
I don’t particularly relate to Taylor Swift or her lifestyle, but I can relate to that creative process. My work is also autobiographical, and journalistic. My life becomes material for books, paintings, drawings, poetry, blogs, and music.
So maybe, in that limited sense, I’m a Swiftie too.
Success itself does not necessarily equal selling out. An artist can become wealthy and famous while still maintaining considerable control over what they create. At the same time, commercial success introduces lawyers, contracts, copyrights, publishers, record companies, licensing agreements, and other people with financial interests in the work.
That raises another question: where does protecting your work end and restricting creativity begin?
Artists have always borrowed from life. They write about lovers, enemies, family members, politicians, celebrities, tragedies, dreams, arguments, memories, and everything else that crosses their paths. But when real people become characters in someone else’s story, legal and ethical questions can follow.
Paul McCartney's experience with the Beatles catalog presents another side of the argument. Michael Jackson famously acquired publishing rights to a large portion of the Beatles catalog, and Beatles music later appeared in advertising. For McCartney, the commercial use of those songs could clash with the values he associated with the Beatles and their music.
Then there is Andy Warhol.
Warhol practically kicked down the wall separating art from advertising. Campbell’s Soup cans, Coca-Cola bottles, celebrities, publicity photographs, packaging, mass production, and consumer culture became his artistic vocabulary. Instead of pretending that commercial culture did not exist, he dragged it directly into the gallery and asked us to look at it differently. However most of Warhols work would be illegal if made and sold in this day and age.
Today, postmodern artists work in an even stranger environment.
We are flooded every day with photographs, videos, advertisements, memes, music, movies, television, social media posts, AI-generated images, logos, celebrities, and endless streams of visual information. It is almost impossible to create without being influenced by something that came before us.
So where does inspiration end and infringement begin?
What happens when an artist paints from a photograph? What about recording a cover song? Borrowing a familiar chord progression? Painting a celebrity? Writing about someone from your own life? Turning an advertisement into a painting? Quoting popular culture? Using your own experiences to market a memoir?
Obviously, artists have to obey the law, and copyright, privacy, publicity rights, defamation, licensing, and fair use can become complicated very quickly. But artists also need room to respond to the culture around them. If every influence becomes forbidden territory, creativity can start feeling less like an open field and more like walking through a room filled with legal tripwires.
Which brings me back to the man at my booth.
When I talk about my experiences with mental health in my books and artwork, I am not pretending they happened to somebody else. I am saying: This happened to me. This is part of my story. This is what I made from it.
And yes, I would like people to buy my books and artwork.
I don't believe those two things contradict each other.
Artists have always needed to eat. Shakespeare sold tickets. Michelangelo accepted commissions. Musicians sell records and concert tickets. Authors sell books. Painters sell paintings. Making money from creativity doesn't automatically corrupt creativity.
The real question is whether the artist still controls the story.
If I changed my beliefs because somebody paid me to, that would be worth questioning. If a corporation dictated what I was allowed to say, that would be worth questioning. If I manufactured struggles I never experienced simply because tragedy sold more books, that would certainly be worth questioning.
But telling my own story and then putting a price on the book containing it?
I call that being an artist.
My struggles are part of my life. My life is part of my art. And my art is part of how I communicate with other people.
Maybe selling your story isn't selling out.
Maybe sometimes it's simply refusing to give your story away for free.
Just saying.
by Dan and Bonkers
SUPPORT MENTAL HEALTH AWARENESS TODAY!!!
