These interviews offer deep explorations into what it means to work in the creative industry today. It is an attempt to broaden the current success narrative where success is just about the accumulation of money and power. Financial stability remains a significant part in this series, as our practices need to be sustainable and yet, the answers explore many other visions about successful creative labor. All the current interviews are with women creative professionals and are based on the values of solidarity and intersectional feminism because success is, contrary to what meritocracy wants to make us believe, connected to gender, race and class.
Esthir Lemi is a composer and artist currently based in Athens, Greece. Read this personal interview about what artistic success looks like to her. This ongoing interview series attempts to look deeper into labor conditions in the arts and broaden the success narrative that portrays success as a simple accumulation of wealth and power, but it’s more complex than that.
On June 1st, 2020 I had the pleasure to host a #MuseumHour on twitter around the topic of success as a museum worker. Read the many insightful replies and discussions around the topic.
Rachel Friedman is the author of And Then We Grew Up: On Creativity, Potential, and the Imperfect Art of Adulthood and The Good Girl’s Guide to Getting Lost. Her writing has appeared in The Best Women’s Travel Writing, The New York Times, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and more. She lives in Brooklyn with her son.
In this interview Latvian artist Gundega Evelone shares her thoughts on fame, success, financial stability and more. This ongoing interview series attempts to look deeper into labor conditions in the arts and broaden the success narrative that portrays success as a simple accumulation of wealth, but it’s more complex.
Ruth Catlow is the artistic director of Furtherfield, a not-for-profit international community hub for arts, technology and social change founded with Marc Garrett in London, in 1996. In this interview she shares her thoughts on fame, success, financial stability and more. This ongoing interview series attempts to look deeper into labor conditions in the arts and broaden the success narrative that portrays success as a simple accumulation of wealth, but it’s more complex.
Merle Radtke (*1986) is since July 2018 the director of the Kunsthalle Münster. In this interview she gives personal insights on the notion of success, fame, financial stability and more. This interview is part of an ongoing interview series exploring different aspects of labor in the art world.
In this ongoing interview series about what success in the arts might look like today’s guest Tehmina Goskar shares her thoughts on fame, success, financial stability and more.
Carla Gannis is an American transmedia artist based in New York and faculty and the assistant chairperson of The Department of Digital Arts at Pratt Institute. In this ongoing interview series I ask female art professionals about their thoughts on success, fame and more in an attempt to demystify the success narrativ that is merely centered around making six-figures. What does success in the arts look like for female art professionals?
Tina Sauerlaender is a curator and writer based in Berlin. She focuses on the impact of the digital and the internet on individual environments and society. In this ongoing interview series I ask female arts professionals about honest reflections on success, fame, role models and more as an attempt to demystify the success narration.
In this ongoing interview series on "What does success in the arts look like?" I ask writers, curators, artists, academics, museum workers etc. to give me a personal insight on topics such as rejection, fame, success and financial stability. The conversations are an attempt to challenge the current success narrative that emphasizes that there is just one version of success and that translates into making six-figures. All the voices are by female thinkers up to this point. I am trying to be very intentional about providing voices from diverse backgrounds to facilitate different perspectives to the usually very male dominated success narrative.
In this ongoing interview series on "What does success in the arts look like?" I ask writers, curators, artists, academics, museum workers etc. to give me a personal insight on topics such as rejection, fame, success and financial stability. The conversations are an attempt to challenge the current success narrative that emphasizes that there is just one version of success and that translates into making six-figures. All the voices are by female thinkers up to this point. I am trying to be very intentional about providing voices from diverse backgrounds to facilitate different perspectives to the usually very male dominated success narrative.
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts about what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor".
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts about what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor".
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts about what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor".
Last year I started with the interview series on what success looks like to arts professionals and people working in the creative industry. It is an attempt to redefine what success is and find personal attempts to define a sustainable definition of creative work.
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts about what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor".
We are told the myth that working harder will be rewarded one day with success. The problem is that sacrification does not necessarily lead to the expected outcome and leaves us drained instead. We need to find a more sustainable approach if we talk about work, in particular if we're talking about creative work. In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor" that tries to approach labor issues in the arts and provide more personal conversations. It is about finding a sustainable way to work in the arts and to understand that creative work is a long-term commitment.
A few months ago I started with the interview series on what success looks like to arts professionals and people working in the creative industry. It is an attempt to redefine what success is and find personal attempts to define a sustainable definition of creative work.
Anastasia Karpova Tinari is the Director of Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago, IL. She recently started her own project space, Anastasia Tinari Projects to exhibit more emerging contemporary artists.
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field what their thoughts are on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor" that tries to approach labor issues in the arts and provide more personal conversations. It is not about working harder and to buy into the narrative that sacrification will eventually lead to success but about finding a sustainable way to work in the arts and to understand that creative work is a long-term commitment.
We are told the myth that working harder will be rewarded one day with success. The problem is that sacrification does not necessarily lead to the expected outcome and leaves us drained instead. We need to find a more sustainable approach if we talk about work, in particular if we're talking about creative work. In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor" that tries to approach labor issues in the arts and provide more personal conversations. It is about finding a sustainable way to work in the arts and to understand that creative work is a long-term commitment.
A few months ago I started with the interview series on what success looks like to arts professionals and people working in the creative industry. It is an attempt to redefine what success is and find personal attempts to define a sustainable definition of creative work.
Since I started with the interview series I got an overwhelming feedback of people asking me if there are things left out in the editing process or if there are other behind the scenes or learnings I could share.
This interview is part of the series where I ask colleagues, artists, museum worker and other workers from the creative field on their thoughts on what success in their fields might look like. It's an attempt to facilitate a more personal perspective into the labor conditions in the creative field and to demystify the myth that sacrification will be rewarded with success one day. We need to find a more sustainable approach if we talk about work, in particular if we're talking about creative work. The interview series is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor" that tries to approach labor issues in the arts and provide more personal conversations.
We are told the myth that working harder will be rewarded one day with success. The problem is that sacrification does not necessarily lead to the expected outcome and leaves us drained instead. We need to find a more sustainable approach if we talk about work, in particular if we're talking about creative work. In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field on their thoughts on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor" that tries to approach labor issues in the arts and provide more personal conversations. It is about finding a sustainable way to work in the arts and to understand that creative work is a long-term commitment.
Today I open the interview series "What does success in the Arts look like?" to another creative field: Writing! Creative work is a very broad field and I am interested in the different approaches and insights. So today I am talking to Manjula Martin, who edited the incredible book Scratch—where she asked writers like Cheryl Strayed, Roxane Gay, Jennifer Weiner and many more—on the realities of making a living in the writing world. Read her thoughts on fame, rejection, financial stabilty and role models here.
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field what their thoughts are on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor" that tries to approach labor issues in the arts and provide more personal conversations. It is not about working harder and to buy into the narrative that sacrification will eventually lead to success but about finding a sustainable way to work in the arts and to understand that creative work is a long-term commitment.
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field what their thoughts are on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor".
In several interviews I ask curators, academics, artists and other friends and colleagues from the creative field what their thoughts are on what success in the arts looks like for them. It is part of my long-term project "Art as Labor".
Success in the arts seems to have some sort of mythic silence attached to it. Some become visible within the art market, in Biennales, or academia while others will never reach broader audiences – at least not on the terms they defined as successful. Success seems to be related to power, money and fame. In a world where we glorify hustling and we wear constant busyness as some sort of badge of honor, I would love to open the conversation and try to define values for art as labor and to fill the term success with as much individual honesty and thought as we can. Success in the arts seems so vague that I am really wondering why people start to measure all their doings through this term without having defined how a sustainable approach looks like. We become obsessed with constant production, are afraid to take a break and are encouraged to be as competitive as possible. Is this ecosystem the only surrounding in which success in the arts is possible?
Find out in this inspiring interviews.
On October 19, 2020 I had the pleasure to host a #MuseumHour on twitter around the topic of failure as a museum worker. Read in this post the many insightful replies and discussions around the topic.