| Disclaimer: I'm an amateur artist that at one point almost went to art school. Some professional artists talked me out of it and 20 years later I am still thankful. Its such a well-known meme that attempting to become a professional artist by dropping $250k on a BFA is a fool's errand that I wouldn't feel bad about being an art teacher. Now, if they make you lie about it and repeatedly tell students they are gonna be making 6 figures upon graduation that's a different story. That would be kind of unethical. The advice that I got was basically this: If you live and breathe art, you will be a professional artist and a degree isn't going to have much of an impact on that. Make a portfolio, apply to jobs, and maybe some day you might want to take a few classes that seem interesting. There are no shortcuts to being a competent artist. Anyone CAN learn to draw/paint/sculpt incredibly well. Almost nobody will because it requires 1000s of hours of practice. Art school can't give you that passion. If you haven't already spent thousands of hours honing your craft, maybe you aren't passionate enough. They were totally right. I like to draw once in a while, but I have other obsessions that I was passionate about, and I got incredibly good at those (good enough to land my dream job without a degree) while I merely liked the idea of being an artist. Another critical bit of advice: Art is not like many other professions, the 80 year old painter is usually at the peak of his performance. Not only is he probably better than you, he's probably also much much faster at being good. If you do freelance work, he will be your competition. That doesn't mean you can't make it, but you gotta find a niche that works for you and you it has to truly be something you are passionate about. |