One of the top questions I get from artists is some version of “how much time?”
How much time will the lessons take?
How much time should I spend on marketing versus making my art?
How much time before any of this pays off?
I understand why these questions are asked.
Time is sacred and finite, and the older we get the more precious it becomes. You should be choosy about how you spend it.
But it’s worth it to pause and consider the phrase spending time. We usually attach spending to money, turning over cash or charging a card in return for something.
When you spend time, you’re paying with your attention. You have a limited budget, and you’re (mostly) in control of how it passes.
You can’t manage time. You can only manage yourself and decide how to spend the time you have.
So rather than asking “how much time?” the better question is “how much time and effort am I willing to spend on this?”
The key word is willing.
When you’re committed to something, you stop counting the hours. You find the time and a way to make it happen because it has become a priority. You become focused on the goal, not how many hours are ticking by.
That’s true whether we’re talking about your daily routine or the longer stretch it takes to build a career.
There are two separate questions implied by the title of this post, and they both deserve answers.
Listen
Time to devote to your art business each day
The first question is about your routine.
If you’re serious about earning a living from your art — aiming for profit and increased income — you’ll spend an average of at least half your time on business and marketing.
In a 40-hour week, that’s 20 hours on everything outside making the work itself: updating your database, writing a newsletter, sharing on social, packing and shipping. If you only have 10 hours for your art business every week, 5 will go to the business and 5 to the studio.
And contrary to what you might expect, success doesn’t shrink that number. The more your career grows, the more demands arrive from galleries, museums, collectors, and the team helping you manage it all.
More success means more business, not less.
That figure might be lower when you’re heads-down focused on a new body of work and higher when you’re busily promoting your upcoming show. You have to account for your schedule and obligations and, again, know what you’re willing to spend on your goals.
If you want a rewarding art business, meaning you’re aiming for profit, you have to be realistic about what it asks of you when you make the commitment.
Time it takes for your art career to gain traction
The second question is the harder one: how long before it pays off?
In general, you’re looking at years rather than months.
Years of honing the work, meeting new people, nurturing those relationships, and growing your audience. Nothing here is a single action or a single transaction. It’s one thing at a time, showing up repeatedly for yourself and the work.
Yes, some artists catch a break.
A post goes viral, a critic raves, a curator seems to pull their name out of thin air. Those are the exceptions. Most of the time we put in the hours for years without much visible reward, because we’re committed.
And I know how frustrating it is to work and work and see so little in return. But you are making progress even when it feels like you’re standing still. Even when it feels like nobody is watching or nobody gets you.
Remember that you’re not doing it for them. For accolades. You’re doing it because you have something to say, and the only way to build an audience is to keep showing up in the studio and the office.
So before you ask how long any of this will take, check that the commitment is there. When you’re committed to the journey, you’ll make the time.
24 thoughts on “How much time will your art career take? (267)”
I probably spend around 10 hours a week on art creation. This is because I have other kinds of content, products and services to create for my business (art is part of it but not all of it). I think I’m around 50-50 for creation vs working on the business.
As for actual work vs other time, I’m probably somewhere around 4 hours of work a day. Spread out over the whole day. The rest is caring for family, housework, reading and hanging around on social media.
This is a timely reminder, thanks Alyson! I keep this quote from Steven Covey prominently displayed: “You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage – pleasantly, smilingly, nonapologetically, to say “no” to other things. And the way you do that is by having a bigger “yes” burning inside.” I check in with my “yes” and roll up my sleeves. I feel this is in keeping with all you so patiently tell us here on the Art Biz Blog. -Sally
Love that, Sally.
There’s being a friend, and there’s “saving” friends from their own habits as a feel-good “excuse” for procrastination. I have to watch when I’m saying “yes” to a friend’s sense of urgency in case I’m *really* saying “no” to my own priorities.
If I could get the art business side of my art down to just 50%, I would be one happy artist. I run more on the 80/20 rule, with the 80% on the wrong side, as far as I am concerned. I do have an assistant; we both work 20 or more hours a week supporting the business end of my art. I paint an average of 10 hours a week, at best. I do produce a lot of work, usually about 100 paintings annually, but I am quite unhappy with my ratio of business to creating art. I have added two new galleries, and I would have to agree with Alyson that growing does not lessen the need to spend time on the business side of art, it increases it.
So, that’s about 30 hours, Claudia. How does the rest of a 40-hour week work for you?
Good timing. Thanks for reminding me 50/50 is a goal and not let business become more than 50. My work is almost no deadlines and it’s become clear I’m very much a deadline kind of gal. So days quickly go by and I realize I’ve created nothing! I’m also easily distracted (like with this e-mail when I’m supposed to be printing cards! lol). But I know what needs to be done and once I’m passed the huge event I’m working now – and the holidays – I’ll implement the items I’ll be working on over the next few weeks to help me get back on track starting Jan 2016!
Lisa: To be clear, I didn’t say not to let business become more than 50%. I think it might at some point. We just need to be clear that spending 15 hours a week on Facebook doesn’t count toward the business number.
It sounds like you would benefit from working with a coach for accountability purposes. At the very least, you need to set deadlines and goals for yourself.
And why wait until 2016?
Alyson, your “Truth About Time” is so true. There’s even a name for the concept.
It’s called Parkinson’s law and it says that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.
For me the most useful part of this post is “committed” vs. “not committed.”
Thank you!
Thanks for naming it, Jay. I didn’t know that.
We often have to check our commitment scale for various goals and projects.
A very “timely” LOL article! As I’m ramping up my art business, it’s apparent how much time the business end of things takes. I had read about that before, so I was prepared and committed to it from the start. I’m sure it’s one of the main reasons so many artists who *want* to live from their art don’t do so. Not only do you need to have direction in your business efforts, but you have to be quite disciplined with your time and watch out for those “expanding tasks”. Right now the most challenging thing is knowing *what* to spend my time on to promote my business effectively.
Lisa: See if this helps:
https://aaartbizold.wpengine.com/2014/09/your-marketing-mix.html
Great article. I love spending time in the art studio and am fully committed to the business. However, saying no to people who need assistance is very difficult for me. I am practicing the “no” word and spending more time operating the business. During autumn, winter and early spring the challenge of focusing on the studio business is easier. Summer poses a business challenge because most of my painting is inspired by the outdoors. It doesn’t help that the garden is outside of the art studio window begging to be painted and weeded. Currently, I am focusing on writing art instructional material and uploading to HP Magcloud for on demand printing distribution which has allowed for more time to write and design and less time is spent mailing magazines and burning CD’s. If I gave myself a report card for time management the box for focusing on one business task at a time would definitely be checked “needs to improve”.
Mary Lou: What is your weakest link? What’s hardest to say No to?
Spending 80percent on mkt . Nearly 70 hours a week. I miss my love…creating. I do exhibit often, social media, blog I want to… but so confused with FBpage blogging.!!
Recent exhibit, the physicians wife bought my abstracts…. cool; I think I’ll be more balanced once I have my distribution points identified. I just juried on line with two.
But would like two curated galleries outside my city. Oh, an I do work with a designer as she needs. Still, a trickle of sales. http://www.vickipmaguire.com oil abstracts…palette knife.
Wish I could do more; color and design is strength after building and flipping high end homes. I’m not doing something right. signed….very tired.
Cut back on the social media, Vicki. Set some boundaries around that.
Timely post! This is something a lot of people have been asking me recently in my work as an accountability coach and I find it SO difficult to answer. My own personal approach lately is to reduce the amount of WIP’s – art and other kinds – that I’m doing simultaneously and set clear outcomes for each session before starting to work. I’m finding I’m getting more done in the same amount of time this way. Hours are not always the best measurement. Completion is more satisfying – even if it’s only a stage in something 🙂 Also we need metrics for results v time spent. If I spend an hour on FB cultivating a client, great. If it’s reading something meaningless not so.
Excellent perspective, Cherry. Yep, hours spent are not best measurement since we tend to expand to what’s available (Parkinson’s Law, as Jay identified above).
“The more successful you are the more time you’ll spend on business.”
This is SO true! My business more than doubled this summer and the business end of my career flooded into almost every waking hour I had left to create. It took a lot of thought to make business decisions that would move me into a new level of business practices that better suit all the new clientele. Each new growth spurt has its challenges… and rewards.
Wendy: Careful what you wish for, right? And … congratulations on your successes. It sounds like you have handled them with grace.
Its such a funny question. My first answer was “all of your time”. The real struggle is knowing when to stop. Taking time for yourself is very important.
Yes, that’s right, Jason. For those of us who are consumed by our creative work, it’s hard to turn it off (and then turn it on again at will).
Oh yeah thats right I forgot about turning it back on.. Im finally in my down time right now and always end up realizing I only have 2 gears on and off. I have to work on that!
Hi Alyson,
The Pareto Principle or 80/20 rule wold suggest that 80% of your sales come from just 20% of your efforts…as an artist.
And only 20% of your sales come from 80% of your efforts…as an art marketing executive.
So perhaps just make the art. Maintain the website weekly. Have the online shopping cart and show various options for worldwide shipping?
Now just paint your art vision with several versions of the same inspiration.