Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
As one of the (perhaps many) artists here with day jobs in software, I read this with interest.  I was a bit disappointed but, given it&#x27;s the NYT, unsurprised there wasn&#x27;t more about the primary reason most artists have day jobs in the first place: the art, more often than not, doesn&#x27;t pay; and some of us need to make rent just the same.<p>I would not say being a software guy has, by itself, had much influence on my art practice so far, though I may yet end up mixing the two disciplines.  But I will say that having a reliable, full-time day-job over the years has hugely influenced my artistic <i>productivity</i> and not for the better.  Other artists-with-day-jobs I know would almost certainly echo this.<p>However, for better or worse I chose this path because I didn&#x27;t want the kind of financial insecurity I saw as a likely risk of trying the &quot;professional artist&quot; path.  In retrospect I think I was only half right about that.<p>On the one hand, a good number of the successful artists I know have other money and also connections such that their worst-case scenario would have been falling back to a fancier version of my life.  On the other hand, now that I&#x27;m 20-odd years into it I see that a lot comes to you from just staying in the game, and there are ways of balancing the &quot;work&quot; against the &quot;art&quot; that are more favorable to the latter.  Figuring this out going forward is one of my big challenges at the moment -- it gets more complicated as your career progresses and you can&#x27;t just punch a virtual clock anymore.<p>Purely anecdotal evidence: off the top of my head I can think of seven friends (plus me) who have real day jobs and are also visual artists.  One basically gave up painting; two of us are stalled and trying to get started again; one has a job in the art world so is &quot;inside&quot; even during his downtime; and everyone struggles to find time for their art.<p>Among those I know without day jobs, I&#x27;d say about half are more or less broke and half are more or less successful (galleries, museums, etc.).  But even among the successful ones there are several who would be broke if not for their partners.  I guess I (obviously) still don&#x27;t like those odds.