#illshowyoumine
by Alex from Maybe ( ) Together
Bryony Kimmings did this in the uk.
So I’m doing it here.
It’s probably a bit boring if you’re looking for something poetic.
This is a very nuts and bolts, clear and cut explanation of money.
I’ve had a month of many presenters asking for quotes, of some presenters being amazing and saying “yes”, trusting our budgets & others asking for reduced (up to half) budgets because of emails like this:
“I am hoping as we would feature your performance as a key event in our free outdoor program and over 4 weekends of the Festival, you will benefit from the exposure and status of inclusion in the Festival; and that you can see the benefit of discounting your rates.”
(and then they offered 50% of our fee)
This is about a work that has been around for 2 years and been presented at White Night, Sydney Festival, Harvest Festival, City of Melbourne, Glow Festival, Cube Wodonga and more.
Issues:
– Presenters & Council workers forgetting independent artists aren’t paid a wage.
– Lack of conversation/transparency about how presenters spend their budget
– Lack of standard fees within the industry and artists working for reduced fees or free.
– my own weakness in not knowing where to draw “the line” – ultimately preventing a presentation of work.
I’ll show you mine:
Maybe ( ) Together has 4 big gigs over the next six months (Arts Centre, Perth Festival, Come Out & Sydney Festival).
I will earn $10,080 in artist and shared producer fees over this six months.
I will earn $4,400 in royalties.
Both these amounts go into Maybe ( ) Together and I plan to pay myself a wage of $20,000 per year in 2015. ($18,000 in 2014, $15,000 in 2013).
The $4,400 has been flagged to be put into a new work that hasn’t received funding we’d hoped to happen.
Our performer day rates have been $200/day for the last two years.
I am trying to up this to $250.
We charge $300 per workshop.
This doesn’t include super or workers cover, which we now budget for every performance we do.
Our development of work rates are $1000/wk.
As are our admin/producer fees.
I have a producer! She isn’t paid enough either, she gets between $500 & $1500/gig.
However, these two roles are never paid sufficiently.
But I do charge royalties. This isn’t ticket royalties, but an added percentage of overall fee for a work:
5-10% for me as an artist (or other artists I’ve collaborated with)
5-10% for Maybe ( ) Together to cover studio rent, paper, pens, coffees/beers/lunch for artists when they donate time, rehearsal fees for new performers, when we blow a budget & to re-invest in new work.
So, you might be wondering – if you’re only getting $10,000 then you must have budgeted for only 10 weeks work. So that is how much work you’ll be doing.
Incorrect.
Here are some things that I won’t get paid for that will take up the majority of the other 16 weeks:
– 2 week development of new work, unpaid (i’m ok with this, this is my choice)
– 1 week of admin for new work – scheduling, contracts, liaising, budgets, meetings, sourcing of items, emails! etc.
– Between 4 to 10 funding applications. Ranging from 1 day to 3 days each (thankfully our support material is in good shape)
– filling out tech spec & marketing spec sheets for presenters that save them time, even though I have them all ready to go in my own format.
– Media calls/interviews for all works.
– reading and (usually) editing contracts from presenters.
– tweeting, facebook & website updating
– quotes. The amount of back and forth with quotes with some presenters! One asked us for six, and it was down to the last 24hrs before the program went to print that they confirmed us (!)
– recruiting new artists.
– advocacy for the sector (like this post, meetings, emails, advice to other artists etc).
– meeting funders/presenters
– riding/travelling to funders/presenters offices
– Seeing other work. Reading about work. Thinking. Reflecting.
– 2 week break over christmas (if I can…!)
I worked for City of Melbourne at ArtPlay.
During my 3 years there my salary went from $40,000/yr to $65,000/yr.
I also got professional development, flights interstate to see things, time in lieu, and a bucket load of free tickets to shows (this doesn’t happen much when you’re an independent). I pay for all of this out of my own wage or royalties.
I wanted to be an artist. And I can scrape by. But this is because of a few reasons.
Namely, i live in an 8 person share house and pay $400/month.
I have parents that I know will help me out if things got dire.
I also have a bit of a nest egg that I can eat into to help with cash flow.
I ride my bike a lot.
I op shop.
I eat out cheaply.
I like hanging out at home.
But I don’t want to live like this for ever.
And I don’t want all independent artists to live like this forever.
Or for it to get worse.
Let’s share. Let’s talk about this.
Lets find a way, a standard, an understanding within the industry.
xx
Dear Alex,
I am friends with Shari and she told me about this post.
As I read this post i agreed with everything I saw.
It’s the same in my life as well.
We should get together and talk more about this.
Thank you for sharing
Jeminah Reidy
Hi Jeminah! I know Bea too! And am doing a work about the yarra too. I’d really love to meet you as have heard your name a few times through different people.
On this issue: I am trying to get at least 9 other artists to write their #illshowyoumine to then take to a few key organisations/people. I know it’s also even harder in the visual world. Would you be keen in writing your own?
I would be interested but when do you need it by as I am going away on Wednesday and its crazy busy here:-)
If its in January I’d be happy to write you one.
Lets meet up in the early half of next year.
Give me a bell
0414419182
Have great festive season
Jem
Alex! Thank you. Beautiful post. If I had a blog I’d write on too. It would look very similar to your struggles…and Bryony’s….and every other independent artist out there. Aimee
hey aimee, just saw this. Thanks lady. You should totally write this. I want to get a bunch of us to crank some numbers and put it all together. I’m going to nag you/email you some qs in a month or so xx
Hi Alex,
Thank for writing this. I didn’t reply earlier partly because sometimes I don’t trust myself not to rant. Like you, I’ve always been happy to make work for no pay and to fund all the production costs myself. However, when my quotes, which are similar to yours, are consistently slashed it’s simply not possible to cover all the overheads which you’ve listed. Put it in perspective: An early career teacher doing relief work gets around $250 for working 9-3 and has no overheads. I have the same or higher level of formal qualifications, 25 years experience and, even though I run a lean office operation, plenty of unavoidable overheads, but I still only ask for the equivalent of $250 per day for one-off gigs. I usually get much less. There is an ongoing problem in that there just isn’t enough paid work to go around all the wonderful artists out there, but I do feel that it’s important that we share real figures so that if we want to take a stand when we’re asked to work for “exposure” we know we are not being lovies. So here’s mine: I charge $350 for a performance in a kindergarten or child care centre. It’s too much for most to afford because there may only be 20-40 kids there. I charge $400 for schools and libraries, which most are happy with because they have bigger audiences. If I am asked to do multiple shows in one day I will lower the unit price but not below $250 per day per performer. An excellent book about this is Funemployed by Justin Heazlewood (Affirm Press) and I’d also recommend The Artist in the New World Order by David Pledger (Platform Papers). All the best for a wonderful 2015, Jen
Hi Jen,
Thank you for this. Apologies, as am only realising i had a few comments here to approve!
David Pledger’s book is amazing. I haven’t read Funemployed as yet – but thanks for the reminder!
xx
[…] of time spent, as well as in what we did achieve. This can then also give us tangible figures to claim our value when we are being tasked by others to work on their […]
[…] quite a #illshowyoumine post in it’s details, but an aspect of and artist’s business that doesn’t get […]
Hi Alex,
Your post is great about finances and the joys of being paid to be a cultural worker. A deft mix of detail, accountancy figures and the sardonic realities of getting by.
My experience is a conventionally bifurcated one. As an independent artist, curator, writer who chooses not to work in the dealer gallery system, I see myself as a very anaemic ‘Mom and Pop’ operation. I rarely get properly paid for work whether it be festivals, galleries or whatever. There is a massive difference between Arts House/Performance Space who pay proper fees and look after you and similarly ‘prestigious’ institutions who do not. I recently developed a large public commission with a project budget of around $90k. From this I took home $1300 for a solid 12 months work. Yes I ended up with a very large inflatable structure that cost over $50k but the take home pay once taxed was under a thousand dollars. The discrepancy of fees across the sector is alarming, bizarre and illogical. Festivals are often the worst especially those whose remit it is to make money. Too often the premise is that we are helping your career in lieu of paying you properly. This wears very thin after a while. I have a sense that performance-based work is especially hard done by in the visual arts. Often seen as a public programme activity, the funding mostly comes from the same pool as the art talk and kids doing fun activities program pot. This is never a big pot to begin with and performance practitioners are competing with the finger painting contingent. Many times I have been asked to do something with the dreaded line “unfortunately we can only pay you an honorarium of………….”. Interestingly the curatorial gigs are nearly always better paid (its a curators world!). I am not saying you can put a down payment on an Alfa with the money an independent curator earns (it is still peanuts) but it is in my experience much better. Because I have always worked as an academic and a full time one at that, I have been able to subsidize the art folly. Academics are well paid, given good research conditions to make work, and the research money (while deteriorating) is consistent. Effectively I get well paid to have very stimulating conversations with people about art. Things are certainly tightening up in higher education and we have to do more with less but I am very privileged to have the job I have. When I see the things you sacrifice to make a go of it and the self-justificatory shit commissioners throw at you to suggest you should not be properly paid and instead trade off money for ‘profile’ I realize I can make those tactical sacrifices safe in the assurance of the regular pay check.
Best,
DC