Artist's Resource Pack

An artist is a creator of art. This could be visual art (like painting, sculpture or photography), performing arts (music, dance or drama), literature (writing and poetry) or other any other art forms including fashion design, computer animation and graffiti art.

Some definitions of a professional artist say that an artist is someone who earns most of their income through their artwork, but this may not be true for some disabled artists. Some disabled artists earn very little from their work to minimise the impact on their benefits.

Artists sell their work and their skills. A painter may sell their paintings to individuals, loan them to exhibitions or make postcards of their work and sell these instead. A playwright may be paid for writing a piece, and receive additional funds each time it is performed, or they might write a play and sell it to a company for them to use. A musician may play their own work, or perform the work of others. This might be through live or recorded performances.

Some artist’s work only on their own ideas, some work through collaborating with others and some create work to order. There is no right or wrong way of being an artist.

For information on particular artforms, go straight to the final section of the artists’ resource site and the artform specific section. This link will take you to that section of the artists’ resource site. (click here)