ARTIST SUPPORT AND THE ARTS ORGANIZATION: SHRINKING THE “HUMAN RESOURCES DEFICIT”

The economics of being an artist have been the subject of robust study for the last fifty years. Despite the ever-clearer picture being painted about what life is like for the average artists, the picture has changed very little throughout that study. A career in the arts in still among the most precarious careers a person enter. Earnings of artists are still lower than for workers with comparable training and expertise in other fields. In the United States, a multi-faceted system of artist support has grown to help artists deal with the precarity of arts work and help them build more sustainable careers. However, the role of the arts organization in this precarious system is under-explored. This paper examines the role that arts organizations play in creating and sustaining the precariousness of artistic careers (in exchange for organizational health) and suggests a more artist-centered mission as a partial solution to the problem.