Free Agent: How can we expect more for our careers?

Using the genius and business savvy of Prince as a case study

In 1981, Prince, who was not yet well-known, was invited to open for the Rolling Stones tour. They were playing here in LA at the Coliseum for a crowd of over 90,000 people.

As Prince walked out on stage, Far Out Magazine reports that “portions of the crowd were already on Prince’s back before he had even begun playing as his gender-defying outfit made up of a see-through jacket, thigh-high boots and black bikini briefs.” This is iconic Prince and yet the audience wasn’t into it. He was booed and assaulted by the crowd with food and bottles until he walked off stage after his fourth song.

Mick Jagger was such a fan that he somehow managed to convince Prince come back again to LA, only to have something similar happen again. He played for ony 20 minutes.

What would you do if given the opportunity to present your art at such a large scale, and to open on behalf of rock royalty, only to fail? It is the height of public humiliation to be verbally and physically assaulted by an audience bigger than some small towns.

It’s hard to imagine the conversation Prince had with himself on those flights back to Minneapolis. But whatever that moment was like for him, Prince decided to keep playing and not only that, decided that he would never again open for another band .

I found this story so inspiring, and somewhat hilarious considering how famous Prince went on to be. It demonstrates his keen business savvy and self-awareness as a performer, in addition to his strong belief in his value as a musician. Instead of trying to convince a bunch of people to get on board with his music while piggy-backing on larger bands like the Rolling Stones, he decided he would carve out his own fanbase by headlining only to people who paid expressly to see him play. This meant that no one would not be there to see the Purple One and he wouldn’t have to try and get the approval of people who would never give it to him.

This anecdote makes me think about the many times I have been rejected from any number of things: shows, jobs, and grants. There’s nothing I hate more than spending time on a boring application and especially spending money on it, only to get rejected with a form letter, or sometimes nothing at all. And as one friend told me back in the day about a gallery I was interested in, but who was not reciprocating the interest, it’s like crushing on a gay guy- just not going to happen. (This was back when I was dating guys- also just not going to happen. Happy pride!)

I’m not saying we all shouldn’t be humble in our pursuit of our career, but I do think that especially for the women out there, we are socialized to follow the rules and do everything we are supposed to, then sit around and wait for someone to choose us.

Choose me! We say with our $50 application fee to New American Painters. Choose me! we say with another $50 application to the Hopper Prize. It’s not to say these organizations are not well meaning, or that winning them isn’t valuable. But how much money are we expected to shell out without any expectation of getting something back? This is not the lottery. We have valuable work on our hands waiting to be experienced by people who will benefit from it.

An example comes to mind from my own career that I wouldn’t exactly try to replicate, but I offer it as an example of the power of wishing for more, and honoring that part of you that expects more. In 2019 I was doing a residency in London at Plop. While in my studio scrolling away on Instagram (whoops), and I saw a call for an art magazine to submit work. The call for entry was £35 and I was on my nomad budget so I didn’t jump to apply. Plus, when I saw it, a little voice inside me said something so arrogant that I am nervous to repeat it, but here it goes: I’m not paying just so they could maybe show my work. They should want to put me in their magazine. And then I added for good measure: And put me on the cover.

Um, ok. Well good luck with that, you might say to that demanding little voice or the person sitting next to you who dared to say that out loud. Except only a couple weeks later at the residency opening, the founder of the magazine walked up to me, without me knowing who she was, and told me how much she loved my work. We went on to have coffee, and my work ended up on the cover with a full-color spread about my travels and my art practice- without me asking. It was even more than I had thought to ask for.

All this is to say, I had wanted and even expected more than to pay someone to maybe take a chance on me. This is not to say that I don’t think we should support art organizations or publications, or that they shouldn’t ask for financial help in covering their costs. I also think depending on the stage in your career, getting a feature in a magazine like that can make a huge different in grabbing the attention of a new audience.

But what I am wondering is if we as humble artists could do with a little less rule-following and take a more savvy approach when thinking about our careers.

What if, instead of trying to find the perfect gallery, or check all the boxes of an art resume, we figure out our own path to connecting with an audience. This is in part why Instagram is so popular. It democratizes our ability to reach people all over the world. But Instagram and other marketing tools are only part of the equation.

We have to be self-aware. What does our art look like to others. Who likes it and who do we want to like it? Using Prince’s approach as a case study, it’s important to know yourself. If you are a wild performer who dresses in outfits that have previously been unseen by the public on a man, you might be wise to acknowledge that not everyone will accept you right away, or even be interested in trying to figure you out.

In a studio visit I did with Cecily Brown as part of a class in grad school she said in her experience there are more or less 5 kinds of audiences, and you can’t please all of them. There’s the general public, the critics, the curators, the institutions, and the gallery world. She said at best, you can please three, so choose wisely. Or more aptly, be discerning when figuring out which ones they are.

What do you do, for example, if your work is not being picked up by galleries and is being snubbed by higher institutions? Do you keep banging your head against a wall hoping it will cave in? It might 30 years down the road or after you’re dead, but is that really how you want to live your life? Or, do you go where there’s energy and excitement? Maybe people really love your work and it’s meant for a more populist audience, not the average museum goer or curator?

Maybe there’s wall space at the coffee shop down the road, or you can volunteer your time to help students paint a mural at the school on your street that will then be seen everyday by thousands of people. Or maybe you start your own online store and sell a crap ton, quit your job and get to organize your days around enjoying what you do.

Or maybe you change the narrative. What if you started a new project that supports your community like a salon night, and gives your work attention and a context that it didn’t have when you were sending pdfs of your work to random people - although that can work too.

It’s all about the idea that you can and should expect more, but that you have to be realistic about what your options are. Some people might tell you to pursue rejections and to keep them in a folder in your desk to inspire you. I personally think it’s ok to acknowledge the courage you have in moving forward after a no or a nothing, but not to seek them out or get to attached to them. I say, throw them away, burn them, shred them with your fingers. Use all the frustration from those nos, or the closed doors, to fuel your creativity and push you to kick ass and take names the next time. But also, pay attention when it sounds like people are turning their backs to you. And ask yourself, how hard do you want to work to change their minds, and more importantly, why?

Despite all the unspoken rules of the art world, and really any creative industry, we are free and get to create our own rules about what our careers mean, and what they are going to look like. What drives you in moments of failure or times when the path ahead isn’t clear?