The Comparison Game

Oooh, I’m really good at at this game! Let’s play, shall we?

First, you have to pick something you’re really passionate about. So, using myself as an example, we’ll use art. Pretty damned passionate about that.

Next, you find someone who is incredibly successful at that thing you love, and is someone that you really admire. Continuing to use myself as an example, we’ll use Richard Schmid.

Third, you compare yourself to them mercilessly, ignoring all sorts of logical things like age, years of practice, training etc. (It’s actually necessary that you ignore those things, because otherwise you might be reasonable and then you wouldn’t be playing the game very well now, would you?)

Fourth – repeat until you’re seriously considering giving up whatever it is you love because ohmygod, you will never be like person you really admire.

Don’t you feel really good about yourself now?

I know I sure do.

Obviously I’m being somewhat tongue in cheek here….

But at the same time, I’m not. I do it to myself all the time, just not quite so obviously. My inner perfectionist is one loud SOB, and she likes to tell me all the time that my work is no good, because I don’t paint as well as X (seriously, just fill in any name there. Any of the Old Masters will do quite nicely.)

And it’s insidious – I’ve been seriously considering dropping my prices because I don’t feel like I deserve to make any money as I haven’t reached the master level yet. Yes, at 21, I’m berating myself for not being a master. Perfectionism is a bitch.

Pricing is always one of the hardest things to do as an artist, and I’ve been reading so much art pricing advice lately that says start cheap, my perfectionist has really sunk her nasty little claws in there and is now sitting on my shoulder crowing that I’m much too expensive, and should really be dropping my prices considerably.

I’m actually really torn up about it. I’m feeling so uppity about my current pricing. And yet, I don’t want to drop my prices because that insults previous collectors who paid higher prices without blinking. You’re not supposed to drop your prices as an artist. You start cheap and go up. But maybe I’m not cheap enough to begin with.

I’ve gotten such conflicting advice about this. On the one hand, I’ve had older artists encourage me to charge a bit more, and price myself well and make sure I’m making enough money for my time and labour. On the other hand, I’ve had older artists berate me for charging so much and that I basically have absolutely no right to be selling for these prices because my work is crap and I don’t know what I’m doing.

And let’s not even get into the “Hey you don’t have an MFA in fine art from a really expensive university, what the hell do you think you’re doing trying to make money from your art?!” thing.

Oof.

Where’s that magic 8 ball?

This whole situation makes me wish I had one. I could just shake it up, and get the right answer – these are the prices you should be charging. Voila!

Unfortunately, I have to figure it out for myself. Which quite frankly hasn’t been going too well so far. That whole dog chasing his tail thing? That’s me right now.

So I throw it over to you guys

Artists – how do you make peace on this one? How do you figure out your pricing? How cheap was your art when you started? I’m all open for advice here.

And anyone else who wants to chime in here, please feel free to! It’s great to hear different opinions on this. I only ask that you be polite and respectful. Which of course you will be. Cus we’re all good people here.