Good things shouldn't freak you out OR Things all art students should know what I finally know

Today was Commencement for our 2012 graduates. I know many of my own students are filled with the terror of "what's next" and "how will I earn a living". I remember the terror too. Trying to explain that you might have a job outside your field while you pursue your art is hard enough to accept, not to mention, explain to others. As art faculty, we have the same problem. The alumni surveys go out with that question, "Are you earning a living from your degree?" Usually the answer is no. No, I work in radio or real estate or dog grooming, but I ask, what job doesn't benefit from an education? And more so, is salary the only judge of academic success? What about happiness or cultural appreciation and contributions? What about the artist who make a small amount of money from art, but gains a lot of happiness and peace from it, while they have a "day job" as a seamstress?

During our recent job interviews, one question I wrote was, "please talk about a time you felt things were going right in the classroom," and I was amused by imagining my own answer. Of course, seeing a light bulb go on as a student finally connects content and technique, but I think my favorite moment in teaching is more subtle. When I see students suddenly achieving at their work, making work for themselves and not just for me, that is when (I know from experience) the anxiety sets in. "How will I ever find a place in a world that is so career and rank oriented? How can I be so selfish to think I'm good enough to be an artist?" That realization is such a trauma. While it reveals a low self esteem for the student artist, it also means they have reached a level of knowledge to know how much there still is to learn. The student who doesn't show this, in my experience, is the student who has not yet questioned their own assumptions about "talent" or how an education should challenge their preconceived ideas about themselves as artists.

It's the students with that traumatic realization that are both self aware and in a precarious place in their learning. Then I tell them this, and I tell them as many times as I need to, til they believe me.

Art students in many ways are more challenged in school than other students. Most degrees ask you to learn what is already known, to retrace the logic of an experiment or philosophy that you might be able to replicate it, then send you to graduate school to start creating new knowledge. Not so with students of the arts. Much earlier, these students are asked to create new, never before seen works from new ideas. It's hard work they will likely never be acknowledged for by other degrees ("oh, you got an art degree? That sounds fun, but what are you going to do with that?"). This is an area art majors are at the advantage over others in the job market: generating NEW ideas.

And as for being an artist? We are both at the advantage and disadvantage. We will never be "hired" as an artist (in terms of making personal work), while doctors and lawyers are hired. They never question if they are a TRUE doctor or lawyer, but artists always question it (or at least, cyclically). BUT we can also Never be fired... we can only quit.

I usually point dramatically at the room at this point.

No one can fire you; but you can quit.

And when I see really good students (it's usually the really good ones) still struggling, I take them aside and ask, "Do you love this? Is this something you feel like you need to do?" When they say yes, I say, that's because you ARE an artist. You need it. And you want someone to tell you it's true, so I am. Remember it. And I know they will because I still remember when the title was bestowed on me.

There is always terror about the next show or series. Life tries to tell me my time is better spent doing something else, but here I am, still trying to make it work. I'm happy to be moving to be with my sweetheart and also joining another excellent program as a faculty member; I'm happy to find myself in escrow so quickly. But I resent all the time these things have taken the last couple weeks. I have art work to do!