There Are Clear Differences

The term Arts and Crafts makes me cringe. There is a clear difference in what separates the art object from the craft object.

Makers and those who love crafts should forever leave the term art alone. Yes this is an age old debate that still is a frustrating problem.

This evolution of art to craft is not new. You can read about Intarsia wood and how it progressed through time. Today it is a common craft when it once was an art found within the Renaissance.

Let’s define what comes to mind when one mentions arts and crafts. I am not speaking to the definition of the term or idea, just what comes to mind. I immediately think cheap products and mass production.

Go to any show tailored to this concept and that is what you will see.

How Artists Become Marginalized In The Market

It is easy to learn how to start a craft business. Too few research why they often fail and measure what it takes to succeed.

Additionally learning to pivot and survive is critical in business. Through this struggle artists are encroached upon making life ever more difficult.

Why is this issue so important? Look at Etsy and see how many are using marketing terms for art to define what they do.

How this works is by using terms to define something when that term does not apply. Keywords are still the heart of search engines, and genuine artists get lumped in with arts and crafts.

It drives competition for words in order to gain views or be noticed. It has been killing artists for a long time.

Yet it does not end there. Google is no different.

Why describe what someone makes as something it is not? That is easy to answer. Its purpose is to try and sell product.

Yet big marketing itself has had its hand in this as well. Larger corporations play a role in how terms are seen or thought of based upon marketing campaigns.

So the real question is, what actually separates these worlds and is there really a difference? For any artist that happens across this page please pay attention.

This is a major lesson in why you should never group yourself in with these crafters and makers in locations such as Etsy.

Basic lessons from art appreciation classes should enlighten an artist to these reasons. There never has been craft appreciation which has been taught at any university.

Defining What Art Is Within The Art Market

There are clear qualifications to defining what art is. Among these qualifications is purpose. One must first know the purpose of art in order to understand this principle.

With this purpose also comes artistic expression. Is this thing that is being presented a genuine artistic expression, or is it a mass produced product?

With these former two principles comes the artists ability to use philosophies and art theory within their creation.

As you can see… clearly there are ways to define what art is.

Each of these concepts every artists should learn and be exposed to within the development process of the artist. It is for these reasons that we arrive at a clear divide in how things should be classified.

Separating Art From Craft’s And Makers

It is imperative for the artist to properly classify themselves. While we cannot help what broader markets appropriate to use in marketing, we can control what we do.

It is for that reason that artists should never allow themselves to be brokered on platforms that predominantly cater to arts and crafts or the maker community.

I do understand every artist wishes to be noticed and recognized. Nevertheless an artist must understand the importance of their brand association by where they allow themselves to be located within any given market.

It is this failure within the strategy of many artists that lead them to failure. The herd mentality will always net herd results.

Despite these issues, we cannot alter how broader markets appropriate art terminology for their end products. All that we can do is to separate ourselves from these generalized locations to set ourselves apart from them.

Creating Your Brand In Art Creates Clarity To Your Work

Brand association will go a long way to define what your art is and who you are as an artist. You must at some point come to the realization that your artwork is a business.

Too many artists allow for their work to send mixed signals. It becomes diluted by where they allow themselves to be seen. There is no consistency to how their brand is defined.

Too few take the responsibility to educate themselves in order to properly represent their work within their own online art gallery.

Additionally, too many use social media improperly and focus on it as their vehicle to success. They abandoned the tried and true principles of business in exchange for vain metrics that never pay.

Each of these points are very basic principles at the foundations of self promotion and presentation.

The end result of these failures are self evident across the many platforms of the webspace. Ultimately artists sell their original works too cheap. This only furthers the deteriorating cycle of their value.

It is imperative that artists begin to take the business aspect of their work seriously. This will require education and acquiring new skills. Success never happens to anyone merely by chance or from a good accident.

Defining What Crafts Are Within The Market

Some get into arts and crafts as a hobby and that is perfectly fine. Please understand that there is nothing wrong with having a hobby or being a maker.

Yet there are clear differences between a hobbyist, crafts, and an artist.

A craft is a product which is made for decoration. It does not hold any of the previously mentioned principles found within art. It is also most often mass produced as we find within the maker community.

Common items to be found are things like cutting boards, serving trays, and wall sculptures of wide varieties. These are popular maker products that become saturated within the marketplace.

We also see other brands that sell a process and product to these makers or hobby crafts. Chalk Couture products are a prime example to this end.

In essence, the craft industry has an industry within itself producing for those who make their products. Thus why I call them “makers”.

This too can be seen on Etsy as high volumes of an item, such as cutting boards, can be purchased. A maker then creates a design to only place them back on Etsy for sale individually.

Please understand there is nothing wrong with what they do. I have no issues with them until they begin to call this art. These kinds of processes is not in any way art.

There is nothing unique about their product . The single idea they create could have some unique qualities, yet they produce thousands of that same item.

There is no refinement to what is created and the focus is on sales more than the creation. It is merely a home based factory.

The materials used are low quality. Every part of their projects are based on a budget requiring these lower end resources. More often than not they end up chasing trends rather than refining their work.

Where is the value in what they produce? Certainly I would call it home decor. Yet it is little more than that when compared to genuine art.

Nevertheless, makers will continue to appropriate art terminology for the purposes of pushing a product. This we cannot change. Yet it does not mean that we should take part in their world.

Key Problems Within The Craft Market

A major problem with the craft market is that these items do not sell quickly. In order to move items with any speed requires low prices.

To achieve low prices requires two things. First cheap materials must be resourced. Secondly a streamlined production process that can be done with speed and repeatability.

Does this sound anything like art? Absolutely not.

Another problem is how quickly a trend can shift. The maker of that craft item must produce and offload that product quickly or risk being stuck with it.

If the items they have do not sell quickly then they have no choice but to offer it at further discounted prices. In order to achieve a fast sell they need high volumes of people following them.

Social media is among their primary tools as well as “drive by low value blogs”. Ad marketing is another common tool.

Having multiple points of sale among different web platforms like Amazon or an Etsy is a usual go to standard. This in turn dilutes their viable price point which is sacrificed for broader exposure. I call it “lazy marketing”.

After all this, they still have a much bigger problem that too many cannot overcome. Cheap overseas imports that are allowed on these same selling platforms flood the market.

These imports are brought in by middle men who have bigger advertising budgets yet pose as small home businesses. Their primary tool is only marketing without the need for any focus on production processes.

The issues do not end there. Bigger entities such as Hobby Lobby or Kirklands come into play. They have much larger budgets and streamlined professional marketing.

I will admit, it takes some bravery to have a little home shop and take on giants. Nevertheless that is not the kind of battle I want to find myself in. In the end there really is never any profit.

To put this bluntly, very few makers survive. They attempt to compete in the same circles as artists while also tackling the larger branded names. There simply is not enough room for them all.

Understanding The Artist Mindset Towards The Art Market

Artists survive not because we make money, but rather for the reason that being an artist is a part of who we are.

We will still create art even when we make no money. Therefore we still persist. A craft or maker business is not framed around this same mindset.

An artist is born to be what we are. We did not choose one day to set up a widget shop to try and build a home business. We remain who we are in what I call our artistic life.

The vast majority of artists work regular jobs to support themselves. Additionally, those of us who are older have already tried all the same avenues these makers run to when they start out.

Aside from this clear difference in purpose to life, what is the deciding factor for success or failure? The reason why many makers fail is that they exist in a no man’s land of the market.

To make money you must either provide a solution to problems for people, or create something of extraordinary beauty with meaning that people desire.

The problem with makers is that they exist in between those worlds. Their crafts are neither exceptional, nor are they often functional in solving problems.

Due to the bigger names in home decor they cannot find a foothold in their campaign.

A social media account simply is not enough. Within a couple years they are typically gone being replaced by others who attempt the same thing.

How An Artist Survives And Why Some Find Success

While an artist will often not care about sales, the crafter must have them. A maker will use marketing ads as part of their campaign.

Very few artists will do this unless they are relatively new. We learned long ago it is not worth it unless there are specific exceptions for an intended purpose.

Artists will use social media just as a maker, yet the way it is used is different. A crafter will be all about what they are making.

An experienced artist will be more about the creation and relationships with people. Social media is more about communication and making friends while showing their life work.

Makers and people within crafting will often make the same mistakes as younger artists.

Yet our art community is unique from that of the craft or maker community. Within art we do at least have structured information and education despite its many frustrations.

Few of those in the craft community will have independent websites much less a real blog. While artists can struggle with this as well, this is changing as more turn to self representation rather than art galleries.

Speaking of art galleries, nothing of that nature ever has existed for crafters or makers. Instead of galleries they attend planned events at wholesale.

The more experienced artists will be focused on networking, relationship building, education, being involved in community events, and the list could go on.

Artists find many avenues of involvement. A maker has what is essentially a one string banjo that plays only one cord… sell, sell, sell.

While one in marketing would look at the differences thus far listed, they could claim that an artist simply learns to conduct better public relations. This is not true by intent, but rather it as a result of community and history.

I will be the first to admit that we artists are an odd crowd with a lot of quirks. Too few of us are good enough out of the box to put together a campaign on purpose. It happens over time and a lot of personal growth.

Artists care more about the art than we do the product. We often will obsess over fine details slowing us down.

At times we trash what we made to start over, and personally I have done this. Makers will try to sell the not so great items because throwing it away cuts into their ROI.

There is nothing about the two communities which are the same other than a crafter attempting to use our circles to sell themselves.

Why Are Artists So Different?

I do like these maker people. There are times when I have seen some who are more exceptional in what they do.

Yet they run into a world where they have no idea of how to survive. The truth is that if you expect to build a business based on this idea and run it full time, you may be in for a surprise.

No artist gets into art for the money, in reality there is very little there. It is the one profession you are almost guaranteed to starve in.

We either have to be crazy or stupid to keep going, and simply we cannot help being in love with art. So we continue forward.

Part of my frustration is going beyond how the crafter and maker rides on our coat tails. It is like watching a plane crash in slow motion.

There are some I have come to know and be friends with that faced difficult times as a result of failure. In short there is no fast way to profits. Watching good people fail is not easy especially when there is no way to help them.

When an artist find success it is because they have done a few things the right way for long enough. It really is about having the right vehicle, method, patience, determination, and consistency all come together over time.

This is why I steer people away from craft or maker type businesses. I find it much better to refine and create with a vision in mind rather than make a product.