Written by Brielle Jobe

The Internet made me do it!

We know the arts are hard, but I’ve begun to notice that we may be making it even harder…

Artists have become more than one-man-bands; they’ve become their own agent, manager, accountant, social media person, publicist, editor, director, designer…the list goes on. The digital age and AI have made making self-tapes and Instagram reels possible for actors, comedians, and musicians — but not without headaches, carpal tunnel, and endless nights hyped up on your substance of choice to get everything done before our 9–5 starts the next morning — you know, the job we do so we can actually make money.

Why do we do this to ourselves? Because we’re sooo dedicated to our craft? Or have we just been convinced it’s the only way?

The Arts used to be a respectable field, but somewhere in the 20th Century, we devalued ourselves like a 20-something in an abusive relationship: I can’t ask people for money just to see my hobby; I can’t expect to make money with the thing I love; I have to do everything all by myself and that’s just the way it is, it’s my fault, really.

But, is it?

Art in your home used to be a symbol of status. It meant you were cultured, and more importantly, rich, if you had a painting hanging on the wall or musicians in the salon or tickets to the opera. But now, we accept donations in place of pay checks, likes and views in place of ticket sales, exposure in place of actual compensation. You have to subject yourself to hours and hours of unpaid work to earn the right and the credibility to be paid for what you do. You don’t get paid as a painter if you can’t show a finished product, you can’t get cast in a play or a movie without demonstrating the work in front of someone, you can’t fill a theatre as a comedian if you don’t have footage of you performing as a comedian! It’s this circular Catch-22: you must prove to us that you can create art before we pay you to create art.

This may sound no different from other jobs, of course your potential employer has to see your resumé. But the thing about the arts is that they’re collaborative — they require a whole team to produce a product. If I’m applying for a teaching job, I can send you a lesson plan without having taught it to a class. But if I’m applying to be a director? I have to present you with an entire production or at least a scene fitted with actors, a script, and on film from a decent angle. Subsequently, there has been a boom in one-man-shows and solo performance hours. As we have become more and more isolated in our digital caves, we shy away from what art is supposed to be: a collaboration.

The ensemble is dying.

But we are not meant to do art alone, we are not meant to tell stories alone. Storytelling is the oldest human tradition. And if there’s one thing we know about humans it is that we are not meant to experience life in isolation. We now live in such a fast-paced, individualistic, productivity-centered society that artists feel the screaming demand to create all day and all night. We strive to push content to gain followers to ultimately, hopefully, one day, maybe, launch our careers. But the quality of the art suffers. We talk more but say less. We commercialize and cater to the algorithms in hopes the digital gods will smile on our modest endeavors. And the best way to do that, is to take it all on ourselves. If we can learn to do everything then we don’t have to coordinate, we don’t have to ask for help, we can do it all. How else are we supposed to compete in this DIY digital age?

It’s logistically simpler! I can’t afford to pay multiple artists! AI can do the rest!

But I call bullshit.

I think we’re hiding behind technology and money. I think the one man show is less about logistics and finances and more about good ol’ fashioned trust issues. No need to expose your ideas when you can make it all yourself when no one’s looking. No need to face judgement before you’ve even started. No need to chance someone letting you down.
If you do everything, you can only be disappointed in yourself when it fails. No one else has betrayed you, no one else has hurt you. I think we insist on doing everything ourselves so we can hide behind the struggle. Music in our short film isn’t so good? “Well, I’m not a musician, I’m an actor.” Marketing flops? “Well, I’m a painter, not a sales rep.” We can continue to play the victim and be responsible for no one and nothing but ourselves. We don’t have to invest so much, we don’t have to take as big a risk.

If we do a half-assed job, then we can’t be that mad when it doesn’t work, we can shrug our shoulders and say, well, we tried. Art is hard.

But I don’t want to try. I want to succeed. 
I want to tell my stories and the stories of others. I don’t want to perform in a vacuum, nor should anyone. Because we don’t live in a vacuum. In order to create art we have to experience our world, and as much as your smart phone disagrees, you can’t do that from behind a screen.

And you can’t do it alone.

So when the muse strikes you next, don’t curl up with your laptop in the dark. Take a friend to a coffee shop, walk through the park with a colleague, talk shop all day every day until everyone else in the bar is annoyed that a gaggle of artists stumbled in. 
Because we are meant to collaborate. And in a world where we’re sucked further and further into solitary darkness, we need the ensemble more than ever.