
The Struggling Artist at 86 - wallflower
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/05/nyregion/the-struggling-artist-at-86.html
======
nyc111
Compare him to Picasso. Picasso never said "I had to pay the rent." He never
considered earning money with anything other than painting. When he had no
money he lived in friends' apartments. He faced and accepted poverty and
hunger. Picasso did not compromise. Same with Van Gogh. Paintings on their own
have no value. Buyers pay for the life story of the painters. The more heroic
is your life the more expensive your paintings. Painter's job is to market
himself in order to create a life mythology. This guy just painted. He did not
create a myth around his life.

~~~
crispinb
The idea that there is some One True Path to becoming an Artist (as if either
path or role were a consequence of universal natural law) is myth-making at
its most obtuse.

Even a cursory glance at art history will show the heroic myth is anything but
universal. There are tortured artists yet others who are at the peak of mental
health. There are poor artists, rich ones, uncompromising artists, artists
who'll sell their soul for a drink or a fuck, artists who beat their partners,
those who die young, or live to a ripe old age; organised artists, yet others
who can barely find their studio.

A shorthand: there's no such thing as 'an artist' (let alone a 'real artist').

~~~
tmh79
There is a huge difference between "all great artists did X" and "there is
nothing particularly in common between all great artists". My intuition is
telling me that the truth is definitely in the middle, and if there was some
way to perform a "clustering" algorithm on artist's
lives/work/legacy/commercial success we would see some clear patterns emerge
around certain "archetypes" or "personas" of artists, and this guy doesn't
seem to fit into one.

~~~
meric
It is natural for one’s intuition to be in the middle of one’s perception of
two extremes. :)

------
mattbierner
Wish there was a better proxy for the value of an artist than what their works
sell for. For example, how many people did this guy influence, how did his
work change art or how people understand the world? Neither was really
discussed in the article

~~~
egypturnash
His day job was "working as a freelance graphic designer creating logos,
packaging and advertising for brands like Pond’s cold cream and Bufferin." So
he may have anonymously influenced a ton of people to buy one brand of
painkiller or another.

He also lived in Cleveland from about 1952-1961, which means there's a not
insignificant chance he may have done work for American Greetings. Which means
that maybe his art was on some number of cards that began or ended a
relationship. That's an influence, I think? Probably an anonymous one, though.

It sounds like pretty much everything he's drawn or painted for himself is
still in his apartment. So most of it hasn't had any chance to influence
anyone or their understanding of the world. This may change now that he has
people in the NYC gallery scene becoming interested in his work as a new
artist to promote as worth investing in. Or it may not; the few pieces of his
work shown in the article didn't strike me as saying anything that hasn't
already been said a thousand times by the "New York School" of 50s/60s
abstract expressionists that he exhibited next to back then. YMMV, abstract
expressionism ain't my thing in general.

------
pmorici
Reads more like a cautionary tale of what happens when you don't save for
retirement than a story of a struggling artist

~~~
brudgers
He's 86. Fifty years ago in 1958, when he was a young 26, prudent retirement
planning was getting a good stable job with a pension. Forth years ago in
1968, when he was 36, prudent retirement planning was holding a stable job
with a pension. 1978, he was 46 and prudence was still a pension. Even thirty
years ago in 1988, it was the same for someone at 56. Now twenty years ago,
when he was 66, new employees were typically being put in 401k plans rather
than pensions, but in 1998 he was 66 and retirement age.

The world changed in ways that were not consistent with conventional
retirement wisdom. Or to put it another way, people looked at the piles of
money sitting in pensions and figured out a way to get their hands on it
because that was their full time job. For what it's worth, there are people
who spend all day everyday thinking about your retirement savings becoming
their money because skating to where the conventional retirement wisdom for
retirement is going is still a job people have.

For what it's worth, a lot of people who had retirement savings saw that money
shrink by 40-60% in 2008-2009. There's no coming back from that even with ten
years of 7% net growth, you're still behind inflation without drawing any of
the capital and profits...and you're not going to get ten years of 7% net
growth without extraordinary good luck.

~~~
rileymat2
> and you're not going to get ten years of 7% net growth without extraordinary
> good luck.

Typically, I would agree, however in the cited time period I would not. From
the middle of 2009 to now the DJI is up 180%. Significantly more than the 7%.

From Peak 2007, that money is up 90% since 2007.

By simply holding and not selling broad index funds, you would have been fine.

~~~
brudgers
Unlike real portfolios, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gets to replace
losers with winners. Dropped by the DJI since 2008 are:

\+ Alitra, Honeywell for BOA and Chevron: Remember Honeywell?

\+ AIG for Kraft Foods: AIG was worth close to $0 and Kraft was worth
something and so the DJI went up because averaging in something is better than
averaging in nothing.

\+ Citigroup, GM for Cisco and Travelers: GM was at about $10 and getting
bailed out by the government. Consumer spending was down for Citi. The
internet was exploding and Travelers had cash reserves to invest in the down
market.

\+ Kraft for United Health Group. More money in fixing the problems that come
from eating Cheez Whiz than selling it.

\+ Alcoa, BOA, HP for Goldman Sachs, Nike, Visa. Remember HP?

\+ ATT for Apple: Replacing the ~$50 ATT with the ~$500 Apple made the average
go up. If you can swap out shares in your portfolio similarly, my advice is to
do so.

The conventional advice is to play the market because the DJI is up. It
doesn't explain how the DJI works and that you can't replicate its
performance. And if you are retired, you have to live off the money and the
size of your pile is shrinking not growing. The conventional advice comes from
an industry that has no problem using your life savings for its own purposes.

~~~
rileymat2
I am not claiming the Dow is a ideal index I used it for its name brand,
however Here is a link to a comparison to .DJI and VTI (Vanguard Total Stock
Market)

[https://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chd...](https://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=maximized&chdeh=0&chfdeh=0&chdet=1515099600000&chddm=1146743&chls=IntervalBasedLine&cmpto=INDEXDJX:.DJI&cmptdms=0&q=NYSEARCA:VTI&ntsp=1&ei=Rn9TWtmbCYvijAHEtZ3wBg)

You will notice a negligible difference, all of my points stand.

~~~
brudgers
Here's the 10year
[https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/snapshot?FundIntExt=I...](https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/snapshot?FundIntExt=INT&FundId=0085&ps_disable_redirect=true#tab=1)

If a person had bought into it in 2007, they would have done reasonably
well...a little worse than 7% per year compounded. All that a person needed
was an oracle to pick a winner. On the other hand, the ten year from 1999 to
2009 would not have looked so good and it's not providing DJI like increases
in value because the DJI is Public Relations not finance (that's why it
doesn't indicate when to make money as a bear).

Keep in mind that in terms of retirement, pensions looked good and in 1992
when the Vangard fund became available the artist was already sixty-two years
old. There's no guarantee that today's Vanguard Fund will look as attractive
in twenty, thirty or forty years when the people following conventional
retirement advice have to cash in their chips. The fund performed _better_
than average.

Finally, people lost their jobs in the downturn and often had to dip into
retirement savings to keep themselves afloat. Even with a time machine, it
isn't possible for many people to have timed the market perfectly by investing
heavily at the 2009 trough. That's the smoke and hand waving that the
conventional financial advice uses to dismiss actual individual
circumstances...well that and the idea that poverty reflects a lack of virtue.

------
claudiulodro
> “Harry’s never been a salesman,” said Mary Bertschmann, his wife of more
> than 50 years. “He didn’t get his art out there for them to see.”

Like pretty much everything in life, it all comes back to marketing. In order
for people to want a specific artist's art they have to know the artist exists
and they have to be familiar with his work. The more people that know, the
more people will want the art, and the more valuable it will be.

For example, a Rothko is worth millions, but if I paint a large fuzzy colored
rectangle it's worth practically nothing. People know about Rothko, what he
was doing, and why. His art has a well-known, proven track record of being a
good investment and buyers already know this.

Even in art, it doesn't matter how good the product is if nobody knows about
it.

~~~
megaman22
God, Rothkos... nobody has ever been able to explain why I should care about
him or his fuzzy rectangles. And I was engaged to an artist that loved him...

~~~
klodolph
If you have not seen a Rothko in person, you may want to postpone judgment a
bit. I've known a few people who have independently told me that they didn't
get Rothko until they went to a museum with his work.

~~~
replicatorblog
Rothko is the visual art's embodiment of the emperor's new clothes. I've seen
Rothkos up close and personal. They're fuzzy rectangles painted by a guy who
couldn't draw. They're interesting cultural artifacts, but as an art school
graduate, I hate when the smart set elevates mediocre artwork to make the
unenlightened feel dumb.

Pollock's paintings at least have a sense of dynamism and there are
interesting interactions in the paint. DeKooning has a sense of dynamism, but
so did most classical artists with a bunch of other benefits to boot.
Frankenthaler/Kline/Twombly all had one move they repeated for decades.
Rauschenberg and Johns predicted a lot of modern graphic design, but you'll
find more interesting visuals in an issue of Lucky Peach. Diebenkorn made an
attempt to add the rudiments of representation.

Modern art is endlessly interesting. There are personal dramas, changes in
cultural norms, and financial stories that are much more compelling than
anything on the canvas. AbEx stuff is fine, but you'll find equally compelling
designs on bedding at Target.

~~~
Fricken
I was told that Rothko's Colour Field paintings were great many times and I
didn't believe it because I didn't see it with my own eyes. It wasn't until
after I had came to appreciate the work of hundreds of other artists that I
one day stumbled across a Rothko and found it to breathtaking.

If you can get that kind of feeling looking at the bedding designs at Target,
that's great, you've saved yourself a lot of trouble. I had to go on a decades
long odyssey to learn how to appreciate any painting as much as I appreciate
the work of Rothko.

------
benbenolson
No wonder he's still struggling, his art isn't good.

~~~
dang
Please don't post unsubstantive comments here.

~~~
InternetUser
Would you have said the same if his comment was "It's a wonder he's still
struggling, his art is very good."

~~~
dang
Not necessarily. Empty positive comments aren't as bad:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html).

It would be different if we got to a point where empty positive comments were
the main threat to quality on HN, but we're far from that.

