> How does making a profit hinder an artisan from producing quality work?
Oh, Nick, Nick, are we stirring the pot again? Hee hee... I know how much we both love to see these interesting questions debated on the list ;-)
I agree with Doug completely, and I've seen far more real-world evidence to back up what he's saying than I would care to acknowledge. So many talented and meticulous artists and craftsmen have priced themselves out of the market because they they worked to their own (perhaps unreasonably high) standards, therefore they had trouble selling their work at a living wage or attracting the requisite number of buyers. It then became necessary for them to either lower their standards or subsidize their art with another job that kept the bills paid, thus relegating their one true love to what others might call "hobby" status.
Having a primary job (like Berry's bike shop) sometimes works out well for all concerned... the buyer gets a far better deal than he would otherwise (how much would a frame cost if the builder only produced three or four frames a year with no other source of income, would he be able to sell enough $15,000-20,000 frames to stay in business?) and the seller is free to work to whatever level of quality or detail he sees fit without nagging concerns that the bills will not get paid.
Sometimes the fields of endeavor are unrelated (an example might be Richard Moon's day job at Intel(?), with framebuilding on the side), or are somewhat related (Berry's bike shop/framebuilding) or perhaps they are the very same product, differing only in the price tier (when I had my pottery studio I produced high priced but still unprofitable gallery porcelain and lower priced bread and butter stoneware, both at the same time. The porcelain gave me fulfillment and satisfaction, the stoneware gave me a roof over my head).
> If it was in fact true; their best work would be free.
This is sometimes true, in fact perhaps far more often than many folks in our profit-oriented society might suspect. I knew a wonderful quilter who worked as a receptionist and gave her quilts away only to those she felt would appreciate them. She would spend several hundred hours on a quilt and for her it was all about love, so she was not about to hand it over to strangers for money.
Bob Hovey Columbus, GA USA
How does making a profit hinder an artisan from producing quality work?
I have heard this mentioned from several other sources and have a difficult time comprehending this thought process.
If it was in fact true; their best work would be free.
Nick Zatezalo Atlanta,Ga.USA
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http://www.aol.com.