Yancey Strickler, founder of Metalabel and Kickstarter, wrote an interesting piece titled What’s the difference between an artist and a creator?
An artist is a self-directed artistic expressor. They work for themselves and express what they want. There’s no one beyond their anxiety looking over their shoulder telling them what to do.
A creator is a self-directed market expressor. Everything they do has a commercial aim at its core, but they answer to themselves and their audience. Rather than a traditional boss, they have an algorithmic one that implicitly and explicitly shapes their output.
A commercial artist, or “a creative,” is a contracted market expressor. Everyone who works at an ad agency or as an in-house designer fits into this bucket. This group is much better paid than anyone else because they fulfill a market-oriented purpose. Today this role is often called a “creative” — a dehumanizing phrase with roots in the advertising industry.
An institutional artist is a form of contracted artistic expression. Think of an artist being asked to produce a Biennale commission or a piece for a museum. They are being contracted for their voice in a defined way. You have to have “made it” to be part of this quadrant.
Read the full article here.
