Next time you're at Trader Joe's just ask the cashier about it on the way out, if they aren't an artist they'll certainly know someone in the store who is.
Kidding (sort of) aside, I've known a surprisingly large number of professional artists and all of them had a primary source of income that had a much smaller salary than a software engineer. None of them could subsist entirely from art.
It's an unfortunate reality that artists, unless they're focused on something "practical" like wedding photography, really can barely scrape by as a career, and that nearly always includes having a part time job and a partner with full time income to make it even possible. Even people like professional symphony musicians often need an extra job to get by.
If you're in tech and interested in the arts I would start making art in the evenings. If you have a laid back tech job you should have plenty of time to devote to what you're interested in and will have an income, even at a low paying tech job, that will make you the perpetual envy of the artist friends you make along the way.
tl;dr there is no such thing as a "career" in art. If you're passionate about art, just start making it.
> If you're tech and interested in the arts I would start making art in the evenings. If have a laid back tech job you should have plenty of time to devote to what you're interested in and will have an income, even at a low paying tech job, that will make you the perpetual envy of the artist friends you make along the way.
The laid back tech job is tricky to wrangle in my experience. Like people inevitably say in all the blue-collar threads on HN, tech jobs have a way of sticking in your brain well after the official workday is done. That really dampens my creative energies. It could be that I'm not picking sufficiently laid-back jobs though! I've always wondered, what sort of tech areas would be the most laid back? Enterprise stuff? Government work?
Drawing doesn't really require a lot of 'creative energies' when you're learning. It's mostly mindless grinding of fundamentals, and that can go on for months or years. You should just start doing it to see if you actually like it. There's a billion resources on drawing and painting out there these days, not like it's some esoteric secret.
I make art all the time, during work hours even! I work remote though.
Sorry, maybe I should have clarified: I'm approaching this as an artist that has had time and creative energy sapped by the tech industry, trying to figure out what sort of tech work would let me tip the balance away from tech and back towards art.
Devops at mature company, sure. Devops at a small startup is one of the most stressful jobs you can have, because people use it as a catch-all for security engineer, backend engineer, and 24/7 oncall.
Freelancing could make this possible, you can work in spurts on small projects and do art in between. Also boring jobs like insurance, finance, car companies, and similar corporate america non-tech companies can be pretty chill.
I would recommend (if you're serious) to reduce hours and make art every Friday. Most in tech make enough to continue your life, quite a lot earn less than your 4 day week. Making it in the evening is quite taxing if you're want to create some good.
Kidding (sort of) aside, I've known a surprisingly large number of professional artists and all of them had a primary source of income that had a much smaller salary than a software engineer. None of them could subsist entirely from art.
It's an unfortunate reality that artists, unless they're focused on something "practical" like wedding photography, really can barely scrape by as a career, and that nearly always includes having a part time job and a partner with full time income to make it even possible. Even people like professional symphony musicians often need an extra job to get by.
If you're in tech and interested in the arts I would start making art in the evenings. If you have a laid back tech job you should have plenty of time to devote to what you're interested in and will have an income, even at a low paying tech job, that will make you the perpetual envy of the artist friends you make along the way.
tl;dr there is no such thing as a "career" in art. If you're passionate about art, just start making it.