1/14/2015 The Death of the Artistand the Birth of the Creative Entrepreneur - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/01/the-death-of-the-artist-and-the-birth-of-the-creative-entrepreneur/383497/ 1/18

Islamophobia IsNot a MythBy ConorFriedersdorf

What to Do With aDyingNeighborhoodBy Alana Semuels

The Return of aNazi-Era GermanWordBy Adam Chandler

2Chainz,Conservative IconBy David A. Graham

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2015

WILLIAM DERESIEWICZ DEC 28 2014, 7:43 PM ET

PRONOUNCE THE WORD ARTIST, to conjure up the image of a solitary genius. Asacred aura still attaches to the word, a sense of one in contact with thenuminous. Hes an artist, well say in tones of reverence about an actor ormusician or director. A true artist, well solemnly proclaim our favorite singeror photographer, meaning someone who appears to dwell upon a higher plane.Vision, inspiration, mysterious gifts as from above: such are some of theassociations that continue to adorn the word.

Yet the notion of the artist as a solitary geniusso potent a cultural force, sodeterminative, still, of the way we think of creativity in generalis decades out ofdate. So out of date, in fact, that the model that replaced it is itself already out ofdate. A new paradigm is emerging, and has been since about the turn of themillennium, one thats in the process of reshaping what artists are: how theywork, train, trade, collaborate, think of themselves and are thought ofevenwhat art isjust as the solitary-genius model did two centuries ago. The newparadigm may finally destroy the very notion of art as suchthat sacredspiritual substancewhich the older one created.

Before we thought of artists as geniuses, we thought of them as artisans. Thewords, by no coincidence, are virtually the same. Art itself derives from a rootthat means to join or fit togetherthat is, to make or craft, a sense thatsurvives in phrases like theartofcooking and words like artful, in the sense of

TheDeathoftheArtistandtheBirthoftheCreativeEntrepreneurHard-working artisan, solitary genius, credentialed professionalthe image of the artist haschanged radically over the centuries. What if the latest model to emerge means the end of artas we have known it?

Jan/Feb2015 December2014 November2014

October2014 September2014 WWIIssue

MORE IN ENTERTAINMENT

The Taken Series IsEvery Father's Fearand FantasyALEXANDERHULS

Beyonc Is a RoleModel forTraditional MarriageSPENCERKORNHABER

WonderWoman:Learning to Love theComic Behind theIconNOAHBERLATSKY

MAGAZINE ARCHIVE

Javier Jan

VIDEO

SocialMedia:TheVideoGameWhat if the validation of your peerscould "level up" your life?

SUBSCRIBEEVENTSNEWSLETTERSBOOKSAPPSFEATURESPHOTOJUST IN Bed, Bath, and Bong Rips: The Glorious Return of Broad City

SIGN IN SIGN UP SEARCH

Get The Atlantic on Facebook

POLITICS BUSINESS TECH ENTERTAINMENT HEALTH EDUCATION SEXES NATIONAL GLOBAL VIDEO MAGAZINE

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/the-glorious-return-of-broad-city/384405/http://www.theatlantic.com/national/https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/atlantic-magazine-digital/id397599894?mt=8http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2014/09/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2015/01/http://www.theatlantic.com/noah-berlatsky/http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/http://www.theatlantic.com/william-deresiewicz/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/print/2015/01/the-death-of-the-artist-and-the-birth-of-the-creative-entrepreneur/383497/http://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/http://www.theatlantic.com/ebooks/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/backissueshttp://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2014/11/http://www.theatlantic.com/education/http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/taken-series-is-every-fathers-worst-nightmare/384467/https://w1.buysub.com/servlet/OrdersGateway?cds_mag_code=ATL&cds_page_id=172711&cds_response_key=I14A2Chttp://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2014/10/http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/http://www.theatlantic.com/international/http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/beyonce-is-a-role-model-for-traditional-marriage/384488/http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/01/what-to-do-with-a-dying-neighborhood/384475/http://www.theatlantic.com/features/mailto:?subject=The%20Death%20of%20the%20Artist%E2%80%94and%20the%20Birth%20of%20the%20Creative%20Entrepreneur&body=Hard-working%20artisan%2C%20solitary%20genius%2C%20credentialed%20professional%26mdash%3Bthe%20image%20of%20the%20artist%20has%20changed%20radically%20over%20the%20centuries.%20What%20if%20the%20latest%20model%20to%20emerge%20means%20the%20end%20of%20art%20as%20we%20have%20known%20it%3F%0A%0ARead%20More%3A%0Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fmagazine%2Farchive%2F2015%2F01%2Fthe-death-of-the-artist-and-the-birth-of-the-creative-entrepreneur%2F383497%2Fhttp://www.theatlantic.com/live/http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/taken-series-is-every-fathers-worst-nightmare/384467/http://www.theatlantic.com/alexander-huls/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2015/01/http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/01/islamophobia-is-not-a-myth/384502/http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/wonder-woman-learning-to-love-the-comic-behind-the-icon/384160/http://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/384122/social-media-the-video-game/https://w1.buysub.com/servlet/OrdersGateway?cds_mag_code=ATL&cds_page_id=171695&cds_response_key=I14A1Chttp://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/wonder-woman-learning-to-love-the-comic-behind-the-icon/384160/http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/http://www.theatlantic.com/spencer-kornhaber/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2014/12/http://www.theatlantic.com/http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/beyonce-is-a-role-model-for-traditional-marriage/384488/http://www.theatlantic.com/health/http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/http://www.theatlantic.com/video/http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/01/2chainz-nancy-grace-marijuana-legalization-conservative-icon/384508/https://www.facebook.com/TheAtlantichttp://www.theatlantic.com/photo/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/toc/2014/08/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/01/the-worst-german-word-of-the-year/384493/http://www.theatlantic.com/business/

1/14/2015 The Death of the Artistand the Birth of the Creative Entrepreneur - The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/01/the-death-of-the-artist-and-the-birth-of-the-creative-entrepreneur/383497/ 2/18

crafty. We may think of Bach as a genius, but he thought of himself as anartisan, a maker. Shakespeare wasnt an artist, he was a poet, a denotation thatis rooted in another word for make. He was also a playwright, a term worthpausing over. A playwright isnt someone who writes plays; he is someone whofashions them, like a wheelwright or shipwright.

A whole constellation of ideas and practices accompanied this conception.Artists served apprenticeships, like other craftsmen, to learn the customarymethods (hence the attributions one sees in museums: workshop of Bellini orstudio of Rembrandt). Creativity was prized, but credibility and value derived,above all, from tradition. In a world still governed by a fairly rigid socialstructure, artists were grouped with the other artisans, somewhere in the middleor lower middle, below the merchants, let alone the aristocracy. Individualpractitioners could come to be esteemedthink of the Dutch mastersbut theywere, precisely, masters, as in master craftsmen. The distinction between artand craft, in short, was weak at best. Indeed, the very concept of art as it waslater understoodof Artdid not exist.

ALL OF THIS began to change in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, theperiod associated with Romanticism: the age of Rousseau, Goethe, Blake, andBeethoven, the age that taught itself to value not only individualism andoriginality but also rebellion and youth. Now it was desirable and evenglamorous to break the rules and overthrow traditionto reject society and blazeyour own path. The age of revolution, it was also the age of secularization. Astraditional belief became discredited, at least among the educated class, the artsemerged as the basis of a new creed, the place where people turned to putthemselves in touch with higher truths.

Art rose to its zenith of spiritual prestige, and the artist rose along with it. Theartisan became the genius: solitary, like a holy man; inspired, like a prophet; intouch with the unseen, his consciousness bulging into the future. The priestdeparts, said Whitman, the divine literatus comes. Art disentangled itselffrom craft; the term finearts, those which appeal to the mind and theimagination, was first recorded in 1767.

Art became a unitary concept, incorporating music, theater, and literature aswell as the visual arts, but also, in a sense, distinct from each, a kind of higheressence available for philosophical speculation and cultural veneration. Art forarts sake, the aestheticist slogan, dates from the early 19th century. So doesGesamtkunstwerk, the dream or ideal, so precious to Wagner, of the total workof art. By the modernist moment, a century later, the age of Picasso, Joyce, andStravinsky, the artist stood at the pinnacle of status, too, a cultural aristocratwith whom the old aristocratsor at any rate the most advanced among themwanted nothing more than to associate.

It is hardly any wonder that the image of the artist as a solitary geniusso noble,so enviable, so pleasant an object of aspiration and projectionhas kept its holdon the collective imagination. Yet it was already obsolescent more than half acentury ago. After World War II in particular, and in America especially