The Economic World Obverse: Freedom Through Markets After Arts Education

What role does arts education play in artistic activity and income? In light of the rise of university arts education and its effects, especially the changing role of teaching in artistic careers, this article questions key assumptions of both winner-take-all and economic-world-reversed analyses of artistic careers. While almost all studies of remuneration in the creative arts find that income is highly skewed, these dominant perspectives take an object-oriented view of artistic life that neglects the vast majority of activities that underpin and compose contemporary arts practices. Looking at arts practices more holistically and using the changing status of art teaching as an exemplar of the expanded field of artistic practice, we document the challenges that the rise of arts education present to traditional analyses of artistic careers, income, and success.