The Noble Pursuit of The Creative Entrepreneur
Finally, a more perfect union of business, ethics, and art, and why this transformation is so important to America’s cultural landscape
Dana Gioia’s iconic “businessman-poet” has gone entrepreneurial.
One of the famous poet’s most popular essays, “Business and Poetry,” focuses on the interesting fact that though quite a few of the world’s most well-known poets were also businessmen, they never included this sphere of their life in their art. They wrote about everything from love and loss to train stations and cats. But a part of their life that required much of their time, just like countless other individuals who work for companies, banks, corporations, and marketing firms, never made the cut for writing material.
Gioia, who spent much of his life in the corporate sector, found this both odd and not all that surprising. His own experience in the arts world and the business world gave him first-hand knowledge that the two don’t collide. Much like Atlas holds up the sphere of the heavens so it doesn’t come crashing down to Earth, mixing with mere mortals, the powers that be in the arts and business worlds both pull an Atlas. This way, the arts aren’t muddied by talks of money. And quite frankly the business world is generally just too busy to care about caesuras and heroic couplets.
While this creates a severe disconnect between the realities of being a professional artist and a hobby one, Gioia eloquently lays out why many poets decided to wade into the waters of the business world, and the pros and cons of this difficult choice. T.S. Eliot, a banker, James Dickey, a copywriter, and Wallace Stevens, a corporate lawyer, are just a few Gioia covers in his eye-opening essay.
These men were all successful in business and eventually reached a considerable amount of fame with their poetry as well. Despite this win-win, Gioia’s “businessman-poet” was never brought out of his secretive, closed-curtains-home-office to be celebrated and studied.
The Business of Art
His “Business and Poetry” essay was first published in the early ‘80s, and up until recently, it seemed like any progress made with tightening the gap between arts and business spheres was regressing.
In my opinion, a large part of this has to do with how young writers are educated. From high school arts magnet programs to college arts major curriculums, there is hardly a mention of the business aspect of the specialized fields’ respective industries. And there is definitely no focused attention put on business or economic theory.
In a world where artists are having to take on more and more business responsibilities for their own art, this is detrimental to their success rate.
In my own collegiate experience, despite actually having a good head for business (I’ve been a full time professional musician and writer for over a decade now), my guidance counselor steered me away from a business degree because I went to an arts high school. After studying my art for four years in an official educational capacity, I wanted to study business so I could marry the two when I graduated. The counselor saw to it that wasn’t going to happen on her watch. She quite literally refused to enroll me in the college’s business program.
Instead, I got enrolled in their advertising degree program, where on the first day I had the distinct honor of learning all about newspapers… the dinosaurs of our ever-changing, ever-progressing media world. Great use of my scholarship money.
The Ethics of Business
Philosopher and writer Ayn Rand warned readers about this issue back in the 1960s. Despite morality being tied to everything from the arts to politics and science, for some reason even the world’s leading economists refused to understand the important link between morality and business. Between ethics and economics.
As an artist, I’m also a moral philosopher. To pretend then that as soon as I put on my business cap, ethics no longer applies is to deny reality.
During her (sometimes fiery) communications with Austrian school economist Ludwig von Mises, Rand stated in regards to Mises and his associates either skirting around or outright misunderstanding morality’s role in business and economics:
“The great mistake . . . is in assuming that economics is a science which can be isolated from moral, philosophical and political principles, and considered as a subject in itself, without relation to them. It can’t be done.”
Despite a long tradition of viewing the outdated businessman, the prototypical oil tycoon or smokestack factory owner, as an innately anti-ethical archetype, the revolution of the market has shown that not only in order to improve human flourishing do we need the freedom of the market, but we need ethical men at the helm and in every nook and cranny of the market as well. To demand anything less is a mistake.
Ayn Rand fought for this as far back as the mid. 20th century, when a valley between economics and morality was widening. Business must be tied to ethics. Moral philosophy is not relegated to classrooms and courtrooms, but is all the more important in business and economics because it’s a realm far more human than others.
After all, according to Mises, economics is the study of human action. If economics deals with human action, it deals with humans right down to their individual level. If we don’t understand the importance of individuals, who are both consumers and producers, having sound ethics while conducting themselves in business and economics, we have failed to understand the very essence of the market. Rand still seems to be the only one who fully understood this important concept.
The Ethics of Art
Technological freedom has broken the door wide open for artists. Like never before, they are able to take control of their careers and marry business with their art in ways previously only dreamed of by visionaries.
This new technological freedom has given the scarce, business savvy artist a giant step forward and made him entrepreneurial.
This is a new phenomenon in the arts world.
Austrian economics so far is the only school of economic thought that places a great deal of importance on the entrepreneur. Afterall, the entrepreneur plays a distinct role in society separate from the everyday businessman for he puts up (or secures) his own capital to fund his business in the first place. He’s not only a businessman, he’s a business owner.
Money is talked about more openly now between professional artists, something that was a major faux pas in previous generations.
Though money isn’t the reason artists get into the business of creating in the first place, becoming more entrepreneurially savvy has naturally made artists of all kinds more interested in basic business economics like cost, profit, and net income.
Has becoming more business oriented made artists more ethical with their art?
Thanks to publishing platforms like Substack, distribution companies like CD Baby, and a plethora of other independent options, it seems on some level artists have gained a newfound respect for the business world. Much like a teenager gains a whole new perspective on taxation when he sees FICA listed on his first paycheck, once artists assume the role of businessman or woman, suddenly these previously seedy character archetypes don’t seem so bad.
One browsing of Substack renders a host of writing and music-related publications covering everything from original work and classical music to Ancient Greek philosophy and independently published poetry collections.
With new technological freedom comes the freedom to create art that speaks to both the artist and the consumer, without having to worry about gatekeepers, from editors to record labels, canning a project or idea because it’s too marginal or controversial.
This freedom is a big win in the arts' actual ethics department which is made up of the spiritual essence of creators, and the minds of consumers discovering, interpreting, and yes, judging, art.
Perhaps the most interesting part of this progression isn’t just that artists have become more business oriented, but they’ve become business owners.
Gioia’s elusive, sometimes- shadowy “businessman-poet” has been thrust out of his suburban basement office and has been placed right in the middle of today’s most important arts industry debates.
While universities still shy away from teaching their arts students business and economics, America’s most popular music conferences, like CD Baby’s annual DIY Musician Conference, focus heavily on the business side of creating, and there’s never an empty seat in the house for the lectures.
Today’s Creative Entrepreneur
Gioia’s trailblazing “Business and Poetry” essay pointed out the severed realities of the poetry world, especially the academic poetry world, and the world of business. The evolution of technology and the now wide-open arts world full of independently released music, books, and publications proves that Gioia’s commentary was spot on, and it applied to not just the realm of poetry, but the arts and entertainment industry as a whole.
This newfound independence forces artists to create works worth experiencing because they are full of passion, metaphysical questions, searched-for answers, and skill. Artists don’t hide behind labels, publishing companies, or marketing teams anymore. They are out in the open, creating music, poetry, and stories they’ll stand by no matter what criticism (or praise) they receive.
Creative entrepreneurs are spiritually tied to their work, perhaps like never before, because they’ve seen the entire process through themselves, from creation to economization. Because of this attention to detail, philosophically-driven pieces are making a resounding comeback.
Artists are even becoming more involved in the judicial sphere, doing their research and giving their feedback to organizations, judges, and attorneys dealing with the tricky, highly outdated reality of U.S. copyright law.
Artists of previous generations would have scoffed at the idea of cracking open a law book. Instead, many of them could be found half-naked and drunk in a field, waiting for some new-age deity to strike them at any moment with a new hit song.
This changing landscape means a cultural change for America, and other westernized countries with active creative arts industries.
Art has never before been this accessible. While this means that the value of what is released can decrease due to the sheer volume of output, it also means artists and consumers have an extensive amount of options, content, and an ability to connect with each other directly.
These all have huge, positive cultural implications.
Writers, who used to have to go through a years-long editing process to get their book printed and published via a traditional publishing house, can now publish independently on Amazon or release their book in chapters digitally on Substack. They build a camaraderie and community with their audience in real time. This is spiritually nourishing for artists and consumers.
Gone are the days where you are either a businessman or poet, a musician or a lawyer. These days, thanks to technological advancement, the judiciousness of creators, and the voracious appetites of consumers, you can be a poetpreneur, musicpreneur, writerpreneur, or all three.
Just make sure to brush up on your ethics, or this whole renaissance could go to hell in a handbasket pretty quickly.
The strength of the market is only as strong as the moral fortitude of its participants. Whether you are a writer or reader, musician or listener, you no longer need to choose. Do it all. And do it all virtuously.