In September of 2020, my Sharpie drawings were selling for more than Beeple had ever sold a piece of his art for. Really. And I'm a homeless, goofball, Sharpie artist, known only in the Old School BMX freestyle world. I'm not dissing him, just putting his insane NFT sales from 2021 in perspective. But Mike Winkleman, aka Beeple, had been putting one piece of digital art up on the web and social media, free to everyone to check out, every single day, for nearly 13 years. The collection of those works, "Everydays: The First 5,000 Days," was sold by Christie's, as an NFT, in March of 2021. That single sale raked in $69,346, 250, during a 14 day auction. Five months earlier, he'd never sold a piece of art for over $100. We live in interesting times, people. Really interesting times if you're a creative person. The video above is NSFW, Beeple cusses.
This post is about why you should give away as much of your creative work as possible. Mike Winkleman, best known as digital/NFT artist Beeple these days, is the one of the best examples of how giving away free creative work can pay off in multiple ways. He's not the only guy out there that gives creative work away. Every graffiti and street artist gives work away, for example, that's the whole idea. They put there work in public places, free for anyone there to check out. Banksy and Shephard Fairey (Obey Giant), are two of the best known examples from those worlds. Both sell art in major galleries now, by the way.
The video clip above is a good watch, and only about 20 minutes. For those who haven't watched it, Here's a synopsis of Beeple's story. He always liked to draw as a kid, and got into computers, and eventually brought the two together, getting into digital art. He's a family man, and has been making a living, and supporting his family, by doing freelance graphic design work, for many years now. He wasn't striving to be known as an "artist" or "digital artist." There's a clip on YouTube where he says calling yourself an "artist" sounds douchey to him. He just likes making cool digital images and videos.
What made Beeple into the guy I'm writing about today? His $69 million dollar sale of "Everydays: The First 5,000 Days" is what thrust him into worldwide recognition in the mainstream art and business worlds. How that happened is in the title. Way back in 2007, May 1st, I believe, Mike Winkleman decided to push himself. He decided to start putting an image up, every day, on the internet and social media (Instagram: @beeple_crap and Twitter: @beeple). If you watch the video above, you'll see the first images were pretty simple. But he just kept going, he kept improving his skills, and he kept putting up an image every day. "Everydays: The First 5,000 Days," happened because Beeple just put something out, some digital image, for free, every day, for over 13 years now (He has a couple of great Elon Musk pictures up in the last couple of days, BTW).
Much like a high caliber athletes, Beeple put the work in, day after day after day before is big financial and prestigious win came. He strips the magic out of the artistic process," and he repeatedly says, "I just need to get shit done every day." As I'm writing this post, I'm listening to a great podcast with Beeple, from 2018, I think, long before his multi-million dollars sales and recent fame. This podcast is hilarious, and a great listen, here's the link:
He just said, in the podcast, that doing "Everydays" is "what brings in the freelance work, and that's what puts food on the table for the wife and kids." He didn't even have a demo reel of client work back then. People saw his "Everydays" images, and thought, ""Hey, let's get this guy to do our next project," then contacted him Those are two of the great reasons to put out creative work for free, 1) it's a great way to build a following for your work, and 2) putting out cool work for free is a great way to get people to approach you for paid freelance work, and sometimes long term jobs.
So... will doing a piece or art, music, or writing every day help you score millions of dollars in one big sale? Probably not. But these days, as crazy as the world is, I can't say, "that will NEVER happen." It's unlikely you'll ever sell a piece for millions, but it is possible.
Here's what will definitely happen if you start putting creative work out for free on a regular basis. 1) You will get better at whatever you do. It sounds stupid, but if you practice something consistently, you will improve, you will progress. 2)You will get more in tune with your creative process. You'll figure out how you work creatively, and what it takes for you to sit down and actually get something done, consistently. For some of you, it may take a specific cup of coffee, a quiet room, and specific tools to work with. For me, A Diet Coke, a couple of donuts, my laptop and art supplies, and a plug and wifi are what's needed.
Now, I am not Beeple, he's a millionaire, and world renowned digital artist now. But, we do have three things in common. 1) We've both put out a lot of content for free in the last 13 years, 2) We both put are really prolific creative people, and put a lot of creative work out, and 3) we both say "fuck" nearly as much as Jay and Silent Bob.
I put out my first zine (self-published booklet) about BMX freestyle, way back in 1985. I started it to find, and get to know, other BMX freestylers in the San Francisco Bay area. when I moved there. Within in a month, I'd met most of the pros and top amateurs in the region. I liked being the "zine guy" of our scene, So I kept putting my zine out monthly. By the next summer, 1986, I was making about $450 a month working at Pizza Hut, and spending $200 of that publishing my zine. That sounds ridiculous, and like a real waste of time to most people. But that little Xerox zine landed me a job at BMX Action and FREESTYLIN' magazines, at age 20. That job changed the course of my life, and set me off on a path I couldn't have imagined before.
That's another thing that doing consistent creative work, and putting it out, for free, does. There's an idea called the "corridor" or "hallway" concept. When you get busy doing something, it heads you down a different path than if you just sat around doing nothing. As you move forward down that "hallway," doors may open, opportunities may come along, that never would have happened on your previous path. You can decide to take, to not take, a particular opportunity. But if you keep working, in this case putting out some of your creative work, for free, more opportunities will come along. Some may seem like little things. For example, two of my drawings are up on walls of the library I'm working in right now. That's cool. The staff here knows me as that "Sharpie artist guy," or something like that. That could lead to bigger opportunities down the road. I'm scheduled to do an art workshop here in a couple of months. That could lead to other opportunities as well, who knows?
These days, my main output of free creative work is my blogs, this one, and 25 or so other ones I've tried. I started blogging about my days in the 1980's BMX freestyle world in 2008, when I was broke, out of work, majorly depressed, and living with my parents, in a small town in North Carolina. I've written over 2,400 blog posts since then. I'm not kidding, check out this post.
I built a following over the years, mostly from my BMX blogs. When I decided to try and sell my Sharpie drawings in late 2015, I put word out to my blog followers. and I sold a drawing for $20. Then another. Then another. While I don't make a decent living selling my drawings (yet!), I've now sold over 100 originals, and 150 or so prints, and they're spread across 12 or 15 states, and more than a dozen countries on 6 of the 7 continents. Now, six years later, I'm known mostly as a Sharpie artist. Nearly all of my drawings are on my blogs and social media, free for everyone to check out, or even print out a free copy of. I'm about to start a new direction with my drawings, and already have a couple people inquiring about it, just from a few sketches I posted.
We have all these amazing platforms to share creative work for free in today's world. Trust me kids, it a million times easier to get exposure for your creative work than it was back in the zine days. So USE those platforms. Blogs, websites, Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram, Medium, Tik Tok, Snapchat, podcasts, YouTube channels, whatever makes sense for you. Seriously, if you want to sell your creative work, maybe make a living at it some day, and you're not putting free stuff out consistently, you're a fucking idiot. OK, maybe not an idiot, but you're not serious. Get your work out there. Let people see it. Then do more. Consistency. That's the main way you build a following as a creative person, in today's world. So put something out! You may never have the insane financial success Beeple had. But you'll be in a much better place creatively in a few years, whatever level of success you find.
This is the David Bowie drawing I did for a friend in 2018, and then accidentally left at a bus stop in Richmond, Virginia. But you can see the progression in my drawing skills in 3 1/2 years. #sharpiescribblestyle
I started a new personal blog, check it out:
