I'm seeing a lot of wonderfully well-meaning advice from collectors to artists. Insight from experience, from personal buying experience to business experience. The difficulty is that what is needed to make great art, unique art can't be broken down and quantified in these ways.

Art comes from the soul. It's not like being an entrepreneur. It's not like owning a business. It's not like being a marketer. All those skills help push into a market, of course! But you're not making stock. Not shifting product. That's not how art happens.

Can you look at it like product? Of course. And maybe you'll do well. But if your art is being traded as stock and not collected by passion, I don't know how long that will last. One of the basic things in marketing books is that you need a great product. Art is not that simple.

If you make your art in the way the market wants, you will likely make art that is derivative. Because it will be based on prior market experience. It will just be product. Based on what has been made rather than all the unexpected surprises, the totally unpredictable magic.

Art is in that unpredictable magic. The best art is found in things we haven't yet seen. In pieces we didn't see coming. And that's a thing that comes from deep inside you. And I don't just speak as some dreamy optimistic artist. I speak as someone who has been in media 25 years.

I've seen decades of people chase that next big TV success by trying to repeat the previous one. By desperately trying to break down what broadcasters want. To give them exactly what they ask for. Here's the reality – what they ask for is almost never what they want.

What they want is to be surprised. Is to find magic. Is to fall in love with something they didn't see coming. To connect with it on a deep level in the same way the creator does. That's what's beautiful about that creator/broadcaster relationship. When it works, it's wonderful.

Same with art. Collectors are so important to us. Every bit of their support is like channeling energy directly into us, and sometimes vastly improving our day to day lives. But that connection is not something you can break down and quantify.

Make art you believe in. Make art that is from your soul. Make the art you want to exist. Art that is part of you. That is from you. Try the things that might not work. Do the unexpected. Find the magic that lies in that path not yet taken. Love your art.

There are all sorts of other things that will help of course. Connect with the community. Help others. Be engaged. Be kind. See what's happening around you. Keep your art visible even if that means showing the same pieces over and over. Push your art.

But when it comes down to it, when it comes down to your actual art, your creativity, remember this quote that @Signalnoise always passes my way. Never play to gallery. That's all.