Creative Ways to Make More Money as an Artist

When you’re ready to turn your passion projects into income, it can be difficult and overwhelming to know where to start. Enter Kyle Mosher, Alli K., and Cyn Santos, working artists who have cracked the code to make more money as an artist without sacrificing your creativity. In this minisode, we’re rewinding the actionable and inspiring soundbites from their Brush & Banter interviews to help you turn your passion into profit. 

In this episode, you’ll hear:

• How Kyle Mosher built an artist-in-residence program to build the brand for an apartment complex
• Why Alli K. said “no” to projects more often even as competition increased
• How Cyn Santos leveraged her website to reach the right clients
• Presenting yourself as an influencer vs. a contractor
• Negotiating brand collaborations so you have creative freedom as the artist

Hit rewind on these episodes:

• Booking Brand Collabs with Kyle Mosher
• Setting Your Prices as an Artist with Alli K Design
• Landing Paid Art Projects with Major Brands & Finding Your Creative Voice with Cyn of Chalk & Brush

Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project. 

Brush & Banter is co-hosted by Brie Hansen, President of Zibra; Annie Bolding, Founder of It’s a Disco Day Designs; and Lauren Cooper, Founder of Rosemont Lane Design Studio.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

Welcome to Brush and Panter, the podcast where creativity meets real life hustle. Brought to you by Zebra. We go beyond perfect brush strokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist.

SPEAKER_02 0:13

I'm Brie Hansen, Crafter at Heart, Creative Cheerleader, and President of Zebra.

SPEAKER_05 0:18

I'm Annie Bolding, muralist, designer, lover of all things that sparkle, and founder of It's a Disco Day Designs.

SPEAKER_04 0:24

And I'm Lauren Cooper, muralist, designer, creative mama, and founder of Rosemont Lane Design Studio. We're here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business in a built-in painting companion for your next project. So grab your favorite zebra brush, pop in your headphones, and let the banter begin.

SPEAKER_02 0:46

Welcome to a special episode of Brush and Banter. I'm Brie Hansen, president of Zebra, and co-host of the show. This week we thought it would be fun to hit rewind on some of our past episodes to grab the most actionable sound bites to inspire you this week. In this mini sode, we're discussing a topic we're incredibly passionate about: making money from your art. Whether you're a muralist, a furniture finisher, or a fine artist, this episode has tips for you to get creative and strategic about how you are presenting your work. Our experts today are Kyle Mosier, Allie Kay, and Sin Santos, working artists who have cracked the code to make more money as an artist without sacrificing your creativity. We hope you enjoy this mini sode and that it helps you turn your passion into profit.

SPEAKER_00 1:30

Again, just like anything, everything was really organic. At the time, I had an assistant. The entire experience I had in that apartment was paid for through uh a mural deal. It was a business structure, but I had structured this to live in Southend for two years for free. Oh my gosh. Yeah. And I structured it with an apartment complex. And they paid me. So it was like double dipping.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

That's awesome. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

And I ended up doing like 10 murals in one in like one neighborhood.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

Where? Well are they still there?

SPEAKER_00 1:58

Yeah, they're also there. They're over by on uh over by uh Highwire and Spenga. Oh yeah. That whole neighborhood. So that that whole neighborhood was owned by a company at the time called Ram Realty. At the time, this area was considered old for Southend, aka it was like three years old, which is like ancient in Southend times. So they wanted to like refresh the building. We started with one mural, and I was like, man, we can take this and you know, we can really build out something special here. So I created this business model to be like an artist in residence at this apartment complex. And I was like, let me live here, give me your social media, and let me give me a tiny mic and just let me create traction for your brand. And we built uh this whole experience with residents around this idea of art. And I we were the title back, like we were doing like the social takeovers and we were doing all the murals on the complex, we were doing events. I mean, it was just like a huge things that we were doing. It was a two-year program. Um, and at the time we were I remember sitting in my apartment. I was like, everything in here is paid for with art. Like it it kind of like, and I think I was just on one of my soapbox like moments where I was just like being like, you know, trying to hide myself up. You had the mic. Yeah, yeah. I had the tiny mic, and I was just like, everything in here is paid for with art. And I yeah, the paid for with art stuff can be, you know, it's a it's a rallying cry for all artists of all mediums across all platforms to just be like, you know, this is my life, and I I deserve to get paid for it. I deserve to eat, you know, sleep and breathe it. It's a career, it's very real. And channeling all of that energy that I had to sort of put into myself, you know, coming up and being my own mentor and be having my own back, and you know, I sort of wanted that to be paid for with art. I want people to own it and be proud of it. And it's it's not, I may be the one who sort of am the catalyst and start it, but it belongs to the community, it belongs to everybody, and that's what I want to build with it.

SPEAKER_02 3:59

So for artists who uh have that feel that pressure to kind of do it all and like take all of those little opportunities that come, how do you sort through them and decide which are the one you should take?

SPEAKER_03 4:13

This is controversial in my head because when I started my business, I said yes to everything, but there weren't also a thousand other muralists also doing it, and so it is a weird it's weird, right? Because people that have their business right now and they like see other muralists and they're not charging enough, but they're so good, and you're like, hold on, know your worth, know your value, but they're like, Oh, but I've only painted like one or two murals, so that's hard to like be like, no, don't do that. Because when I was starting out, I did the same thing. Um and so it's trying to find that balance in this new world of entrepreneurship, and you're trying to be a fish in this big pond and trying to take up space and being doing it confidently to get yourself out of that. Um like, yes, say yes, but don't say yes and undervalue yourself, right? So like it's so much harder to go from zero to five thousand. Like that's a huge jump. Try not to do things for free. I know it's so it's it's so hard. Um, I don't think I've I've ever done anything for free if I've if I've thought about it. Like I'm constantly like, okay, like, yeah, let's do something as a trade. Like there needs to be some type of transaction um versus like let me just do this for free. I don't do anything for family and or really close friends. Uh that's another kind of like boundary that I have set because you get into this like rhythm of not valuing your worth if you're constantly doing things as like handouts. Um so again, like building confidence takes practice. You have to constantly practice your worth.

SPEAKER_04 6:24

I feel like protecting maybe this advice came from you. Let me know. But like there's projects that feel like a yes or no, and those are kind of sometimes confusing, but like more so look out for like the people or like maybe like what they're doing that you may or may not align with sometimes.

SPEAKER_03 6:43

Yeah, for sure. I am a huge again, I huge connector. I want every client to be my friend at the end of um that and the clients that are just kind of like they see you as a transaction, I know it's not gonna be great. And sometimes I'll the worst ones are like, oh, I don't know if this is gonna be great until you double your price, and then like, all right. And I'm like, oh darn it. Like, I guess we're in this. Yeah, it's just being curious is probably the most what has gotten me this far is just being curious about people, being curious about what other people are doing, being curious about the process, being curious about how I can time management. Like I'm just constantly learning and constantly um wanting to just yeah, curiosity is I I love it.

SPEAKER_04 7:41

I feel like in making those minor tweaks, like again, to just fit your lifestyle. You have like obviously a long list of some of these dream clients for us. I mean, Starbucks and you know, a cruise ship and all of these things. Who are you looking for when you're doing the outreach, or based off of people who've reached out to you, can you drop any of those job titles that we can maybe get some insight on?

SPEAKER_01 8:02

Yeah, I want to say anything that has to do with like experiences. Um, not necessarily we're always looking for like design and designer, but head of like blank experience or marketing or anything like that is always a good idea. I don't actually do a lot of outreach, and that's something that I'm gonna change this year so that I can be more intentional um with who I'm reaching out to. But yeah, I definitely think we got a little bogged down with just designers or specific businesses and aren't looking for the developers, for like the general construction managers who are the people that we're dealing with most of the time when we're working at a higher commercial scale.

SPEAKER_05 8:38

I mean, that makes a lot of sense that this it's it's people who are you know experience-based, marketing based, because yeah, like you said, like it's not always the head of design or branding design that really even has any sort of say or has the the nudge to say in the right direction. So I am curious though. So obviously you're talking about like you didn't do too much client outreach. So, more so you're saying, you know, maybe a lot of your work is coming from referrals or it's coming from people finding you online. What do you think is important for clients to see from a web page? And do you think that that was something they were getting from your old web page? And if not, you know, what are you gonna be doing to build that up? Just so others who are building theirs, maybe me, um, can know what to include.

SPEAKER_01 9:24

Yeah, I mean, I definitely think a website should be, and even just like our social media, right, should be more of a portfolio that is showing your work. And I think especially when you want to work on a larger scale, right? So we're talking residential developers and commercial developers and getting these sort of like six-figure projects. Those people are not necessarily looking for like an influencer, right? They're looking for a contractor. So I think building a reputation as somebody who is knowledgeable, who doesn't mess around, right? Who's just gonna go in there, put their boots and their hard hat on, stay out of your crews way and get to work is just as important, right, as making the fun videos that are gonna reach the masses. I think a lot of us get bogged down in making videos and making content that appeals to other artists. And I think that's awesome because you build community that way. But that's definitely not how you get jobs, right? Um, and once you are in with developers or with larger corporations that have these sort of internal systems that you have to be vetted and you have to be able to get into, you're sort of set because whether they themselves need another project or they move companies, which happens all the time and need somebody to work with, you're already the trusted, knowledgeable artist who's gonna deliver on what they need on time and without making a mess. Um and yeah, I think that's just as important as catchiness. And if you can do both, then you're solid.

SPEAKER_00 10:59

I mean, a lot of these brands have really good art subsidiaries, Porsche, BMW. They they have they realize that art is I mean, artists and are the new athletes. There's so much marketing dollars and values that can go into art and they're you can see it. I mean, it's palpable. There's artists have agents and all of these things now. And I think like the ones that are doing it correctly and staying true to the artist are brands like BMW and Porsche, where they're it's not just slapping their logo on something, it's like they make it a full immersive experience, which is what which is so important for collaborations is to get it right. Is it shouldn't just be like, you know, our brand value is a billion dollars. That way that means we can just slap our logo onto one of your paintings. It's like no, that you you see now when I was at Puma, it was like changing the logo was the biggest no-no in any brand. It was like you do not hear our brand guidelines. Right, right, right. And now you see, I mean, you see artists like Travis Scott with Nike, and he's turning the logo upside down and flipping it around, and then you see all of these artists that are taking liberties with the logo, and that's the way a collaboration should be. It should be you know, the artists should be allowed to come in and make it theirs, right? And um so I mean Nike, shout out, love to do one with Nike. Um Porsche has Type 7, which is uh a really great subsidiary that they have that they do collaborations with like architects and like you know, obviously artists and they like build whole houses around this idea of like what does it mean with Porsche? What would Porsche look like as a house? And then they hired architecture. And it's like just really creative things. So forward thinking brands.

SPEAKER_05 12:39

Thank you for listening to the Brush and Banter Podcast, brought to you by Zebra. We're so grateful you're a part of the creative community. Gearing up for your next project? Head to enjoyZebra.com to grab your new favorite brushes, designed for comfort, precision, and serious creative flow. Be sure to follow Zebra Painting on Instagram for painting tips, artist features, and more. If you enjoyed our banter, subscribe on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts, and don't forget to leave a five star rating and review. Now, go make something beautiful. We'll be here when you need a little banter.