how do performance artists make money?

 

Merchandising!!!! From artifno:

How do artists with ephemeral work get paid?

The simplest answer is that they usually don’t. The key to a lucrative art career is — no surprises here — to produce something that has some sort of material worth. Most performances have negligible market value because they are not easily corralled into a permanent object… It could be argued that Matthew Barney, one of the most successful artists working today, has engineered his market entirely from these aesthetic epiphenomena, with the films documenting his performances, the props persisting as sculpture, and sketches being sold as art objects. Then there is the relatively new phenomenon — arising, in part, from gala culture — of the performance commission, where the most famous practitioners are paid to create spectacles for elite crowds.

Basically, artists make money from the rich dood equivalent of lunch boxes and action figures dolls.

Adverts: From Black Power/Grad Skool Rulz