We’ve seen way too many talented creatives quit because they couldn’t make it work financially. No doubt, the financial challenges of pursuing a creative or artistic career are daunting, but we felt there wasn’t enough discussion around how to make it work. So, we connected with artists and creatives who’ve been able to earn a full time living from their creative work and asked them to share their stories with our readers.

Samantha Sandbrook

I’ve been working as a full-time, professional artist and designer for 22 years. After pursuing a B.F.A. degree majoring in painting at Queen’s University, I worked behind the scenes as an art director and art consultant at various art galleries. Through these work experiences, I learned a lot about creating portfolios, good presentation, curation, sales, and the importance of finding one’s niche in the art industry. Read more>>

Catie Michel

Yes, I’ve been able to support myself fully through creative work for the last three years. Both the time leading up to this work, and doing the work itself, has been a thrilling and nonlinear road. While art has always been a passion, I studied Animal Science and Wildlife Biology in undergrad. In a dendrology class and a marine biology class, we were required to create observational drawings in our field notebooks. That was the first time I realized how much I loved the intersection of art and science—and how powerful strong visuals can be for exploration and understanding. Read more>>

Chris Swainston

The journey as a photographer never ends. I first started in SLC, Utah with skate photography chasing the dream to work in the Skateboard industry. But it wasn’t until moving to Los Angeles did I fall in love with fashion and commercial work. My first introduction through this kind of work came out of an internship with MILK Studios, that turned into a full time job for a couple of years. Working there I learned so much about equipment, lighting and what the high end of professional photography looks like. From there I made connections with photographers and lighting assistants that helped me transition into a full time freelance lighting assistant and digital tech. Read more>>

Cara Brindisi

I work full-time as a Board Certified Music Therapist in Hospice Care (End of life care). I have been doing this for almost 15 years (with a short break during covid). I currently work for an agency that serves patients and families throughout Cape Cod and The Islands. My role on the hospice team is to use therapeutic music as a way to reach goals surrounding comfort, support, pain and anxiety management, and overall family/caregiver support. I typically lead music with my guitar and voice and base songs off of a person’s preference. The music can elicit a range of emotions, from reflective and reminiscent, to challenging and sentimental, to joyous and lighthearted. Read more>>

Lance Paul

Turning my creative passion into a full-time living has been a journey of persistence, vision, and adaptability. I started with a love for storytelling—whether through film, branded content, or visual campaigns. That passion led me to produce 16 feature films and over 200 hours of commercial and digital content across industries, helping brands connect with audiences in compelling, cinematic ways. Read more>>

Michael De Brito

Yes, I’ve been able to earn a living from my creative work, though it certainly wasn’t that way from the start. It’s been a gradual evolution, shaped by persistence, experimentation, and a deep commitment to the work itself. From early on, I stayed focused on my vision and dedicated myself to developing a strong, authentic body of work. While still in my MFA program, I began showing with a gallery—an important early milestone that offered exposure, helped build a collector base, and affirmed the direction I was pursuing. I committed to producing consistent, evolving work in order to grow within the gallery world and maintain momentum in that space. Read more>>

Niki Jones

I started my journey as a creative business owner nearly 15 years ago. At the time, I was working full time and in grad school, on track to become a certified special educator—what I thought would be my forever career. Then one Christmas, I got a DSLR, and everything changed. I quickly fell in love with photography, and from that point on, the trajectory of my life started to shift. Read more>>

Trap Bob

Being able to make a full-time living from creative work felt like an experiment for me. When I realized I wanted to be an artist, I just felt so liberated from what I felt was the lie that I was living. At the time, I had been working toward my Marketing degree and as much as I enjoyed studying business, I knew I didn’t want a traditional marketing job. After graduating and beginning to explore art more on my own time, I saw the many ways that my Marketing degree could be of use, specifically in marketing my work and running my own business. Read more>>

Elias Hendricks

Yes, I’ve been able to earn a full-time living from my creative work, but the journey wasn’t instant—it was built step by step through performance, reinvention, and business-minded strategy. I began performing professionally at 19, making my opera debut in Italy and later performing in more than 20 operatic productions and international musical theater tours, including The Lion King and Motown the Musical. As the founder of Vox Fortura—semi-finalists on Britain’s Got Talent—I gained a global audience and a deeper understanding of how to package artistry for the world stage. Read more>>

Evan Dorian

I’ve been fortunate enough to earn a full-time living from my creative work, but it definitely didn’t happen overnight. The journey has been anything but linear. In the early days, I was juggling side gigs, taking on projects that paid the bills while dreaming about the kind of work I wanted to be doing. The turning point came when I shifted my focus from just surviving to actually building something sustainable. I started Dorian Media Group with the intention of creating high-quality, storytelling-driven content for brands—but also with a long-term vision of growing it into a full-service creative agency. Read more>>

Jennifer Denton

Yes — this year actually marks 20 years since I officially started my photography business. In the beginning, I was a young mom looking for a creative outlet. I had always had a gift for photography and connecting with people, and someone close to me encouraged me to turn that passion into something more. That nudge led me to pursue certifications, invest in education, and commit to building a real business — not just being “another mom with a camera,” as the saying goes. Read more>>

Meliss Fabri

Turning my passion for photography into a full-time career has been a journey—one that didn’t happen overnight. When I first started, I was completely lost as to how to organize my time and get things done, squeezing in sessions on weekends, editing during nap times or late at night. I was constantly wondering if I was really good enough to make this my career. Read more>>

Jamie Pratt

I’ve been earning a full-time living from my business since 2018. I had graduated college in 2017 and worked part-time in music and youth ministry at the church I was attending for the following year. I honestly never expected to pursue full-time photography, but as I was applying for jobs in my field, a few months in I realized I was really happy making ends meet with photography and there was no reason for me to try and “get a real job.” I had already built a business and it was providing everything that I needed for me and was a way to connect with my community. Read more>>

Goldyn Gambit

As of right now I haven’t been able to earn full time living off of my creative endeavors. However I am in a transitional period of attempting to! Basically spending more time on generating income from my music, live performances, public speaking fees when I curate mental health expos, social media consulting exc. it’s a lot easier now that I’m established locally in Michigan so I do have a variety of clients I work with, from other musicians to some of the biggest venues here! If I had the knowledge I have now years ago I would be much further ahead, but I’m still grateful for my lifestyle currently. Read more>>

Sung Kim

Yes, I’ve been fortunate to make a living through creativity, but it’s come with compromises – especially in terms of the scope of work I’ve been able to take on. The definition of what it means to be a “professional sculptor” had to expand when I was young. Read more>>

Nana Sarfo

Yes, I have. With full time content creation, I was able to build a platform with over 250K across my social platforms. I have been able to monetize It took years of learning, failing, and figuring things out on my own to turn this into something sustainable. The growth was slow at times, but every step built on the one before it. If I had known how important delegation, rest, and proper systems were early on, I probably could’ve sped up the process. But I don’t regret the pace. It gave me the skills, confidence, and experience I rely on now. Read more>>

Colleen Eakins

Yes, I’ve been able to earn a full-time living from my creative work, but it didn’t happen overnight. It took time, hustle, and a lot of learning along the way. Read more>>

Brenda Chen

Yes, I do earn a full-time living from my creative work. Back in college, my main goal was to make sure I graduated with a job lined up so that I could move out of my parent’s house. I was particularly fascinated by virtual and augmented reality and how I could merge art with technology to create immersive experiences. That passion, paired with my desire to be independent, led me to dedicate all my free time to building personal projects outside of school. Once I finished those projects, I started exhibiting them at various game and tech conventions like Indiecade and VRLA. This helped me land internships and, eventually, a full-time job after graduation. Read more>>

Shivali Chauhan

Yes, I’ve been fortunate to earn a full-time living from my creative work.
But it definitely wasn’t like that from day one. My journey began quite simply—with a desire to decorate my own space and learn something new. That’s when I discovered dot mandala and mandala art. What started as a personal creative outlet quickly turned into a deep passion. Read more>>

Eddie Mayhew

It definitely felt like a risky move to leave my previous job as an engineer, but we (my wife and I) saved and planned for a couple years of unpredictable income as I got my footing. Sales were slow at first while I gained an audience, mostly through word of mouth. Probably the most recognizable milestones were the time periods where I knew I had work that would sell, I recall my first week where I knew how much I would make, then my first month, and now I have a reasonable sense of job security. Read more>>

Mikealis Alan

I have been a songwriter and performing artist for about 20 years now. When first starting out MySpace was the big platform and there was not many other options such as Spotify to really get your music out there and make money from it. I was able to quickly find my niche as a rapper creating songs over underground house music and started playing free shows at house parties around local colleges and began to get booked as an opening act for artist’s such as Action Bronson and Shwayze. Even though I was not getting paid at the moment I was able to become comfortable in front of crowd’s and really fell in love with the energy you get from these type of shows. I began to get sponsorships from large clothing brands and opportunities that enabled me to move to Atlanta, New York City and Los Angeles. Read more>>

George Stevens

I’m really fortunate to earn my living through creative work, via my design business and as a musician. I worked at a publishing house for more than a decade before founding my design practice in 2019. Since then, I’ve worked on hundreds of projects and built a worldwide client base, growing the business each year and forging many strategic partnerships that feed my pipeline. And the way I made this happen was to be relentless on a couple of fronts: exploring opportunities without hesitation, consistently managing my business functions, and ensuring my clients have a great experience. Read more>>

Colton Smith

It should go without saying, it is HARD to earn a full time living from creative work alone being any kind of artist, not just an actor. Contract work is always a competition, and searching for the next one is often a job in and of itself. The phrase “Actors don’twork that pays, they work FOR work that pays” comes to mind for me, and that holds true now and forever, I’m sure. But man oh man, when that certain project comes around that is fulfilling both creatively and financially, I would argue it makes it all worth it. Read more>>

Augustin Huffman

For me, it all started at college, where I was able to meet other filmmakers and make friends with the people I was doing school projects with. As someone who grew up in Ohio and didn’t know that many likeminded people growing up, it was important that I went to film school just to meet more people (as well as gaining technical knowledge). Read more>>

Andrew Garza

I am fortunate enough to have made a significant amount of money from my creative work. In 2024, I touched 6 figures for the first time in my life. This was a milestone and a huge boost to my confidence. Read more>>

Dan Knepper

After 25 years teaching Art, I quit to become a full-time artist. They tore down the school I’d been in and asked me to do an 8’x32′ mural in the new school building. The income from the mural helped get me started. Dayton Children’s Hospital then asked me to do large, (usually 36×36,) light-hearted images for the hospital. (They continued to ask and now have over 60.) I had an international win pretty quickly and used it to I was to get into a gallery quickly and rolled that into 2 more. My first piece in the C.M. Russell Live Auction sold to John Coors and I think being in his collection helped open doors. I continue to expand the shows and auctions selling my work. Read more>>