Should I create what I love or what the market wants?

The most sustainable approach is to start with market demand and work backwards, while staying authentic to what you actually care about. Rather than creating whatever you want and hoping it sells, identify passionate audiences with existing demand, then create work for them that you genuinely connect with. This isn’t about being inauthentic—it’s about finding the intersection between what you care about and what people actually want to buy. Ask yourself: what can I create once and sell many times? What audiences am I genuinely part of or passionate about? Then create for those groups.

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Asked by artists balancing creativity with commerce · Answered by Patrick Shanahan and Megh Knappenberger · art-marketing-podcast · 2022-06-11