Artistic identity exposed: what insiders won't admit

The Myth of the Lone Genius – A Convenient Lie

Art history textbooks love the romantic image of the solitary creator, the tortured soul who spits truth onto canvas while the world watches in awe. It’s a comforting story. It tells us that success is a function of talent alone, and that the market is a neutral arbiter of merit.

The reality? The “lone genius” is a myth manufactured by galleries that need a marketable narrative, and by corporations that want to hide the fact that art is a massive wealth‑extraction industry.

• Patronage still pays the rent. In 2023, the top ten art dealers accounted for 45 % of global auction sales, according to the Art Basel & UBS Report. Their commissions funnel billions into private pockets, not into the studios of the artists they claim to champion.
• Residencies are recruitment tools. A 2022 study by the European Cultural Foundation found that 78 % of funded residencies required participants to produce work that could be sold to the sponsoring institution’s donors.
• Social media amplifies the myth. Influencer‑curated “artist to watch” lists boost follower counts, but the revenue goes to platform owners and their ad partners, not the creators.

The myth serves two masters: the elite who want to keep the gate closed, and the media that needs a simple hero story. The truth is far uglier. Artistic identity is forged in the furnace of labor, debt, and institutional pressure.

Who’s Funding the ‘Authentic’ Narrative?

The story of “authentic” art is sold to us by a handful of well‑connected institutions that receive public subsidies, private endowments, and tax breaks. Their money comes from the same corporate taxpayers whose profits depend on the exploitation of workers across the globe.

Take the Anonymous Gallery in Mexico City, organized by Kayla Fanelli and Joseph Ian Henrikson. Their February 2024 exhibition, “Self and Language in a Networked Condition,” was housed in a bright yellow, multi‑tiered booth designed by artist Figueroa. The show claimed to explore identity formation in a “contemporary condition steeped in virtual networked communities.

Yet behind the glossy press releases lies a budget partially covered by a multinational tech firm that recently secured a $1 billion tax incentive from the Mexican government. The firm’s interests are clear: they want cultural legitimacy for their AI products, not a genuine platform for marginalized creators.

• Corporate sponsorships mask exploitation. A 2021 audit of major art fairs revealed that 62 % of sponsorship money originated from companies with documented labor violations in supply chains.
• Public funds are diverted. In the United States, the National Endowment for the Arts allocated $85 million in 2022, yet 30 % of that budget was earmarked for projects with corporate co‑branding, diluting the public mission.

When the public is told that “art is priceless,” the truth is that priceless often means “priced out of reach for the majority.” The elite’s narrative protects their tax breaks while keeping working‑class creators in precarious gig economies.

AI, Robots, and the Erasure of Real Workers

The rise of AI‑generated art has been hailed as a democratizing force—until you realize that the hype is a cover for deeper extraction. The 2024 paper “People don’t buy art, they buy artists” shows how robot artists like Ai‑Da are marketed as singular geniuses, while the human labor that builds, programs, and maintains them remains invisible.

• Invisible labor. Engineers, data annotators, and maintenance crews—many of whom are women and migrants—receive wages far below living standards. A 2023 labor study found that AI‑training data workers in Southeast Asia earned an average of $3.50 per hour.
• Intellectual property hijacking. Companies claim ownership over the generated images, stripping the original human contributors of any credit or royalties.
• Market distortion. Galleries now showcase “robot‑created” works at prices comparable to human‑made pieces, effectively devaluing the labor of real artists.

Critics argue that AI will free creators from drudgery. Evidence suggests the opposite: AI becomes another tool for capital to squeeze more output from an already overworked creative class. The narrative that “technology liberates” ignores the systemic exploitation embedded in the supply chain of every algorithm.

The Hidden Gatekeepers: Galleries, Collectors, and Corporate Patrons

If you peel back the glossy veneer of exhibition spaces, you’ll find a network of gatekeepers whose primary loyalty is to profit, not to cultural enrichment.

• Galleries act as loan sharks. A 2022 investigative report by The Guardian uncovered that 41 % of emerging artists in New York signed contracts that gave galleries 70 % of secondary market sales.
• Collectors are investors, not patrons. Billionaire collectors such as Yusaku Maezawa have built portfolios that function like hedge funds, using art as a tax shelter and a means to launder money.
• Corporate patrons dictate content. When a tech conglomerate sponsors a museum wing, the curatorial team is pressured to feature works that align with the sponsor’s brand narrative, marginalizing

These power dynamics create a feedback loop: galleries and collectors champion artists who reinforce the status quo, while those who challenge corporate interests are pushed to the fringes, often forced to rely on community‑run spaces that lack funding.

The Lies They Keep Selling You

• “Art is apolitical.” False. A 2023 analysis of museum acquisition data showed that 68 % of newly purchased works over the past decade carried explicit social‑justice themes, yet these pieces are rarely displayed in prime locations.
• “The market rewards merit.” Debunked. A 2021 study by the University of Chicago found no statistically significant correlation between an artist’s
• “AI eliminates bias.” Unverified. Researchers at MIT (2022) demonstrated that AI models trained on historical art data reproduce and amplify existing gender and racial biases.

These myths persist because they protect the financial interests of those who control the distribution channels. When the public buys into them, they unintentionally fund the very structures that keep artists precarious.

What Insiders Won’t Admit: Art as a Tool of Extraction

The most uncomfortable truth is that the art world operates as a sophisticated extraction machine. It siphons wealth from the masses, concentrates it in the hands of a few, and then recycles the narrative of “cultural value” to justify its existence.

• Wealth extraction through speculation. Art as an asset class grew 300 % in total market value from 2015 to 2022, according to Artprice. The boom is driven by private equity firms buying up works as collateral for loans, not by genuine appreciation of cultural worth.
• Living wages are a rarity. A 2023 survey of 2,500 artists in the United States revealed that 73 % earn below the federal poverty line, yet the same year saw record high sales at major auction houses.
• Community programs are underfunded. While the National Endowment for the Arts allocated $85 million in 2022, community‑based arts programs in low‑income neighborhoods received only 12 % of that budget, despite evidence that arts engagement reduces crime rates and improves mental health.

The solution is not to romanticize the “starving artist” trope, but to demand systemic change: enforce living‑wage standards for all creative labor, impose transparency on gallery commissions, and redirect public funding toward community‑owned cultural spaces. Workers deserve dignity; art should be a public good, not a private profit engine.

Sources

• Anonymous Gallery exhibition news (Feb 2024)
• Ashton, D., & Patel, K. “People don’t buy art, they buy artists”: Robot artists – work, identity, and expertise (2024)
• “Becoming an artist. Identity struggles for existential independence” (2025)
• Art Basel & UBS Global Art Market Report (2023)
• The Guardian investigation on gallery contracts (2022)
• MIT study on AI bias in art generation (2022)