Getting By - This Ain't no Holiday Inn: Down and Out at the Chelsea Hotel 1980-1995 - page 135

CHAPTER 5

Getting By

Perhaps I would have to take a job—a most depressing thought.
— HENRY MILLER, The Air-Conditioned Nightmare
The thorny predicament of making a living has always dogged Bohemian artists. The

Beat poet-turned-affluent-entrepreneur Lawrence Ferlinghetti defined Bohemians as
“nonconformists who don't lead a nine-to-five life.” 79 Some Bohemians don't want
thenine-to-fivelifebecausetheyfindittooconstricting,othersbecausethey'relazy,
and still others because they haven't the confidence to enter the mainstream life of working
foraliving.ThisiswhyStanleyBardwassuchagodsendtoartists.ButFerlinghettifailedto
mentionthemainreasonwhyBohemian artistsdon'twantafull-time job:theyalreadyhave
one.
For artists to improve at their craft and be successful, they have to work at their art for
hourseveryday.Havingafull-time job,then,meanshavingtwojobs,notalifemanywould
relish. Most of us average full-time drones come home tired from our full day's work. To
begin our second job with a pen, a paintbrush, a guitar or a camera requires concentration
and energy, two resources that day jobs have a way of devouring. It's hard enough to keep
on top of life's quotidian routines: laundry, groceries and housework. And the fact that most
aspiring artists make little ornomoney from their creative workrunsthem through a mill of
self-doubt, frustration and depression. After a hard day at the job, it's easier to crack a beer
and watch TV than inspire yourself to make art.
One option for artists is to work half-time at their day jobs and half-time at their real
vocations, theirart.Thisisalsoeasier saidthandone.Mosthalf-time workpayspeanuts,re-
legating artists to poverty, and here they are again, back to being starving Bohemian artists.
ThisiswhytheChelsea Hotel, withStanley Bardatthehelm, provedsoinvaluable. Hekept
his rooms affordable enough for artists who had committed themselves to Mistress Poverty,
for a while at least, as they worked at making it big.
Even the more well-known and accomplished artists like the painter and printmaker
Bernard Childs didn't have much money.

JUDITH CHILDS
It was a funny thing, because my husband Bernard was a really distinguished
artist—certainly known to the cognoscenti —but we never made a whole lot of
money. We survived—we lived on what he made—but it takes years for this stuff
to fall together. Suddenly, it becomes the time when something catches on. We