Colin Sheridan: Our funding model needs to change — or else we lose the art mavericks

The Basic Income for the Arts pilot scheme is an acknowledgment that artistic work has intrinsic value, even when it is not immediately profitable. But is it structured in the right way?

David Kitt is what musicians often call 'an artist’s artist'. File photo: PLAY Creative Agency

You know the type of artist you are about to read about. They are not famous enough to be mythologised, not commercial enough to be commodified, and not obscure enough to disappear entirely. 

They exist in that uneasy middle ground — admired deeply by those who know, but largely invisible to the systems that decide who gets to keep creating and who quietly stops. You think about them, and wonder how do they get mortgage approval.