10th Biennial ACSPRI Social Science Methodology Conference in conjunction with the Australian Social Network Analysis Conference (ASNAC)

A career in the visual arts is personally fulfilling but incredibly challenging to sustain. In Australia, many artists struggle to receive sufficient income from their practice alone. Artists have adapted their work lives to meet these challenges through engaging in a portfolio career that embraces many entrepreneurial qualities.
Working as freelance, self-employed and micro business owners, artists operate within a network of people and organisations that provide various forms of support. Professional networks and the relationships within them have long been identified as critical to the success of any entrepreneur, including artists, and their ability to sustain their career. As such, much work has been undertaken in the field of business research to understand the role of business networks and their implications on business success. However, the contemporary networks of the Australian art market remain overlooked, particularly in terms of their relational and co-constructed nature.
This ongoing study therefore responds to this knowledge gap and asks: what are the ways in which the Australian visual arts ecosystem supports artists to sustain their practice? As the study seeks to understand the relationships that support artists' careers, this is best explored through Social Network Analysis (SNA) and a mixed-method research design. Given the importance of networks within the Creative and Cultural Industries (CCI), SNA is particularly well suited to describing the functions of the network and to analysing and exploring the network in a structured and systematic way (Swords 2022). Studies using SNA in the CCI have produced the most significant results (de Bernard 2022) when approached with a mixed-method design. Sequential Explanatory Mixed Methods research (Creswell and Plano Clark 2018) allows the researcher to collect both quantitative data and human experience, which can be combined to elicit a deeper understanding of the research problem. Using mixed methods can solve the problem of abstraction, as quantitative measures of the network often require further explanation (Swords 2022). In this project, quantitative research is supplemented by qualitative methods in the form of interviews to provide deeper contextual understanding. This research also contributes to SNA as it demonstrates how mixed method research can be combined with SNA to move beyond describing the network to explaining why the structure and relationships matter to the sustainability of individual careers. This research sits at the intersection of social network science, cultural policy studies, entrepreneurship research, and arts practice showing how relational dynamics and networks can enable or constrain careers.
This research has broad significance to the Australian visual arts ecosystem. A map of the visual art ecosystem which identifies the impactful networks may help artists at all stages of their career navigate challenges and sustain their practice. This short video is of interest to researchers from other creative fields as this method may be replicated in their own disciplines. Beyond the CCI, scholars interested in workforce precarity, labour markets and sustainable careers may find this perspective useful. This research also has implications for policymakers and funding bodies seeking to support a more sustainable and resilient visual arts sector.