[Ansteorra] The Cost of Time

[julie mcknight]

Waving to all my friends back home.......
 
Mistress Mara MacNaughton here, 
So some remember me some don't, but I felt I just had to respond.  This is not a problem that is limited to the SCA.  As the owner of my own studio I hear comments regularly like "oh I could do that" or "how much would you really charge for that piece".  I have found that when someone actually comes to my studio and takes a class do I hear "oh, its harder than it looks".  Rarely do we look at art or a helm or a shield that someone has made and think that every piece was touched by thier hand, that thier time is part of the art.  So thank you for posting as an artist I so appreciated it......
 
Mara

"Leap and the net will appear"

--- On Thu, 7/23/09, Jean Paul de Sens <jeanpauldesens at gmail.com> wrote:


From: Jean Paul de Sens <jeanpauldesens at gmail.com>
Subject: [Ansteorra] The Cost of Time
To: "Kingdom of Ansteorra - SCA, Inc." <ansteorra at lists.ansteorra.org>
Date: Thursday, July 23, 2009, 4:44 PM


The recent shield discussion, and the responses to the costs, has just
reinforced my belief that we (the SCA) and society in general have forgot
how much it costs to do *one* of an object.
Case in point, that shield probably has around $40-$50 of materials (glue,
wood, hose, maybe hidden u-channel, rope, bolts, nuts,primer, paint, finish
coat).
It also has (if I had to bet) around 20 hours of labor (cut shield,
laminate, sand, prime, outline pattern, paint, clear coat).

So if I were to pay some guy $10 per hour to do this, it would cost me
around $250 to do this shield.

If I had to run a business doing this, where I had to pay for construction
space, taxes, perhaps even health, insurance, etc etc, well, that $10 per
hour worker will cost around $25/hour.

Now the cost of that custom shield goes to $550.

Often, I feel that we in the SCA don't appreciate the monetary value of the
art works that people make.  The scrolls on our walls, the clothes, the
weapons, shields, what have you, are custom made works of art, and when we
dismiss the price on something as "too high" and "not worth that" we
diminish the effort of the artist.

I don't know who made that shield.  I know that someone probably put a lot
of energy, money, and effort into it, and might be a bit offended at some of
the comments made.

I know of many generous artisans in our kingdom and our game, who donate
work and craft and art so selflessly that is astounds me.  Let us make sure
that we keep in mind both the spiritual and the monetary value of their
work, and thank them accordingly.

My apologies for rambling, but this issue always bothers me a bit.

JP

Qui mieux fait, mieux vault.
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