Ah, the starving artist. The ever-nagging myth, which in our austere times is, perhaps, not a myth at all. The artist, unable to pay rent in cash, ventures out to exchange her art for a roof over her head.

This performance explores the precarity artists so often face when coming from a non-privileged background. Our career is seen as little more than a hobby we will give up. A tale as old as time of art being the rich man’s playground. “Will pay in art” explores the value of labour, cash, and art as a commodity.

Will we ever see the artist as a worker?
I sure fucking hope so.

Photography by Oishi Dutta