At the same time, corporations have begun to directly fund the artists themselves. As Samantha Culp wrote for The Atlantic in 2018, big global brands like Red Bull and Pepsi have stepped into fulfill the roles that wealthy patrons once used to fulfill. Well-known carmakers, shoe brands, soft drink conglomerates, and fashion houses have given artists lucrative money for branded work. For years now, some of the largest tech companies in the world have operated artist residencies. Google, one of the biggest proponents of machine learning, is funding artists to work with the technology. There are certainly moral and ethical quandaries to consider here, too—should an artist take money from a brand that’s been known to use child labour, or facilitated genocide in Myanmar?—but also valid concerns about the kinds of art that can and can’t be made with corporate money, and the kind of risks an artist can take. “It’s true that most branded projects don’t allow artists to approach sensitive topics such as sex, violence, or political critique—or meta-critique of the brand itself,” writes Culp.

There are certainly advantages and benefits to attaching one’s self to brand—financial, certainly, but access to resources, audience, and the heightened profile the relationship may bring. But not everyone can or should have to rely on corporate benevolence to make a living, nor should that be the primary source of income on which art institutions survive. We’re long overdue for a collective reckoning: a realization that artists are as much a part of a healthy society as anyone else, and that supporting their work is an indisputable public good. Some may still choose corporate patronage. But there should be other sustainable models for artists—for all workers, really—to make a comfortable living on their own terms, too.