By Vannie Gama
The text below is the prelude of my Patreon release. I decided to share the exact first publication there, even though the tone is quite different from the one expressed on this official website. There will be a official publication soon.
That said, this Patreon has a very specific and realistic function: for me to be able to avoid doing what nearly everyone unfortunately has to do, that is, to rely on ads and very commercial creations to pay their bills. We do make money out of our craft, as artists, researchers, and writers. But it is, obviously, a seasonal thing, unless, if you’re not in your beautiful late 40s collecting passive income from what you have created, or, anyway, when you can rely on not depending exclusively on each sale. Well, I have been doing the ”independent but honest art” for 10 years now. I’m 28 right now, on 25th December 2025. As you can imagine, some fame comes first, but money, however, does not, and I was never willing to do commercial art or to bend myself to creating in a rhythm that would harm the depth of my work, despite the media. This always causes me problems. For the last few years, I found some balance between my art studio, my amazing private art collectors, and academia.
But, I am now living in Canada, and all that stability was absolutely shaken by the whole ” living in Canadian dollars and being again, completely unknown” in terms of what would always have my back: private art collectors. As you all know, I do exhibit regularly in Europe and the UK, but this does not mean having an income out of it. I need time to create, and every year this becomes even more true. On Patreon, I can have a chance to present to you the processes of most of my work, set events together that are less formal workshops, more in the sense of building community “elsewhere”.
Also, to worsen things (my favourite hobby), I became a low-tech person, and the only social media that you can find me is TikTok, where I post once every hundred years, and YouTube, where posts are out every two hundred years. It is awful to bullshit people with ads and treat art, ecology, knowledge, and community (our queer community) as “constant content” in the urge of consumerism. If we are going to do any sort of revolution or try any meaningful resilience in such systemic ruins, trying to minimize, each person on their way, the effects of a very rooted and anxiogenic predatory capitalism, places where we can reach specific things about each other, are part of these actions. By the way, I just decided to do it because I follow independent creators that inspired me to do so, such as the journalist Leeja Miller and the artist Kat Blaque – there are thousands of people who are doing meaningful work that apparently find support in here, Patreon, to do so. Now I’m joining this community, and hopefully, I will be able to get closer to you all, in this way less erudite way. Lighter and louder, even more queer. Let’s see how these transform us all.
Thank you for your perception,
Vannie Gama.
(and Carina, the cat muse[ yes, he came with me to Canada, of course!]).
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