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53 per cent of the sculptors teach, 32 per cent of the painters and only 6 per cent of the sculptors do commercial art, and only 2 per cent of the painters and 3 per cent of the sculptors have an independent income. Other jobs to which artists turn include framing, apartment management, beauty shop management, museum curatorships, production, and printing. I quote these to indicate the economic pressure under which our artists work, all of which means that they must devote creative time and energies to non-creative jobs. This involves a great cultural loss to the nation, both now and in the future.

Against this background of economic insecurity, Artists Equity Association was formed solely to help artists economically, and you may be interested to know specifically just how it is accomplishing its ends. Several years ago the fellows of Saybrook College at Yale University commissioned a portrait by an artist who subsequently became a member of Equity. Through misunderstandings, changes in personnel, and an incomplete contract, the artist had received no payment of any kind from the College when he brought the matter to the attention of Equity. Equity was able to effect a satisfactory settlement by the payment of $1,000 to the artist and the return of the portrait. Inasmuch as Equity charges no commissions to its members for such collections, the settlement was net.

Similarly, Equity was able to recover over fifty works of art recently for nearly as many artists, not all of them