Revenues, direct impact on GDP, and jobs in the visual arts in 2023
Part 3 of my macro-economic analysis of national data from 2012 to 2023
If you’re new to this list, welcome! Here is a recap of what I’ve been up to lately (also useful for those who haven’t been paying close attention) …
In recent posts, I’ve examined macroeconomic indicators for the overall cultural sector and the arts – as I phrased it, an imperfect and partial measurement of the arts.
As I noted in last week’s post on the arts, the visual arts are the component with the highest revenues. Yes, higher than film & TV.
What do I mean by “visual arts”?
Today’s post focuses on the visual arts, with key economic indicators in 2023 and trends since 2012. The visual arts (my combination, not from Statistics Canada) include specific subdomains in Statistics Canada data:
Crafts
Photography
Original visual art
Art reproductions
Note that this conception of the visual arts excludes separate subdomains for architecture, advertising, and design. Also, any video-related artworks would likely be captured as film and video products, not visual arts ones.
As is the case with every other grouping, two broad and important categories are excluded from the statistics:
All government-owned arts venues, funding, and support organizations, which are included in the very broad category of “governance, funding, and professional support”
Education and training
As I’ve noted before, because of these exclusions, today’s statistics should be considered a minimum measurement of revenues, impacts, and jobs in the visual arts.
Three key economic indicators are included:
Output (essentially an estimate of total revenues)
Direct impact on Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
Jobs
I analyze the output and GDP statistics in three ways: 1) as published by Statistics Canada; 2) adjusted for inflation; and 3) adjusted for both inflation and population growth.
Other notes to keep in mind, which are mandatory if you haven’t read my previous economic posts, are at the end of this article.
$14 billion in revenues in 2023
Total revenues in the visual arts, including crafts and photography, were $14.0 billion in 2023. As I noted last week, the visual arts account for 41% of all revenues in my admittedly imperfect measurement of the arts.
Today’s first graph provides a breakdown of output (total revenues) in areas that I’ve included in the visual arts. Crafts represent by far the largest share of revenues in the visual arts in 2023: $11.3 billion, or 80%. Next is photography, with $2.2 billion in revenues (15%). The other two areas represent much smaller shares of total revenues: original visual art ($495 million, or 4%) and art reproductions ($99 million, or 0.7%). Expressed in billions, these last two are $0.5 billion for original visual art and $0.1 billion for art reproductions.
In a statistical coincidence, crafts represent 80% of the overall revenues in the visual arts, and craft revenues grew by 80% since 2012 (before adjustments for inflation and population growth). Both are impressive figures.
Craft revenues are equal to revenues in film and video in 2023 (which also round to $11.3 billion and will be the topic of next week’s post). However, there’s a big caveat to this comparison: film and TV revenues in 2023 were deeply affected by the strikes by writers and actors in the U.S.
“Wow, crafts are so large. I had no idea. Can you explain this, Kelly?”
Honestly, I don’t have a great answer for this question. I think that crafts are so large partly because the definition is fairly broad and maybe because crafts are that important to the (arts) economy.
The 2011 Canadian Framework for Culture Statistics set out the definition of crafts that is followed to this day:
Crafts are original artisanal products that have been "produced by artisans, either completely by hand or with the help of hand-tools, or even mechanical means, as long as the direct manual contribution of the artisan remains the most substantial component of the finished product" (UNESCO and ITC 1997, p. 6). Crafts include a wide range of produced goods, ranging from blown glass, jewellery, and carvings to tapestries, artisan-produced paper, weavings, and ceramics. They can be produced in a wide variety of materials such as fibre, leather, metal, pottery, textiles, wood, or glass and may be used for functional or decorative purposes.
The rest of this article offers measurements of changes in the (overall) visual arts economy between 2012 and 2023.