Painter in 100: The Fayum mummy portraits

Do you need to go to art school to become a painter? No — painting has no license anywhere, and history is full of successful painters who trained outside schools: Vincent van Gogh was largely self-taught, and China's Qi Baishi learned by copying a borrowed painting manual by lamplight. But most gallery-represented painters today hold a BFA or MFA, and university teaching posts — the trade's steadiest salary — effectively require an MFA.

How do painters actually make money? What does a gallery do, and what cut does it take? The standard commercial-gallery split is 50 percent of each sale, worldwide. In exchange the gallery pays for exhibition space, openings, art-fair booths that can cost tens of thousands of dollars, promotion, and — most valuably — access to its collector list. Most galleries take work on consignment rather than buying it, so the painter is paid only when a piece actually sells.

How long does it take to learn to paint well? Classical ateliers budget three to four years of full-time drawing and painting to reach professional competence, roughly matching a BFA. A recognizable personal voice usually takes another decade of sustained studio work. Hokusai, at 75, wrote that nothing he made before 70 was worth counting — an exaggeration, but one working painters tend to quote with a straight face.