This article seems to be claiming that somehow artists in the past got more money than artists now, and that simply is not true.<p>It’s survivor bias - we hear about these well funded artists <i>because</i> they were well funded. Other artists in the past could earn a living by doing portraits, etc to pay the bills - if they got lucky and became successful <i>then</i> they could do things outside of the norms. Nowadays the job of portraits, etc has been largely taken over by photographers, who use that to pay bills.<p>There has not been a historical period where just anybody could decide “i want to be an artist”, and then do just that and yet have enough money to pay bills, etc