Patron

Have you ever dreamed that one day you too would be a "Patron of The Arts"? In said dream you would walk around all day wearing a monocle and top hat exclaiming "My, my how Kafkaesque" and polite laughter would ensue. Alas this dream is significantly more exciting in my head. In real life I rush to the lobby during intermission, claim a seat to relieve my aching feet (Pro tip: standing room only tickets at a three hour opera is a bad idea) and, after carefully counting out enough money for the bus home, debate if a 4 oz plastic cup of wine is worth possibly losing your seat to that blue hair staring at you from behind her walker. Granted you are likely to be able to dash to the bar and back before she can manage to shuffle her way across the room. But the danger still exists that morality may stand in the way of knocking her down to regain your cushioned butt surface.

How else can one support the arts? Preferably from the comfort of your own multi-seat home. Enter kickstarter.com where artists and the like can propose a project and the crowd/world/internet/your mom can decide whether they would like to fund your project. You set a goal and a deadline. If you manage to garner enough pledges to meet your goal before the deadline your project is funded! It's an all or nothing system. So if only your mom pledged and you never make it to that $5k goal then no one gets charged and your art is deemed lacking. Ok, perhaps judgement isn't really made but the conclusion is the same. Payments are handled through Amazon and not the artist. So no worries that your information is going to some random stranger in Portland that likes to put birds on things and call it art.

I've funded two successful projects so far and I think it's awesome. By the way, generally you get something back for your investment. So it's not like your totally throwing money out into the world.


My friend Nathan Boucher is currently funding a small indie comic called Adventure is Out There. Wherein his girlfriend and him will go to New York City find adventure and fun, write and illustrate a comic and sell it on Etsy. There are different levels of funding but the on I chose is the $20 level that get's you:

You will receive a hand crafted portrait of you in NYC doing something famous that will be included at the back of the final book. For instance: climbing the Empire State Building, caught in a New Years Eve celebration in Time Square, as a taxi driver in a yellow cab.

How sweet is that?! Big plus I love both Nathan and Meagan's drawing style so I look forward to it. They've met their goal already but feel free to contribute so many more adventures can be sought.