While I don't live on the road, I OFTEN see people post on tiny house or homesteading pages asking "How can we make a living while living on the road or off grid"? Well, I feel there are a TON of ways to do it, and perhaps I'll get into that in another post. Again, I don't live off the road, nor off grid, but I do make a good deal of my living from "nothing"- repurposing the discarded waste of others and making it into art, fixing some of these items, flipping them, and so on. All of this can be done with minimal materials, with limited space, and its fun! Furthermore, these flat art items wouldn't take up much space (especially smaller pieces) in your tiny home, RV, or cabin. Canvases don't have to be frame either, you can simply paint them and roll them for storage or shipping if you are worried about space.
Here's one I recently found/did. Its a bit more on the experimental/urban/weird side....
So lesson ONE- if you have an inkling of artistic ability, considering rescuing some of those "wine and paint night" monstrosities you find curbside on trash day, and painting over them. You can then use this art for your own home decor, or possibly sell it (which I've done dozens upon dozens of times now). In fact I just made a huge graffiti piece that was shipped all the way to Miami to reside in a VERY swanky oceanfront apartment. This shipping ALONE was $250- which the buyer was fine with. Apparently they REALLY wanted this piece- which was flattering as heck, and profitable.
But back on track...
SOME of the art you find might actually be cool and/or fine as is, so before you paint over whatever, do consider its value as it already exists (and DEFINITELY look up artist names if the pieces are originals!!!). I've sold many pieces this way without having to do ANYTHING to them at all. Posting this type art on social media will also help with sales, but don't overlook old-school approaches. About once or twice a year I will rent a booth at a flea market and display some of my larger pieces there. These pieces (wildly colorful) are what I call "eye bait"- they are distracting/attention grabbing and draw people in out of curiosity. My intent often isn't even to sell these pieces, but to lure people in, who then end up buying the other junk I have laying around. Getting people to your booth is half the battle. These art pieces have also served as networking pieces too in that they frequently result in side jobs for me from the people that see them (graffiti mural work in a house, selling a few paintings to tv shows as props, and so forth- all connections that DID actually happen as a flea market. I even had a couple buy a piece of me at a flea, then contact me later on to make two more custom paintings for their home.
So give it a whirl. Even if they never sell, its STILL a lot of fun and there are worse things you could do with your time.
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