What Is An Artist?

An artist can be many things but it is the way in which the artist is represented that is most important. An artist's portrayal to the people can be crucial for the success of the artist, identifying exactly what that artist stands for and what they can bring to the music industry.

Ed Sheeran's representation as an artist is a prime example of texts being used to create an image

Artists can be depicted through texts, these texts can range from their general appearance to adverts, magazine articles, music videos, album covers and so on. Through these texts what the artist tries to create is an image, this is what is used to form the artist. From this people may then attach the artist to a particular genre of music such as Thrash Metal or Indie. An artists image can also be presented through their songs and the lyrics behind them. Messages artist's convey in some of there songs can be very important in solidifying, creating and even re-creating there image, an example of this would be Eminem's - Not Afraid music video. However, artist's are not stand alone texts in relation to there full media production. Instead influential factors such as image and lyrics as well as sound all combine to form texts. It may even be argued that how all of this is presented to the music industry and beyond is even more important that the music itself.

It is important to understand the concept of artists being manipulated through texts as previously mentioned it can be very significant in regards to the actual success of the artist and his or her's career respectively. It also important for me to understand what an artist is as I will dealing with them all throughout my coursework and will eventually be creating my own.