>>24704602
Can you imagine being constantly monitored by an authoritarian government which actively hates you and your entire people, seeking your death and ruin with obsessive and calculating malice?
The artist, in many ways, is free. An artist that makes something of his skills and wins bread for his table. An artist does not need to be perfect, and an artist must make a compromise for the realities of earning his bread, but the artist is generally free in mind and spirit.
Rich? Often, no. But free. In the act of creation, self-expression, the mind is set free.