The link between artists and madness began in a flattering vein in ancient Greece. Plato identified inspiration as a kind of divine frenzy. Like the insane, artists have a fervid imagination that isn't trammelled by reason but works down lateral and sensual pathways. Today, however, artists are judged to be mad because of an irrational passion for doing what nobody asks for or pays for. If you looked at the material support for visual art, you'd wonder how the whole art scene is viable.
Few artists make any money at all from their practice, much less earn a decent living from it.
For most, the studio is lossmaking. The logical conclusion to draw from these low levels of support would be that the public isn't interested in contemporary art. If you visit the office towers in the city or the prosperous suburbs of Melbourne, you'll see a similar story in hectares of blank wall and a proliferation of cheap mechanical reproductions of impressionists or historical posters and so on. Australians are profligate consumers but not when it comes to art. And this in spite of the fact that Australian art is dirt cheap in international terms.