The Social Status of Creative Work: Questioning What Creative Work Means Today

It was a hot Monday afternoon this June in Berlin when I sat in the last bit of shadow that ‘Kaffeebar Jacobi’ had to offer and waited for Joel. It is located on a former cemetery just a few steps away from Hermannplatz and for that it is surprisingly peaceful. Most of the seating area outside was occupied by people staring into their laptops, deeply absorbed in their work or in conversations with their neighbors. I got me wondering what they were on about. Was it their typical work Monday? What are they working on? What kind of job allows them to spend their Monday afternoon sipping coffee and scribbling away in a notebook? I was deep into contemplating wether the artsy guy with the raver sunglasses and the buzz cut two tables across the terrace was an artist or a writer, when Joel sat down before me. I wanted to talk to him about his creative work as a production and set designer ever since we worked together last year. Joel Izeon came to Berlin four years ago, leaving behind the safe net of a design studio job in Barcelona to pursue freelance projects.
Their story reminds me of something I often hear from creative people questioning wether a permanent position at a studio or freelancing in various projects is the right fit for them. Surely both options come with their own pros and cons. For the most part the outside perception on freelance work is positive, even tho most people will acknowledge the difficulties that come with it like the uncertainty of your income stream. Despite this, 1,49 million people in Germany were registered as freelancers in 2025. With creative work there is a whole other reason factoring into the decision: the creative freedom you experience. The creative freedom that draws young designers, artists and creatives towards freelancing own projects is undoubtedly dubbed as one of the main reasons to decide against permanent employment. You get to choose who you work for and how to include your own creative vision and values on your own terms. It seems like a fair trade off for uncertainty and a whole lot of self-discipline to make it work. Or is it?

Following that, the individual creative vision is something you can only explore through your own work. It is developed through exploration of oneself, deeply connected to ones personality, curiosity about the world, trial and error and it is being formed step by step in own projects. Joels story began that way. Even way before Joel knew about the label ‘production designer’ they already worked as one:

Which leads to wonder what does designing mean anyway? And in a wider sense what does creativity mean? Is it something that can be learned and trained? Or rather something some people are born with? Is creativity the latter and designing the former? Do you need to go to university to become a designer? Joels own career beginning shows that you can fulfill being a designer without even being aware of it yourself. It shows that creativity and designing is rather a mindset than a fixed set of hard skills, a mantra that was being praised at ESDAPC, Joels university: “Design is something you do 24/7. Its much more, it’s like a way of thinking”
However when answering wether having a university degree in design is necessary they take a stand towards this position. Even with creativity being the most important thing for a designer it is uni that helps with unlocking and directing your creativity. It teaches you the tools to transform something as abstract and fluid as creativity into ideas, concepts, products or spaces that can be seen, felt and experienced. Uni provided Joel with the technical tools they needed to become a designer, yet they stress that uni systematically misses a huge point.

Design is meant to challenge the world we live in. To raise questions, to criticize, to open up new possibilities, ways of thinking, to offer solutions. It also allows people to join together at art weeks, exhibitions, performances who otherwise wouldn’t have met. Design leaves out everything that separates people - religion, nationality, social status. It doesn’t need that. Instead it allows exchange. It encourages exchange. People are being united through the shared passion for the art. This is true to all kinds of creative work. It is true that, if social power is the biggest added value of creative work, it is hard to grasp that value at times. It is way easier to understand and measure the impact and value for society of being a doctor, to heal and care for illnesses. Maybe this does make it easier to justify the work of doctors. But where does this leave creative work if its worth is measured by the value people can fully grasp. I know of no other jobs where people get offered a job on a project with no financial compensation but the prospect of visibility through an Instagram post on a regular basis. And, to make matters worse, oftentimes no guarantee that the project is actually being published.

As my conversation with Joel unfolded this narrative started to open up. In the beginning those projects are often your only chance to advance your career as they allow you to show your vision, create a network that might lead to bigger projects. Or as Joels says, you have to start somewhere, like it or not. But those offers are not solely targeted at up-and-coming designers. Brands will reach out to more experienced designers with the same offers and often it’s not even an issue of inability to pay fair compensations like NGOs or small collectives might face, but rather an expression of the value that is being assigned to those creative positions. The invitation to present his collection during a main show at Spring/Summer Fashion Week 2026 came without any real support offer from Fashion Council Germany to a befriended Fashion Designer. How are young designers supposed to present their collections without financial support to buy materials, rent a venue or a network to find partnerships? How good is the offer to be invited to present a collection at Fashion Week without being provided the means to do so for young designers? What does it say about the importance that we as a society assign to creative work if we ask creatives to carry the burden themselves but like to have a piece of the cake later?

Then what? In the long run it could make creative work an exclusive job only attainable for those with large enough financial funds to fall onto in the worst case. This approach towards creative work is not only dangerous for its standing and role in our society but has real life consequences for creatives and artists. When being asked wether they think people see creative work inferior to other jobs, Joel agrees. While talking to Joel it became clearer how creative freelancing actually looks like in real life, which is, in all honesty, different from the picture I had in mind. Coming to Berlin from Barcelona, trying to establish a network in a new city while forming a social circle, sent Joel in a loop rotating between independent (occasionally low budget) projects, working commercial productions full time or combining freelance projects with various jobs on the side. It seems as if you have to take whatever opens up at the given moment and just try to make it work. Making it up as you go might be finding out which job offer allows you to pay rent next month and having to choose this over the one that aligns more with your creative vision. It might be agreeing to an unpaid project and sending out CVs for minijobs. It might be going all in with your own projects. It might be a constant transformation from one into the other and then going endlessly back and forth on it. It might be exciting or frightening. But either way it seems like creative careers heavily adapt around the situation the market offers them instead of being able to shape their path themselves.

There seems to be very little freedom in creative self employment. Contradictory to the expected creative freedom that comes with focusing on own projects, self employment seems to come with some loss of control and autonomy in reality. I wonder if this is the paradox of creative freelance work. To think of it as ultimative freedom, when in reality you have little control over what the next job will be?
Is the appointed cultural and societal value to blame for the tough economic situation for self employed creatives? In a sense yes but surely not the only reason to name here. Applying to studio jobs is tough too, where oftentimes it is only the economical situation that decides between a job offer or a rejection. Companies struggling financially and not being able to hire new people at this time is not a sole issue of the creative sector. You might be quick to say that this is an issue politics can solve, and this might be true to an extent but it is hard to understand who is to blame for or who can offer solutions now. With right wing parties and ideologies experiencing momentum across Europe the perceived value of free creative work is even more at risk. Because there is no place for art, culture or creative freedom within right wing ideologies. But even aside that, we as a society need to be more aware of what is important and what is not.
Is not community, sharing passions and exchange important these days? Is not challenging the status quo, raising questions and exploring new ways of thinking important these days? Is not shaping a world where creatives can focus on their social power without having to question their value or not knowing what their next paid job will be important?
It is and besides politics and economists its up to society to create this world.

“In the end”, Joel describes “I aim for the commercial projects because they're the ones that pay me basically so if I can live out of that I can allow myself doing personal projects on the side”

Joel Izeon is a Set/Spatial and Production Designer based in Berlin and working internationally. Joel received a B.A. in Architectural Design from ESDAPC, while simultaneously starting to work in set/spatial design for film, commercials, and events. They also studied Environmental Science at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, exploring natural sciences, ecosystems, and sustainability — elements that shape their distinctive style alongside an industrial and technical approach, and a queer perspective.