Welcome to the world of the precariat. Lighting designers, like most theatre practitioners in this country, work on a freelance basis. There is very little job security in any area of professional theatre apart from administration and general arts management. Good steady jobs might be available in client services or marketing or media but if you want to be a theatre ‘maker,’ be prepared for long periods of unemployment.
Theatre performance depends on a large base of unemployed or under-employed talent for its survival. If you want to know who provides the highest proportion of arts subsidy in this country, then I can tell you that it comes from the personal income sacrifice of arts makers.
