Yes, it is that time of the year and the tax deadline is coming up and you know what that means? It means if you don't dig out all of those boxes of receipts and check stubs, credit card statements and tax payments, you won't get your federal return done on time.
“That's okay, I'll just file an extension.”
You can do that, but you do know it is an extension to file not and extension to pay. Yes, even if you get an extension you still have to pay by the fifteenth of April, and this year the due date falls of Friday so there's no last minute reprieve.
So why am I harping about taxes on a blog about artists? Well, for one thing you are a tax payer and you should have all of your ducks in a row so that when you break open that new copy of TurboTax, you'll have everything you need.
“I don't do that, it's too confusing and it is so much easier to just go to Block and pay them for the headache.”
You know it is. But if you bring H & R Block a shoebox full of little slips of paper or your CPA or even AARP, expect them to charge you at least thirty-five bucks an hour for filing services. And they will do it. They can't afford to waste time in a short tax season doing your work. They have six weeks to make a year's income and they won't wait on you.
Besides do you want to just throw up your hands and let some person you hardly know make big decisions about your life? Do you make enough income from art to file a Schedule C or is it just hobby income and if it is can you deduct all of the framing expenses and art supplies or do you just have to think of that like the money you spent at Starbucks? Okay, okay, Dutch Bros, I came from a place where if you got coffee, it was black and the waitress called you, “hon.”
Knowing a little about your own taxes shouldn't be seen as a punishment, it's a gift. Take it and learn what goes on what line. Being a responsible tax payer is all part of being an artist. You wouldn't want someone to tell you how much your work is worth or say you can't be an artist and a business person at the same time.
Owing the IRS is a bad thing. But you want real, nightmare bad in your life, don't file, or claim something so ridiculous that the audit flag pops up. I spent a year fighting an audit and in the end I wound up settling, not because I did anything wrong, but because I couldn't afford to spend everyday in the IRS office. You do not want the IRS on your case. Get your files in order, get down to the tax preparer, buy H & R Block software, (I plugged TurboTax in an earlier paragraph, it only seemed fair to plug Block.), come ready and get it over with and filed and you will live happily ever after.
Whew! That's a load off.
It isn't? No, while we are talking about being responsible artists what have you done about the other deadlines you are facing?
“What are you talking about there ain't no stinking deadlines.”
But there are deadlines coming up and some of them are knocking on your door this very minute and you know what they say about opportunity knocking? That's right it don't wait one bit better than the IRS!
Have you gone to
http://www.torpedofactory.org/galleries/targetcallforentry.htm
and clicked on the link to download the prospectus, (You could look back a coupla days on the ole Trawler and get it that way, but in the spirit of being part of the solution and not part of the problem), here's the link
http://www.torpedofactory.org/images/galleries/target/June%202011/ITF3%20prospectus.pdf
And you can apply online, so there's really no excuse for missing the March 14 deadline. Oh? You want that link too? Okay, but just this once.
http://www.torpedofactory.org/galleries/target_online_form.htm
Now I know there are folks out there who have been sketching nudes, cause both the Monday Plien Air group and Gold Beach folks have been having regular figure study groups. In fact Port Orford is staging a show based on those who go to the Life Drawing class. So why are you dragging your feet? There's a show that wants you and do you want to be any more of a slacker than those who ignore the Uncle Sam wants you posters or do you want to click on the links and sign up right now. That's what I thought, not a slacker in the bunch.
And what about the motorcycle show at CAM?
I know that you can find a motorcycle in Coos Bay or North Bend because I saw
two of'em, right there in the Safeway parking lot. Now bikers may look a bit less like your second grade school teacher, but they have the same weaknesses for kids, puppies and their bikes that every other proud parent has, if you ask they'll let you take those pictures you can paint from, cause they love their motors and will tell you so forever, so do yourself a favor and ask to take a picture and then run like the devil.
You do remember that the deadline is the 26 of March and that you as a responsible artist need to go to the CAM website,
http://www.coosart.org/
And click on the link for Thunder at CAM
http://www.coosart.org/call-to-artists-thunder-at-cam/
Where you can click on the link to download the entry forms and get you motor running!
http://www.coosart.org/pdf/2011-Thunder-At-CAM-Entry-form.pdf
You don't want to be left at the Candy Shoppe when the leader of the pack takes a magic carpet ride and proves it's fun to be born to be wild so long as you stay out of the rain and get to bed at a reasonable hour. Be responsible, get your forms in the mail!
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