If it was not expensive to be an artist, artists would not demand so much for their work. In the digital era with some software producing work costs nigh next to nothing (regardless of whether or not you take into consideration the electricity bill and artists upkeep, etc). State of the art software still costs £4000 just for the right to use it, an issue of free software which that hacker guy wrote about. Some of those licenses are only temporary anyway. Are canvas and paints particularly valuable, or do we attribute a higher value based on the craftsmanship behind it?