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I want to make my art, to express with no limits. However, I also need to profit with it. If I sell my art purely, the readers might not understand, like or be interested in it, and thus resulting in low sales, although I would like very much what I've done. If I want more sales, I would have to water it down with what the public likes/expects, thus my "art" wouldn't be "pure" (original), but a mainstreamy production. Thus, if I need to put only what the public likes and avoid putting what the public might dislike, I would simply be indirectly working for the readers, always having to please them, or else...
But by "to make my art" I do not in any way mean "to ignore quality standards", it's exactly the opposite; it actually refers to content: it's too nichey, and everyone knows that nichey = low sales, compared to the mainstream.
So I feel divided: one side of me really wants to be free to make my nichey art, while the other side needs the profits (to be used in another project) that this nichey art is not much likely to give and thus needing to change it.
How do I get out of this?
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This is a common issue for any kind of artist.
I'm making this example in the world of music because I still have a lot more experience in that world, but I assume this can be translated to the world of books fairly easily. Take this made-up musician:
John J. Johnsson wants to make Arabic-cultured-melodic-inspired EDM-techno-beats with heavy-metal-inspired growling and screaming.
John probably starts out producing the kind of music he loves and wants others to like and admire him for.
John could be extremely lucky and strike "viral gold" with one of his tracks/songs and gain sudden 'pop-culture-appeal' but it is unlikely - otherwise, we'd have viral tracks of new genres every day.
What John will most likely experience is, that a few people will like his music (if he dares to post/release it anywhere) and a lot of people will not be interested.
THIS HAPPENS TO ALMOST ANY KIND OF ARTIST and most likely to 99 out of 100 new 'experimental' or 'niche' musicians/artists in general.
This will, of course, be extremely frustrating. John wants to make his music and wishes that a lot of people naturally wanted his music.
What many musicians then do is, "make their music more pop-friendly".
This is painful for anyone who doesn't by default make "pop-music", but in order to gain an audience, it may be necessary.
Some musicians produce one "pop" song, others multiple "pop" albums, before 'suddenly' changing their style/genre and surprising almost all of their fans so far. Some stay in their personal pop-genre for good. Some people make completely different music within another genre altogether, others just tone down the "niche-elements".
At some point along the road of someone's career, they have to decide to "go pop" or keep working hard on their own art and hope for the fan-base to grow naturally.
If that someone does "go pop", they then have to decide at some other point if they can "go un-pop", and how...
In the end, the choice is yours and it's not an easy choice.
Whether or not I can support you as a future reader, I can't say, but I can certainly say this: I support you in your struggle to decide, and hope you are closer to your dream scenario in the not too distant future.
I assume that communicating/collaborating with other people within the same or a similar genre/niche can help you in your work, but in the end, your work is your work.
Good luck.
It might be worth playing with pseudonyms, or slight variations on the name by which you want to be known (Michael Marshall Smith, Iain M. Banks, Richard Bachman). You could use the variation to differentiate the styles.
The populist consumers might never know, but your niche audience will love the feeling they're in on a secret.
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