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Many years ago when I was learning to paint and was being mentored by a professional artist, I was encouraged to not paint for the market but to learn and paint "for myself as an artist", without the pressure and underlying drive to sell what I create.  The insight behind that encouragement was that when you paint primarily for the market and/or what you see selling by other artists, you end up robbing yourself of your own instinctive tendencies for personal and authentic style.
    
It is very difficult to not create primarily for the market because a subtle marketing influence seems to always lurk in the background of your choices.  We want to sell our work!  It takes much discipline to keep that tendency in check when making our choices throughout the painting process.

Developing my natural painting style, choosing mediums, materials and the subjects that suited me best, grew to be my primary focus over time. The wisdom of that early encouragement has deepened in my life as an artist and I am very thankful for that. 

I truly believe that by first creating personally satisfying works, an artist will attract great collectors because those collectors, both old and new, can't help but sense your genuine voice in what you create.