Before the period of serious art, artists were well aware that market income could increase their freedom and they had no problem with commerce, commercialism, self-branding and the enrichment of their work, to make it more attractive. As we would say now: they were willing to compromise. But during this period such activities are taboo, and artists who compromise are blamed. Artists must be as autonomous as possible.
Around 1980, along with developments in capitalism, attitudes and practices change again. First, marketing and next cultural entrepreneurship by art-companies become common. Not much later many artists follow. Often without being aware of this, artworks and the art products of art-companies also change in content, with higher sales as the outcome. Moreover, some artists start to worry less about artistic autonomy and develop hybrid art practices.
Not all art-lovers agree. They resist that art-companies and artist are becoming cultural entrepreneurs. And leftist critics warn against a commercialism in the arts that is becoming as common and intense as in the commercial popular arts. An orientation on sponsors and donors is thought to lead to a loss of autonomy and compromise.
Over the last decades, artworks and art products are increasingly enriched; their āwrappingā looks more attractive. This contributes to another phenomenon. Along with commercialization and other developments in society, a winner -take-all mechanism has become more important in the arts. This leads to extremely high incomes among a small group of artists and to a small number of very successful ensembles and venues.
In the following sections I present and discuss many situations in which artists and art organizations attempt to make artistically autonomous art or follow an own mission in offering art, while in practice they often create relatively other- or user-oriented art, art that can be called market-, supporter- and art-world-oriented art. During the period of serious art, when artists are thought to do so, and even more when they are thought to deliberately do so, they are blamed for compromising. This still happens, even though over the last decades blaming artists becomes less intense. But as I notice many artists still feel guilty when they do not make āown workā but compromise, I discuss the phenomenon in detail in the following sections.
Lines on either side of the text indicate that recurring concepts are defined or described. This chapter is accompanied by web-notes and web-texts, which are available on the website: www.hansabbing.com . Numbers between brackets refer to other sections, including web-texts. Numbers at the end of a sentence preceded by a forward slash refer to web-notes. Holding a pc, tablet or phone next to this text, it is easy to āscanā the web-notes and web-texts. (Quantitative data I most often present in web-notes.)
Hostile Spheres
(60) Introduction: THE TERMS COMMERCE, COMMERCIAL , COMMERCIALISM AND MARKET ARE USED IN MORE THAN ONE SENSE. SOMETIMES THEY ARE USED IN A METAPHORIC SENSE. In this part of the book I discuss various convictions and opinions in the arts that are related to ācommerceā, commercialism, and āthe marketā or āmarketsā. To be able to do so, in this intermezzo I explain these and related concepts. They are sometimes used in confusing ways. General readersābut not studentsācan scan or skip the section, and, if necessary, later have a better look at some paragraphs.
In this text I use the term commerce, that is, commerce without inverted commas, the way economists do. Commerce refers to trade in goods and services. Artworks are usually, but not always, traded while money is used as currency.
But when artists and art-lovers reject commerce, they often do not just have trade in mind. They use the term commerce, the same as the market, markets, and sometimes also money in a metaphorical sense. For instance, when somebody says, āArt and money do not go togetherā, he has far more in mind than the currency money.
āCommerceā, āthe marketā, āmarketsā and āmoneyā stand for various combinations of different but related things, like the pursuit of profit, compromise, economic values, the world of commerce, a commercialized world; and sometimes, ātrade in generalā and āa market economyā. To prevent misunderstanding, I put the terms between inverted commas when used in a metaphorical sense. (Note that whereas Europeans more often use the collective noun āthe marketā, in the USA people more often speak of āmarketsā. The intended meanings are usually the same.)
In this text profit and income refer to financial gain./1 The terms income and profit are often used in an imprecise way. A private collector can be said to make a profit when he sells an artwork, but he generates income and not profit . The opposite applies to independent artists. We talk about their income and not their profit , but in a legal sense they are for-profits , companies which generate profits . As said, to stress the relativity of the distinction and not to have to explain each time why I use income and not profit and vice versa, I regularly use the term income/profit to refer to the one or the other or to both.
In this text the terms ācommerceā, commercial and commercialism refer to a being much oriented on users in a broad sense, that is, including sponsors , donors and governments, in order to have (more) income or gain or rewards. Artists and art-companies are oriented on users and entrepreneurial. There is a clear user-orientation . This may imply an intense promotion or marketing of the own product and a pursuit of personal āgainā or income/profit but not necessarily. Income may serve art or all sorts of good courses. There does not have to be an orientation on profit-for-the-sake-of-profit . (In principle, the income, gain or reward can be altogether āaltruisticā, as at present in the case of an artist who by means of an artwork intensely tries to let people participate in Extinction Rebellion protests, directed at measures to contain climate change.)
In practice, when people talk about a commercial artist and commercial art, they associate this with a pursuit of profit-for-the-sake-of-profit . In my approach, this association is often not correct.
In this text when I speak of a strong profit-orientation as in a strongly profit-oriented artist or art-company, I have an artist or company in mind who pursues profit-for-the-sake-of-profit and not foremost for other goals. (This explication is useful, because the term profit is also used in a far more general sense, like in the case of an artist making a profit on the sale of an artwork, implying that he can more than cover its cost.)
Commercialization in the arts refers to the phenomenon that with time artists and art-companies become more commercial , that is, they become more user-oriented and entrepreneurial. Although in the period of serious art there is much commerce in the arts, commercialism is probably less than before and after. It follows that there can be decommercialization and recommercialization .
Many art-lovers do not agree with the recommercialization after 1980. This applies strongest to conservative art-lovers and the leftist, whom I call, new critics of ācommerce ā. Both groups oppose that artists are becoming cultural entrepreneurs. The leftist critics, moreover, criticize a possibly emerging strongly profit-oriented commercial culture industry in the new more user-oriented domain in the arts.
Aside: Sometimes the popular arts are called the commercial arts and, as such, oppose the serious arts.1 This also shows from the fact that in the UK, courses of ācommercial musicā are givenāsome at BA level. Checking the programs all music except serious music is included. But the way I use the term commercial , the provision of classical/serious by nonprofits is sometimes very commercial . There can only be a relative difference between the two domains.
For economists a thingāa good or serviceāis a commodity if it is soldāor offered as a service for paymentāand bought on a regular basis. A commodity is usually thought to be a homogeneous or standardized product, but it can also be relatively heterogeneous. There can be (re)commodification or marketization and decommodification. An example of commodification is that of selling tickets for concerts in parcs, while earlier these concerts were free. As a consequence, there is price exclusion [48]. If the opposite happens, it is an example of de-commodification. The term commodification can also be used in a metaphoric sense, referring, among others, to homogenization and standardization .
Aside: Nowadays, one regularly comes across a very broad notion of ācommodification ā. People may, for instance, refer to the ācommodification of cultureā. But culture is not something that can possibly be bought and sold. It is no commodity in the normal sense. What they may have in mind is usually not clear. The association(s) is anyway negative. They may think of a collection of previously free cultural products being sold in markets, and/or of increasing commercialism in the world of art and culture and/or of increasing homogenization and less diversity and/or of art and culture becoming part of an industry-produced-culture and/or of the possible phenomenon that cultural products are increasingly used instrumentally and foremost to serve economic goals. Whether used in a literal sense or instead in a narrow or broad metaphorical sense, for artists and art theorists the term commodification tends to have a negative connotation. It is associated with popular art and popular culture.
If there is homogenization, the substitutability of artworks increases. One can more easily replace another. Commodification can come together with standardization and homogenization but not necessarily. Free concerts in parcs may be relatively heterogeneous, and due to commodification become more homogeneous. The opposite is also possible.
I use the term market the way it is used in economics. Simplifying a little: in economics a market refers to allover trade in a specific commodity in a certain region. (A market is therefore not a specific space where products are sold and bought.) Markets can be small or large. The commodities (or goods and services) that are traded in small markets are also traded in large markets together with related goods and services. For instance, paintings are goods in the market of paintings, while impressionist paintings are goods in the market (or submarket) of impressionist paintings, and a certain kind of impressionist paintings in a sub-submarket, possibly a very small market or niche market. It follows that the possible goodness or badness of markets has nothing to do with the size of a market.
In section 48 I distinguished deep-pocket , medium-pocket and shallow-pocket , as well as niche and mass markets . I also mentioned the concept of purchasing power and the say of various social groups in different markets. Readers may like to have another look at the section.
I occasionally use the conce pt imagined market.2 People construct in their mind markets which do not really exist, or they organize behavior as if a market existed. The first matters in the arts. For instance, people may negotiate about the payment for a commission. While doing so ...