A peculiar thing

[Lslbsc2]

   I found this in an art critic's   blog.
Kate Sullivan
b9.5 Theses on Art and Classb
Ben Davis
B 
1.0 Class is an issue of fundamental importance for art
1.1 Inasmuch as art is part of and not independent from society, and
society is marked by class divisions, these will also affect the functioning
and
character of the sphere of the visual arts
1.2 Since different classes have different interests, and bartb is
affected by these different interests, art has different values depending on
from
which class standpoint it is approached
1.3 Understanding art means understanding class relations outside the
sphere of the visual arts and how they affect that sphere, as well as
understanding class relations within the sphere of the visual arts itself
1.4 In general, the idea of the bart worldb serves as a way to deflect
consideration of both these sets of relations
1.5 The notion of an bart worldb implies a sphere that is separate or set
aside from the issues of the non-art world (and so separates it from class
issues outside that sphere)
1.6 The notion of an bart worldb also visualizes the sphere of the visual
arts not as a set of conflicting interests, but as a harmonious confluence
of professionals with a common interest: bartb (and so denies class
relations within that sphere)
1.7 Anxiety about class in the sphere of the visual arts manifests in
critiques of the bart marketb; however, this is not the same as a critique
of
class in the sphere of the visual arts; class is an issue that is more
fundamental and determinate than the market
1.8 The bart marketb is approached differently by different classes;
discussing the art market in the absence of understanding class interests
serves
to obscure the actual forces determining artbs situation
1.9 Since class is a fundamental issue for art, art canbt have any clear
idea of its own nature unless it has a clear idea of the interests of
different classes
B 
2.0 Today, the ruling class, which is capitalist, dominates the sphere of
the visual arts
2.1 It is part of the definition of a ruling class that it controls the
material resources of society
2.2 The ruling ideologies, which serve to reproduce this material
situation, also represent the interests of the ruling class
2.3 The dominant values given to art, therefore, will be ones that serve
the interests of the current ruling class
2.4 Concretely, within the sphere of the contemporary visual arts, the
agents whose interests determine the dominant values of art are: large
corporations, including auction houses and corporate collectors; art
investors,
private collectors and patrons; trustees and administrators of large cultural
institutions and universities
2.5 One role for art, therefore, is as a luxury good, whose superior
craftsmanship or intellectual prestige indicates superior social status
2.6 Another role for art is to serve as financial instrument or tradable
repository of value
2.7 Another role for art is as sign of bgiving backb to the community, to
whitewash ill-gotten gains
2.8 Another role for art is symbolic escape valve for radical impulses, to
serve as a place to isolate and contain social energy that runs counter to
the dominant ideologyB 
2.9 A final role for art is the self-replication of ruling-class ideology
about art itselfbthe dominant values given to art serve not only to enact
ruling-class values directly, but also to subjugate, within the sphere of the
arts, other possible values of art
B 
3.0 Though ruling-class ideology is ultimately dominant within the sphere
of the arts, the predominant character of this sphere is middle class
3.1 bMiddle classb in this context does not indicate income level. It
indicates a mode of relating to labor and means of production. bMiddle
classb
here indicates having an individual, self-directed relationship to
production, rather than administering and maximizing the profit produced by
the labor
of others (capitalist class), or selling abstract labor power (working
class)
3.2 The position of the professional artist is archetypically middle-class
in relation to labor: the dream of being an artist is the dream of making a
living off the products of onebs own mental or physical labor while fully
being able to control and identify with that labor
3.3 The specific characteristic of the visual arts sphere, therefore, is
that it is a sphere in which ruling-class ideology dominates, and yet it is
allowed to have an unusually middle-class character (in fact, it is
definitionally middle classbthe bart worldb is defined as the sphere
which trades in
individual products of creativity rather than mass-produced creativity)
3.4 In part, the middle-class character of the visual arts relates to
2.5-2.8, above. From a ruling-class perspective, it is beneficial to promote
the
example of middle-class creative labor for a variety of reasons
3.5 Nevertheless, the bmiddle-classb perspective on the value and role of
art is not identical to the ruling-class one; artists have their own way of
relating to their labor, and consequently, their own value for bartb
3.6 The middle-class value of art is double-sided: on the one hand, bartb
is identified as a profession, as a desirable means of support
3.7 On the other hand, bartb is identified as self-expression, as a
manifestation of creative individuality (whether that is expressed through a
specific style of craftsmanship, or simply as an original intellectual
program;
art-theory debates about the importance of the hand of the artist, or
bstudiob
 versus bpost-studiob production simply displace this more fundamental,
structural sense in which the sphere of the visual arts preserves
individuality)
3.8 Two permanent contradictions therefore dominate the sphere of the
visual arts: The first contradiction is between the fact that the visual arts
are
dominated by ruling-class values, but defined by a middle-class character
3.9 The second contradiction is internal to the middle-class definition of
b
artb itself, which is split between notions of art as profession and as
vocation, and therefore comes into contradiction with itself at every moment
where what an artist wants to express comes into contradiction with the
demands of making a living; in a situation where a minority dominates most of
societybs resources, this is often
B 
4.0 The sphere of the visual arts has weak relations with the working class
4.1 The working class here is defined as consisting of those laborers who
are compelled to sell their labor power as an abstract commodity to make a
living, and therefore have no individual stake in their labor
4.2 There are many links to the working class in the visual arts: gallery
workers, anonymous fabricators of artistic components, non-professional
museum workers, etc. Most artists are themselves employed outside the art
worldb
the dream of having fully realized middle-class status remains aspirational
for most people who identify as bartistsb
4.3 Still, the form of labor at the heart of the sphere of the visual arts,
the production of artworks, remains middle-classbfar more so than most
other bcreative industriesb
4.4 One consequence of this predominantly middle-class character is visual
artsb approach to dealing with the social and economic contradictions that
it faces: An individualized relation to labor means that middle-class agents
tend to conceive of their ability to achieve their political objectives in
individualistic terms, with their social power deriving from individual
intellectual capacity, personality or rhetoric (it is this reality that is
behind
the displacement of the discussion about artbs contradictions onto
considerations of the bmarketbba construct in which free individuals
enter into
economic relations with one anotherbrather than bclassbbwhich implies
fundamental, opposing group interests)
4.5 On the other hand, because being working class involves being treated
as an abstract, interchangeable source of labor, the working classb ability
to achieve its objectives much more depends on its ability to organize
collectively. This is a form of resistance that is difficult to achieve within
the
sphere of the arts (all talk of an bartists strikeb is satirical, outside
a situation like that of the 1930s government art support in the U.S., where
artists are employed as a block)
4.6 Because the ruling structure of society is capitalistbi.e. the
exploitation of wage labor to maximize profitbthe working-class position is
actually
closer to the core of societybs functioning than is the middle classb;
middle-class workers have only the ability to shut down their own production,
whereas an organized working class can shut down the ruling classb means of
production
4.7 The particular character of the working class implies its own outlook
on the concept of bartb
4.8 On the one hand, one working-class value of art is determined by the
reality of bcreative industries,b in which creative laborers are employed
who
have a working-class relation to their creative expression; that is, they
produce creative products not as an expression of their individuality, but
simply as piecework. Viewed from this angle, bartb is demystifiedbit is
not a
uniquely exalted form of expression, but simply one more human process that
is the subject of labor
4.9 On the other hand, inasmuch as working-class labor is controlled from
above, the ideal of bartb also represents expression that is opposed to
the
demands of work, as freely determined expression, whether private or
political. Viewed from this angle, art is deprofessionalized, and in this
sense is
actually more bfreeb than the middle-class ideal of