Imagine a New Art World

Imagine a New Art World

Clearly the art world isn’t a perfect place. We spent a significant amount of time this semester discussing many of these problems. The white cube is restrictive by nature, many artists can’t fit inside of it. It is a direct representation of the capitalist society we inhabit. As there are many problems with the art world, big and small, I’m going to focus on my own experience with the art world and the most major problems I see; public opinions of art, equality for women, and art as a capitalist business. 

Firstly I think it would improve the art community immensely if the sort of layman person in society was more interested in art. Say instead of watching T.V. people wanted to go to art exhibits. I think this also goes hand in hand with a more equalization of prices in art. I believe that if more people were interested in art and more people respected artists it would massively change the experience of being an artist. As it now (perhaps this is unique to my own family) I feel really looked down on for studying art. I inevitably run into the situation where someone asks me what my major is, and upon learning its art they become somewhat dismissive. As if I'm some dumb naive and lazy person trying to do something thats not worthwhile. My own mother once introduced me to a colleague of hers, and upon discovering I went to UNR and was close to graduation he said “Wow thats a great school good job making it through! ” to which my mother responded “well, her major is ART, so…” the implication being that studying art is somehow easier than other subjects. Which is incredibly frustrating. Every art major knows how difficult and time consuming it can be. Just this semester I had over sixty pages worth of research papers due. In addition I think if people outside of the art world were more interested in arts it would help to change the economics of art, and perhaps, more artists would be able to live off of their work. 

Secondly I would like to talk about a really huge issue. One of the biggest problems I see with the art world right now is the lack of equality for women artists. Although the situation is slowly getting better for women artists they are still discriminated against. There are lots of factors that play into this just as Linda Nochlin states in Why Have there Been No Great Women Artists?. However, if I could change just one thing in art it would be to erase gender stereotypes, and make society see men and women as being equal in every way. Currently women make 75 cents on a mans dollar, and this is compounded in the art world. Of the top 15 wealthiest living artists only one is a woman, Cindy Sherman, and she ranks #11. More than anything i think the art world could stand as an example to society at large.

Thirdly An ideal art world would have more equality in the pricing of art. Currently a graph of the lowest paid artist agains the highest paid would be extremely desperate. I’m not saying the top paid artists should be paid in a completely equal level, but just that the situation could stand to be equalized somewhat. I say this in the hopes that it would create a situation where more artists could afford to be artists. I guess as an art undergrad so many times I how wondered and been asked “How am I going to use this to make a living?” It’s a scary prospect, not everyone with an art degree is going to end up being able to use it.