Why Are Artists Poor?

Chapter 11

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Evidently, and in line with what has been written above, the American government expects less from display than mainland Western European governments do. Instead, the government of the us prefers to empower private inst.i.tutions and individuals through the indirect mechanism of tax deductions to address the public purpose.46 This explains its stronger preference for tax deductions and for indirect subsidization through uni-versities. On the other hand, the resistance against tax deductions in Europe, despite some evident advantages, can only be understood, if the aspect of display is taken into account. European governments do not want to cut down on display.

Chapter 11

Informal Barriers Structure the Arts

How Free or Monopolized Are the Arts?

Being Selected by the Government Shortly after graduating from art school Alex applied for a government grant for visual artists. Everybody does. It would have been unprofessional not to. He applied because of the money. There are three different types of grants.1 Each of them offers the artist an amount of money, which is equal to a year"s income in a comparable profession. For an artist, however, a grant of this sort represents an income for many years to come, given the low average incomes in the visual arts. No wonder these grants are attrac-tive. When Alex applied he knew his chances were small. All promising gradu-ates applied; there were four times as many applications as there were grants. So, he wasn"t counting on getting one. In this respect, he was not too disappointed when he was rejected. In another and unexpected way, the rejection hit him hard. It hit him in a way no statistical calculus could mit-igate. He felt rejected as an artist. Secretly he had hoped for recognition. He had hoped that the most signi.cant organization in the Dutch art world, the government, would say: "All right Alex, we know that n.o.body is lining up to buy your drawings, but we can tell that you"re a real artist. We want you to stay in the .eld." So the grants are not only attractive because of the money. In fact, Alex dis-covered that the symbolic attractiveness of the grants exceeded their immediate .nancial attractiveness. Since he did not get the grant, he con-tinued to doubt his right to be an artist. Was he a fraud? He thought (and still thinks) that many unsuccessful artists make bad art. Little would be lost if they just left the arts. Was he one of them? The rejection lowered his self-esteem. He could not hide the doubts he harbored about his own art and that made it all the more dif.cult for him to .nd a good gallery. Had he gotten the grant it would have given him wings. The grant is also important in an objective way; for instance, if he could add that to his curriculum vitae it would certainly help convince Dutch gallery owners and collectors of his worth. After that .rst attempt, Alex tried two more times, both unsuccessfully.

Then he stopped. He wanted to save himself all the existential doubts a.s.so-ciated with a rejection. This is how many artists end up going underground; they often even stop trying to crack the market. Nevertheless, ten years after leaving art school, Alex felt self-a.s.sured enough to start a new round of applications. He .rst applied for the "werkbeurs" subsidy, which is the most prestigious and most dif.cult to get, and he got it. And everything else he has applied for since has also been accepted. Looking back at this .rst grant, Alex now realizes that it was actually an enormous relief. Experts now took his work seriously. He had a right to be in the .eld. Alex even suspects that since that initial sign of recognition his artwork has improved more than it ever did before. He felt more self-a.s.sured and he became more daring. Not all of Alex"s colleagues react as strongly to this kind of rejection. But all of Alex"s colleagues certainly recog-nize this scenario. To almost all avant-garde artists in the Netherlands gov-ernment acceptance is the .rst and most important barrier. Looking back at the rejections, Alex, now belonging to the group that receives government grants, wonders why his earlier work was rejected. The answer he can live with is that his work at that time was not good enough, but since then his work has improved. In the back of his mind, however, he knows that it could also be merely changes in government taste. Back when he applied for his .rst grant, the Dutch government was not interested in .gurative art. It only developed a taste for .gurative art again over the past two decades. And Alex has been producing .gurative art all along. Still, he .nds it dif.cult to admit that the government is not just interested in quality, as it claims, but that it has a taste and that it rejects work that doesn"t .t in with its preferences. This is how it puts up barriers. Alex prefers not to question the government"s authority; he prefers to see the government as an inst.i.tution that protects the autonomy of the artist, not as one that interferes with it. That is why Alex wants to believe that his work has improved.

Incorrect a.s.sociations in the Arts can be Disastrous Alex has a studio in the same building where Margaret has hers. Margaret is quickly becoming a successful international artist. When Margaret and Alex are working, they might have a cup of tea in Margaret"s studio at the end of the day. In a corner of her studio hang four artworks by Margaret"s colleagues. Three are by successful friends about her age; the fourth is a small painting by Alfred who is much older. Alfred is Alex"s friend and was once Margaret"s teacher. Looking at this painting, it is clear that Alfred had a big in.uence on Margaret. She told Alex that this particular painting is precious to her. The painting hangs there as an homage to Alfred. Gradually Alex noticed that every now and then during their tea-sessions this speci.c painting was missing, while the three other paintings would still be there. After a while he worked out that it was missing on days Mar-garet received important visitors: dealers, people from galleries, journalists and successful colleagues. He asked her why she put the painting away. Margaret was extremely embarra.s.sed and almost in tears. She started to apologize. "You know the art world. I must be so careful. It is better not to be in.uenced by an artist who is little known. To be honest, it is worse when they know Alfred"s work. Then they suddenly see my work in a different light. Because of its roots they can more easily dismiss it. Just now I cannot afford to be a.s.sociated with Alfred. Maybe in twenty years, but not now. But, yes, you are right: it is strange the way I handle this painting. I suppose I should take it home." This is what she did. When Alex told this story to his friend Alfred, it evidently hurt him.

Why does Margaret publicly deny her relationship with an artist-friend whose work she admires? And why is it so important for artists to be favored by the government? In order to answer these questions this chap-ter investigates the barriers that artists encounter in the arts. Because many of these barriers depend on government involvement, the treat-ment of this subject was delayed until an a.n.a.lysis of the government"s involvement in the arts could be completed.

At .rst glance, it seems that, unlike other professions, there are few barriers in the arts. The arts are unfettered. Anybody can become an artist. If people couldn"t become artists it would violate the autonomy that de.nes the arts. It would desecrate art. The mythology of the arts demands that success rests solely on one"s commitment and talent. Thus, the arts must remain independent sans barriers that might constrain artists.

As an artist,I strongly believe in the importance of freedom and auton-omy in the arts. So does the whole art world and therefore as an artist I do not believe that barriers exist in the arts. If I end up being less successful than I had hoped, I don"t blame my shortcomings on barriers and monopolization. I"d rather blame myself or the consumer for being not committed enough to art. Therefore, as an artist I don"t readily acknowl-edge forms of monopolization. As an economist, I am better equipped to perceive organized barriers in the market that are deliberately con-structed to keep certain compet.i.tors out. And because I don"t believe these barriers exist in the arts, as an economist I .nd the arts to be unusu-ally open and compet.i.tive. Therefore economist and artist agree.

In other Professions Barriers Inform Consumers, Restrain Producers and Limit Compet.i.tion The barriers that mark other non-arts professions do not seem to exist in the arts. To discover if this is really the case, I will .rst examine barriers in other professions. Anyone who is interested in pursuing a non-arts profession faces a number of barriers. First, candidates pay the fees to their chosen inst.i.tution of higher education. This gives them access to the profession"s certi.ed body of knowledge. Then they have to pa.s.s cer-tain standard exams. They are only allowed to practice their profession after they have received their certi.cations or diplomas. (In some profes-sions candidates are also required to pay fees to colleagues for the right to join an already established practice.) Therefore, anyone who is unable or unwilling to pay or is unable to pa.s.s the examinations faces a de jure or de facto Berufsverbot: in practice he or she is not allowed to work in the profession.

Professionals who have spent some years pursuing their career face other barriers as well. For instance, if they want to be successful at their chosen profession, they must seek admission to one or more select pro-fessional a.s.sociations in one"s .eld or seek an extra quali.cation like a Ph.D. These barriers are not situated at the front door of the profession; they mark off privileged inner sanctums. If candidates want "to move up" in their chosen professions, they must overcome these barriers as well.

In order to pa.s.s through any of these barriers one needs a combination of monetary, cultural and social capital as well as some luck. Authorities can limit the membership or number of entrants by increasing entrance fees or raising the quali.cations standards and so raise the amount of capital needed. Generally speaking, there is a limit to how high fees can be raised. Modern democratic societies consider exorbitant entrance fees as unfair. Requiring inordinate amounts of extra training that bears little relation to the demands of the profession is not uncommon, however. This is one way of restricting the number of entrants into a particular profession and, as a result, the incomes in the profession remain higher than they would be without the barrier. If the barrier is managed by members of the profession who pro.t from limited membership, or if they can unduly in.uence the authority chartered to handle the barrier, the profession is said to be more or less monopolized.

Not all barriers lead to monopolization, however. If producers who meet realistic requirements are allowed to pa.s.s and if there is no Berufsverbot, compet.i.tion is not necessarily impaired. Some barriers serve primarily as certi.cates and information outlets. In this respect, it is useful to examine the signals that barriers emit. First, they produce a warning signal to other producers who might choose to illegally cross the barrier. Secondly, they produce signals telling customers that the membership has special quali.cations not available to those outside the profession. Without signals it is often dif.cult for consumers to procure information on the quality the member produces. Take, for instance, used car dealers. It is dif.cult for consumers to determine whether the automobiles being sold are in satisfactory condition or not. They have less information than the used car dealers themselves have and therefore a situation of asymmetric information exists. To overcome this situation, certain used car dealers display certi.cates, indicating that they are rec-ognized by a certifying organization.2 Signaling barriers can be found everywhere. They exist in both monopolized and non-monopolized situations. They can be related to products, like biological milk with a seal of approval or hotels rated by numbers of stars. Or they are related to people, like scholars who have a Ph.D. degree.

I call the barriers in this section, formal barriers because their exis-tence depends on authorities who have the power to inst.i.tute the barrier and regulate pa.s.sage through it. This authority is not anonymous; it is in the hands of known inst.i.tutions or individuals. The authority informs consumers and through the process of installing, raising, lowering, or removing a certain barrier, it often also controls membership .gures. Sometimes, and not too uncommonly in non-arts professions, formal barriers may, de jure or de facto, result in a formal control of member-ship.

The Arts Resist a Formal Control of Numbers of Artists Given the large supply of artworks and artists and their correspondingly low incomes, one would expect a strong tendency in the arts to reduce membership rolls via formal controls. Or, if that"s impossible, one would expect various organized attempts to certify artists and art products to better inform consumers. This is, however, not the case. The formal bar-riers and signals, found in other professions, are either absent or rela-tively unimportant in the arts.

Unlike in other professions in the arts, the separation between profes-sionals and amateurs does not necessarily have anything to do with formal education. Although most artists have had some formal training, many don"t have diplomas and, more importantly, they do not need a diploma to work as artists. This implies that no formal barrier based on a diploma requirement characterizes the arts. The entrance to the profes-sion is free. Moreover art does not have shielded, certi.ed bodies of knowledge.3 In most professions, only initiated professionals and gradu-ates have access to these certi.ed bodies of knowledge. In the arts, this body of knowledge, including knowledge of techniques, styles and his-tory, is de facto free; anybody can have access to it.4 In general, artists encounter few formal barriers that of.cially limit who can be a working artist. First, in most countries artists without diplomas can receive government grants and unemployment bene.ts.5 The same does not apply to other professions. Second, although certain modern artists a.s.sociations represent formally closed inner circles, these circles have little impact and they are often counterproductive. Success-ful artists, for the most part, do not take these a.s.sociations seriously. Artists a.s.sociations are basically a thing of the past. Third, although artists can get a masters degree or a Ph.D. in some countries, they do not offer easier access to the art world.6 They are basically irrelevant for the professional success of an artist. Finally, on average artists with some years of of.cial training or with a.s.sorted diplomas do not necessarily earn more working in the arts than artists with no of.cial training.7 The actual insigni.cance of professional education as a barrier is most evident in literature. In other art forms diplomas do exist, but are not obligatory. Nevertheless, although professionally educated artists seem to be no better off than artists with less education, many prospective artists do pursue of.cial training. And because there are so many, quite a few are rejected at the gate of the art colleges. Therefore it appears that academies have a numerus clauses and that the most important formal barrier in the arts is situated at the entrance to art schools.

It is however questionable if a signi.cant formal barrier that keeps numbers of artists down really exists at the entrance to the schools. It is true that candidates are selected. Of.cially, admissions are based purely on talent. (Other criteria remained taboo, as they would contradict arts autonomy.) In practice however, the teachers" a.s.sessment of talent is nec-essarily relative and subjective. Teachers have an interest in keeping enrollment high. Most art teachers are artists who earn little from their art and therefore, they cannot afford to lose an attractive teaching job. (Moreover, they are usually eager to help artist friends get teaching jobs in their schools.) As a result, admissions to particular schools tend to depend on the capacity of the schools rather than on the number of tal-ented would-be students. And in the long run, both teachers and arts administrators have an interest in increasing enrollments and the number of schools to accommodate the ever-increasing number of art students. Therefore what seemed to be an arti.cial and formal barrier at the gate of art colleges is primarily a normal price barrier.

Where numbers of applicants were large in other professions, not only information campaigns would discourage potential students from enter-ing, also, especially at the technical and vocational training schools for those over 18-years old, a numerus clausus has been commonly employed in most European countries. By and large, the same applies to the us. 8 After the Second World War in the arts however, art student enroll-ments only continued to rise. Nevertheless, there was no pressure from professional artists to reduce enrollments, nor did governments try to deter students from studying art.9 In most European countries, this situ-ation continues on into the present day. For instance in Britain, where students currently pay a fee that largely covers costs, the enrollments in art departments continues to rise at least as fast as in other departments. After winning the 1981 elections, the socialists in France increased the subsidization of art education and ignited a spectacular rise in enroll-ments. (In the year 2000 in the Netherlands, a new system of .nancing art schools was inst.i.tuted to indirectly limit enrollment .gures in the .ne arts departments at various colleges. Whether this is a sign of changing att.i.tudes with respect to control or an inevitable correction of an earlier excessive growth rate, is at present dif.cult to tell. There are signs how-ever, that current enrollment .gures at the autonomous departments have gone down in the Netherlands.) So far, it is still basically true that barriers that lead to a formal control of numbers of artists are unaccept-able because creativity must not be hampered by of.cial regulations.

It is unthinkable that art "intruders" could simply be scared off as is the case with other professions by telling them that, "We will call the cops if you ever promote yourself as a tenor because you do not have the required quali.cations." Or more generally: "We will call the cops if you attempt to work as an uncerti.ed artist." Using coercion to prevent a col-league from painting or making music would violate people"s deepest belief with respect to art: that of the autonomy of the arts and artist. The arts would lose its sacred status if the entrance to the arts was formally limited. Even the body of knowledge must remain as unrestricted as pos-sible. The arts resist a formal control of numbers of artists. Barriers that formally control numbersare taboo (thesis 100).

In the Past Numbers of Artists were Controlled Because formal barriers are not important in the arts, the arts appear to be relatively open. The entrance fees are low and people with equal amounts of talent appear to have equal chances. Thus far, the a.n.a.lysis con.rms most of the popular images people have of the arts. Looking back at the history of the arts, however, this conclusion could very well be premature.

Before I argued that in the past, until the second half of the nineteenth century, a formal control of numbers or occupational control was common in the arts.10 For instance, in France until the end of the seven-teenth century, painters" guilds regulated sales and the types of materials used, and they also issued licenses to individual painters. Thereafter, the Academie Royale maintained a monopoly and forced all independent painters to join its organization. Moreover, it also de.ned the "correct" style; this style was taught in school.11 In the nineteenth century, the number of artists grew rapidly. An increasing number of these newcomers were so-called bohemian artists. They opposed the basic bourgeois mentality. Their romantic alternative put autonomy and authenticity .rst. This idea countered the notions of control and regulation. During the second half of the nineteenth century, a regulated supply came to an end under the pressures imposed by numerous newcomers, by the deviant mentality of these new bohemian artists as well as the success of new distribution channels. The Academy collapsed, along with comparable inst.i.tutions in other countries and in other art forms.12 Since that time, both the regulation of supply and the idea of enforcing a correct style are unthinkable because they are con-trary to the very essence of art.13 It turns out that both the bohemian ideology of the autonomy of the artist and the pressure of burgeoning numbers of artists forbid the formal control of numbers in the arts (thesis 101). In the .rst place, formal regulation would be futile. If certain artists were excluded from the profession, new groups of "marginal" artists would continuously .nd ways around of.cialdom and become more successful than "quali.ed" artists. Secondly, given the mystique of the arts, society in general does not approve of a formal regulation of numbers in the arts. (After all, reg-ulations might prevent a genius from being discovered.) In this respect, the artist"s status is ambiguous. On the one hand, artists regard themselves as professionals in a similar way as, say, doctors do. Artists evidently have a long professional history. And as artists they have attained a high level of status. On the other hand, the status of the arts as profession cannot compete with the status of comparable profes-sions.14 It has experienced its ups and downs, but over the past one hun-dred years, art as a profession has never had much status.15 By refusing to regulate the size of the group one ultimately decreases the status of a profession. In medicine and other professions with a high level of profes-sional status, this kind of regulating is an important demonstration of the power of a particular profession. It shows who is in charge and it keeps income within a particular profession relatively high.

Granting Certi.cates to Commercial Galleries in the Netherlands (An Example) Even though the arts have changed and barriers that formally control numbers are insigni.cant in the arts these days, this does not necessarily mean that barriers don"t exist and that the arts are totally open. On the contrary, the arts have many barriers, both formal and informal. In order to explain how informal barriers work, it is useful to look at an example.

In 1992 in the Netherlands, a number of galleries were expelled from an attractive subsidy program. In that same year, just about the same group of galleries was excluded from partic.i.p.ating in the most presti-gious commercial art fair in the Netherlands, the KunstRAI. If this was a coincidence, it was an extraordinary coincidence. If it wasn"t, it makes it all even more astounding. After all, it was a public inst.i.tution that issued the subsidies, while the fair was a private industry event. It"s dif.cult to see how the actions in these two sectors were attuned.

Two formal barriers were involved in the expulsions. Applicants had to meet certain objective criteria, but ultimately admission depended on the decisions of two selection committees.16 Admission to both the sub-sidy plan and the trade fair were important for gallery owners because of the .nancial advantages but even more because of the indirect signaling effect. Partic.i.p.ation in both subsidy plan and fair served as symbols of "quality", which by a.s.sociation means a division between "good" and "bad" galleries. Galleries without these two signs were worse off.

The signs were even more attractive because they were not meant to signal quality. If galleries had gotten together to create an inst.i.tute to certify "quality" galleries, it wouldn"t have worked because it would run contrary to the liberal autonomous spirit in the arts. The same, however, does not apply to free riding on existing cla.s.si.cations. In this case, exist-ing signs serve as "marks of quality by a.s.sociation", and thus serve as informal barriers.

Both the subsidy plan and the fair had been under pressure to reduce the number of partic.i.p.ating galleries.17 Therefore, the two parties had each created a committee to select partic.i.p.ating galleries. Both commit-tees consisted of gallery owners and independent experts. There was no overlap between the two committees. As noted, the fair was a private enterprise, while the subsidies were granted by the Dutch government. Nevertheless, miraculously, the two committees somehow decided on an almost identical division of galleries to be included and excluded.

Let"s examine how this could have happened. In 1992, Dutch govern-ment-sponsored avant-garde art was high and the fair"s directors were willing to forsake some .nancial remuneration in return for the prestige that avant-garde art accorded. Therefore, both committees invited inde-pendent experts as well as experts from a business organization of gov-ernment-oriented avant-garde galleries. Although these experts all knew one another, they later denied that they had discussed a common strategy for the selection of galleries beforehand. And this is probably true. There was no need for a conspiracy because the committee-members were already "in tune". They already spoke the same language. In the discourse they used all the right words and "correctly" applied their knowledge of representative galleries and artists to other galleries and artists. Without any conspiratorial intent, they "naturally" came up with the same selec-tion of galleries. The members of the two committees were gatekeepers of the same informal barrier that surrounds "quality" galleries.18 5 Characteristics of Informal Barriers In the example above, experts used an implicit de.nition of "good" and "bad" galleries, and thus de.ned boundaries and barriers. The "good" gal-leries that are on the inside belong to a privileged circle; the "bad" galleries remain on the outside. In the same implicit way, insiders use de.nitions of "good" and "bad" art or "good" and "bad" artists. Below are some styl-ized characteristics of informal barriers. (Sociology offers an extensive literature on related subjects like gatekeepers, cla.s.si.cations, reputa-tions, networks, and the transfer of capital.19 It"s not my intention in this chapter to improve on these .ndings. I primarily rephrase the .ndings to explain informal barriers and monopolization in the arts from an eco-nomic point of view.) a The control of an informal barrier does not rest with appointees or any of.cial inst.i.tution. Instead, the authority is an anonymous ent.i.ty. It comes from a collective of gatekeepers who may not know one another. By de.ning forms of recognition, they produce an informal barrier. b Anybody who takes part in the discourse on the recognition of art and artists and who is able to in.uence the discourse is a gatekeeper.

Artists and other experts like critics, gallery owners, dealers, impresa rios, civil servants etc., can all be gatekeepers. c Inarticulate terms are used in discourses on the arts. Their meanings change rapidly.20 Gatekeepers know the ins and outs of these shifting terms. Connotations refer to "good" and "bad" artistic styles, trends, att.i.tudes, etc.21 d As styles become increasingly dif.cult to describe, the names of a few key artists rather than of styles are used to denote a circle of recogni-tion.22 On the basis of these names gatekeepers can tell which artists belong or do not belong to a certain circle.

eThe de.ned selections and circles of recognition are versatile. They change as the process of de.ning the barrier changes directions. This kind of versatility is possible through the use of container words, such as quality, original, authentic, cutting edge, or innovative, and of names of key artists who represent other related artists as well.

fGatekeepers have an information advantage that allows them to monopolize the discourse, which in turn enables them to easily exclude both artists and experts who do not understand the discourse well enough.

g For producers and consumers alike, informal barriers are a signal that artists inside the circle have qualities that artists outside the circle do not have.

h In practice there are, within any art form, only a limited number of dif-ferent circles of recognition that effectively signal quality.

iA formal barrier often becomes temporarily attached to an informal barrier. Its mark stands for the informal barrier. It is a mark of quality by a.s.sociation.

jCertain formal barriers are interconnected because they stand for the same informal barrier.

k Because the government, to a large extent, .nances the professional regime in the arts and thus pays the numerous gatekeepers, these gate-keepers take care of the government"s interests.

lInformal barriers function as reward systems.23 By pa.s.sing through a particular barrier after ful.lling its requirements, artists start to share in the rewards of a privileged circle.

m Informal barriers hinder compet.i.tion. Memberships within a circle are limited, which means more monetary and non-monetary income for insiders and less for outsiders.

The existence of informal barriers in the arts can usually only be made credible. A .rst clue in the investigation of informal barriers and circles of recognition can often be found in formal barriers, because these formal barriers sometimes get temporarily attached to informal barriers. Formal barriers offer anchorage and a clearly visible sign of quality as well as an organizational structure for gatekeepers. Formal barriers in the arts are easily discerned. Admission to advanced training, diplomas, subsidies, prizes and awards, admission to an artist a.s.sociation, museum purchases, invitations to arts fairs, having one"s work performed by a well-known orchestra, and receiving a prestigious teaching job are all obvious signs of formal barriers. Many of these barriers employ ballots or forms of cooptation. They are effective however, because they rest on underlying. The link is temporary, however, because formal barriers cannot function as signals of quality in the arts in an of.cial and perma-nent manner. This would be contrary to the autonomy of art and artists.

An example of temporary anchorage was presented in the .rst ill.u.s.tra-tion. The type of subsidy Alex received (a "werkbeurs"), was extremely important because in the Netherlands it was very visible and functioned as a sign of pa.s.sage into an important informal circle of recognition. As a sign, it was conspicuous. (It is currently less important as a signal.) In the arts these "marks of quality by a.s.sociation", which were never designed to certify artists, are less objectionable than permanent formal marks like diplomas, which are designed to certify artists. Therefore, when formal barriers gradually becomes rigid and begin to limit artistic free-dom, the informal barrier becomes attached to other formal marks.

When government subsidizes artists and when people organize, for instance, a music concourse or an art fair, they create formal barriers and so, deliberately or not, they enable anchorage to take place with one or more informal barriers. Without their intervention, the informal barri-ers would be less effective. To some degree, the government and those who organize a music concourse or a fair are responsible for the "good art" versus "bad art" dichotomy produced by the informal barrier. Never-theless, because an informal barrier connects different formal barriers, it is sometimes dif.cult to .gure out exactly who is most responsible. In the ill.u.s.tration, the impact of government subsidies was stressed. At the same time however, the aforementioned fair could have been decisive. (Alex"s work had been exhibited at the fair and the government commit-tee members could have seen his work there. The phenomenon of the "joy of recognition" will often mean that committee members will sooner grant subsidies to artists whose work they have already seen than to artists whose work they"ve never seen before.) Therefore, government barriers in part depend on market barriers and vice versa. Nevertheless, one type of barrier often dominates. In the Netherlands, for instance, the government barrier is usually the more important barrier, as we saw in the .rst ill.u.s.tration.

Informal barriers contribute to monopolization in the arts. The degree to which a circle of recognition is monopolized depends on how success-ful a group of gatekeepers is in limiting group size and raising income. In this respect, it does not matter whether or not the monopolization is intentional and the actions of the gatekeepers are coordinated.

Informal barriers as opposed to formal controls of numbers exist in the arts. They limit the number of artists in a circle of recognition and raise their monetary and non-monetary income. Experts, including artists, sharing a speci.c discourse function as gatekeepers (thesis 102).

Informal Barriers Protect Collective Reputations Because most art forms already have a huge supply of art and artists, art consumers have plenty of choice. But deciding is not easy. One often needs to be an expert to know the value of a particular artwork among the oversupply of, for instance, pop music and contemporary visual art. Is the work insigni.cant or does it represent the beginning of a new and important trend? With respect to new art, there is a certain amount of "uncertainty of taste".24 Art moves in many different directions, and even experts .nd it dif.cult to predict long-term developments. Nevertheless, experts still have a better idea of what is hot and what is not than the average consumer does. Because information is asymmetric, like in the case of used cars, experts a.s.sist consumers in distinguishing "good" from "bad" art by granting various marks of quality in the form of repu-tations.25 Reputations in the arts signal quality. Like the certi.cate on the door of the used car dealership, a reputation promises certain qualities for consumers, which artists without this reputation cannot offer. Neverthe-less, a reputation is not a certi.cate; it is not a piece of paper conferring certain rights on the owner, rights that are guaranteed by some of.cial authority. Instead, a reputation in the arts is part of a discourse in which many reputations are formed, a.s.sessed, changed, brought down, or pro-tected.

Reputations have (1) an individual component and (2) a collective component. The individual component is the personal trademark of an artist. Artists are usually known for certain authentic characteristics in their work, which they do not share with other artists. This personal "trademark" is an essential part of their reputation. Because experts including colleagues are continuously a.s.sessing the authentic qualities of artists" works, the reputation of, for instance, Freud is different in many aspects from the reputations of Auerbach and Kitaj even though they all belong to the same group of .gurative painters.

The collective component of a reputation rests on similarities within a group of related artists. The collective aspect of the reputation plays an important role as long as artists are not considered the top in their particular art form. This aspect is an imaginary signal or mark of quality, which is connected to the informal barrier that surrounds the group of related artists. (As noted, nowadays these "schools" usually do not have names, but are known by the names of one or two key artists.) Gatekeep-ers decide on who to let in (to attain a certain reputation) and those who are to be kept out. In fact, partic.i.p.ants in the discourse occasionally let artists in by granting them a favorable reputation, while others are rejected or are stripped of their favorable reputations. This way the favorable reputation of the insider artists can be protected. Letting artists in is often a matter of cooptation, but cooptation within the limi-tations set by the discourse.

Although no legal means exist to protect reputations, punishing offenders is apparently possible. Taking the favorable reputation away from offenders is the same as revoking a certi.cate. Artists get a negative reputation and begin to lose income. This is why Margaret in the ill.u.s.tra-tion is reluctant to show her relationship with Alfred. She is afraid that people will learn about the connection and begin to see her work in a dif-ferent light. This could eventually harm her reputation.

Innovations in the Arts are Protected and Indirectly Rewarded The acknowledgment of the importance of reputations helps in under-standing the extensive presence of innovation in the arts. At .rst glance, there seems to be little award for innovation in the arts. There are no laws protecting innovation in the arts. Although copyright laws protect actual products such as texts, melodies, dance steps or images, copyright does not protect the innovations in the inherent artistic styles in an art-work. In theory, patent law could protect some of these innovations, as it does in industry, but in practice, patent law is not really applicable in the arts. The law requires unambiguous criteria. In the case of industrial innovations, these criteria are supplied in the form of speci.cations. Descriptions of styles, however, will always be ambiguous.

For example, anybody can copy Mondrian"s style. Not only artists working in the style of Mondrian, but also producers of shower curtains (and Yves Saint Laurent) using Mondrian-like patterns could freely pro.t from his innovations, as long as they did not directly copy Mon-drian"s work. In other words, no legal system of appropriation is in place with respect to Mondrian"s innovation in style.26 At the same time, the costs of innovations are usually high. Sometimes many years of "research" by one or, numerous artists precede the innova-tion inherent in a new style. Therefore, without some other system of remuneration the incentive to innovate in the arts might easily disappear. If governments and other donors didn"t .nance a large portion of scien-ti.c research, the same would happen in the sciences, where patents sometimes are also an unlikely option. Therefore, by a.n.a.logy, a case can be and has already been made for government subsidies to the arts to help foster innovation.27 The necessity of the subsidization of artistic innovation seems logical. It is not however because many creative and performing artists are that eager to innovate. Even though not all art forms value innovation equally, change and development are typical for both the modern cre-ative and the performing arts.28 Why are so many artists engaged in innovation, if it is, in fact, an unpro.table endeavor?

Although innovators in the arts do not receive rewards by selling patents, they nevertheless do receive rewards. The fact that outside the market gatekeepers give innovative artists a reputation for being innova-tive contributes to other rewards. Gatekeepers grant a favorable reputa-tion to innovators, which serves as a signal and gives them status and also indirectly increases their market income. Imitators on the other hand, receive an unfavorable reputation and in this way, the reputations of innovators are protected.

This means that while patents serve as formal barriers in the market, important informal barriers replace patents in the arts. The law protects the rights of the patent holders. Only those willing to pay a price are allowed to use patented ideas. Leslie Singer has suggested that the direc-tors of important modern art museums run semi-patent of.ces because they offer semi-patents to innovating artists by giving them reputations for innovation.29 By granting these reputations to some and refusing them to others, they manage to control an informal barrier. Therefore, museum directors are experts who play a signi.cant role in creating rep-utations.

Nevertheless, the in.uence of museum directors must not be exagger-ated. Reputations often begin developing long before these directors become involved. Therefore, the notion of collectives of gatekeepers is more appropriate. They create and a.s.sess reputations for innovation.30 Science, the twin sister of art, also has to deal with the fact that many innovations cannot be protected by law. The sciences however, have an extremely inst.i.tutionalized and formal reward system. The sciences employs a system of certi.ed ranks and t.i.tles, which is conducted by peers. The arts has no of.cial ranks and t.i.tles. Instead, informal barriers based on an ongoing discourse structure the arts. These barriers produce a balance between variety and continuity. The balance shifts over time and varies between art forms. In some art forms, like cla.s.sical music, continuity comes .rst. In others, like the visual arts and pop music, vari-ety and change are more important.31 Even though patent laws cannot be applied to most art innovations, these innovations do not go totally unprotected. Informal barriers con-trolled by gatekeepers protect reputations for innovation that lead to recognition and indirectly to monetary income (thesis 103). Since artists are indirectly rewarded for their innovations, a degree of appropriation exists.

The Arts are Structured and Developments are Controlled Discourses change and informal barriers are always evolving. Neverthe-less, these barriers con.ne the economy of the arts; the economy is less open than expected. Informal barriers not only con.ne, but also struc-ture the economy of the arts (thesis 104). Therefore, the results of people"s activities in the arts are not altogether unpredictable. In this context, I will offer a few remarks on the origin and the mechanism of change in the arts. They may contribute to the understanding of the economy of the arts. (A detailed discussion of the subject falls, however, outside the scope of this book.) When gatekeepers meet, for instance in committees deciding on grants, they speak the same language because they have been trained in the same discourse. Therefore, they tend to agree easily, sometimes to their own astonishment.32 Within the process, the discourse changes. New insights gradually creep into the discourse and in.uence the out-comes of decisions.

In modern art, different schools or styles come and go. By employing the inarticulateness of container terms "dialects" develop. When a new style survives, the dialect starts to in.uence the main discourse. And when it becomes more and more noticed, chief experts and peers start to a.s.sess the new school or style. At this stage, existing gatekeepers ridicule the new style, .ght it, respect it, argue for its recognition, and even start to "produce" it. This is a give and take between the newcomers and the established experts and peers. In this way, the central discourse changes from within. And so barriers also change.

Usually there is only one dominant discourse. Nevertheless, occasion-ally a .ght between two discourses can go on undecided for a long time, like the .ght between avant-garde (contemporary) and traditional (modern) art in Britain discussed in Chapter 3. In this case, two dis-courses exist side by side which have their own gatekeepers and chal-lengers and that largely change from within.

Although a discourse is .exible, it would be wrong to a.s.sume that a discourse can take any form. An art form has a history. Over time cul-tural capital has been acc.u.mulated, which cannot easily be undone. Even when groups disagree, they always have some common ground to stand on. It is above all because of this .xed core that committee members understand one another.33 By controlling the barriers that new styles face, gatekeepers indirectly de.ne art. They check whether new develop-ments respect the core of the specialization or take it in directions they do not approve off.34 The authority or power invested in the informal barriers in the arts rests with groups of insiders, artists, and other experts. In this respect, not everybody who takes part in the discourse surrounding a barrier has the same power. For instance, the director of an important museum of modern art is likely to have a larger say than a critic writing for a local newspaper. This con.rms the conclusion in Chapter 3 that not only the power of rich people"s money, but also the power of words of those with a lot of cultural capital in.uences the de.nition of art, an in.uence that most others do not have. Because the power to de.ne art is unequally dis-tributed, the arts are not as open and free as they seem to be.

The inaccessible or open nature of the arts also depends on the way the power to de.ne art changes hands. Is it vanquished or is it handed over voluntarily? Is there an element of heredity involved in the sense that important artists and experts hand over power to their own kind rather than to strangers? Viewed from the outside, such a system of cooptation would imply yet another form of monopolization, which further abridges artistic freedom.

In the arts, cultural capital and social capital are important sources of power. They enable experts, including artists, to partic.i.p.ate in the rele-vant discourses. Their capital is found in relationships and a network, in their knowledge of the history of an art form, of its developments, of the names of its relevant artists and of the accurate interpretation of perti-nent terminology. However, their power never goes undisputed. If others manage to increase their cultural and social power within the discourse, the value of the cultural and social capital of the .rst diminishes. There-fore, by controlling the access to circles of recognition, including govern-ment funds, the experts and artists concerned have an indirect means to safeguard their cultural capital and pa.s.s it on to whomever they choose.

In general, important gatekeepers tend to favor fellow artists or artist friends who belong to the same artistic schools, even the same colleges where the gatekeepers studied or worked as teachers. This means that to be accepted, the cultural capital, as well as the social capital of newcom-ers, counts. These "kinfolk" or "rookies" are likely to respect the cultural capital of the gatekeepers.35 (Alfred in the ill.u.s.tration is evidently not an important gatekeeper, but an outsider. Although Alfred may have in.u-enced Margaret, she joined an established circle of recognition with its own leading artists. Because Margaret doesn"t take risks and goes to great pains not to offend her colleagues, she is more of a rookie than a rebel. Nevertheless, occasionally gatekeepers invite a "rebel" in as well. Sometimes the alliance with a young rebel can slow down the devalua-tion of the gatekeepers" capital.) At the end of their careers, the old guard"s power will necessarily diminish, but their capital can remain valued and respected. Proteges choose their own directions but will refrain from ridiculing the outdated capital of the old guard and continue to pay tribute. In this way the cul-tural capital of older artists lives on in the work of their younger col-leagues and becomes part of the core of the specialization. This is how successful older artists increase their chances of having their art outlive them.

Because informal barriers protect the bene.ts of a privileged position, allow cooptation, help channel the bene.ts to "offspring", and some-times safeguard privileges beyond the death of the artists concerned, they lead to monopolization (thesis 105).

The largely unintentional mechanism described above is also present in other professions, above all in the sciences. The difference is that new-comers in the arts unjusti.ably expect the arts to be open. Therefore, they arrive in droves, are ill-informed and unaware of the extent of infor-mal monopolization in the arts.

The Risks of Some are Reduced at the Expense of Others Due to informal barriers the arts are structured and partly monopolized, but the structuring is informal and dif.cult to discern. Informal monop-olization causes a reduction in risks for artists in privileged areas, while risks are higher for artists outside these areas.36 In the selected areas, average income, in the form of recognition and usually some money as well, is higher because many are excluded and numbers are relatively small. Therefore, compet.i.tion is less intense. In these areas, there is a consolidated effort to support the reputations of artists. Artists are also informally protected against theft of the intellectual property inherent in their innovations. Moreover, risk is further reduced as gatekeepers par-tially control the development in the discourse about art. Therefore the chance that totally unexpected developments will occur is smaller than elsewhere.

Informal structures make some areas in the arts slightly more pre-dictable and therefore less risky for its partic.i.p.ants. But it does not turn these areas into a safe haven. Even in these areas, however, artist"s careers are in no way comparable with university careers, for instance. Risks remain relatively high. Nevertheless, once an artist drifts outside these areas the risks become even greater. Risk reduction in the inner cir-cles implies increased risks in the unstructured outer zone. In other words, some pro.t at the expense of others.

When I envision the arts, I picture a large outer zone in which many unsuccessful artists dwell and a small inner zone comprised of a small number of more or less successful artists. In my picture, height stands for recognition. The large outer zone is a plane and the inner zone is a moun-tain in the middle of the plane with a few peaks. The beginning of the mountain range and the contours at different heights indicate three or four successive circles of recognition. Because newcomers with equal artistic talents seem to have the same small chance of crossing the plain to reach the mountain, they all seem to be as bad off in the unfriendly outer zone. This is not true, however. Due to other differences in social, cultural, and economic capital, newcomers in the arts face different risks. On average, those who manage to cross the .rst barrier, the plain, have more social, cultural, and economic capital than the rest. And after that, fewer and fewer artists reach the higher mountain peaks, i.e., the higher circles of recognition. Again and again, more and different capi-tal is required to keep going. Some has been gathered along the way; other capital was already there. Most artists, however, never manage to leave the outer zone.

Chapter 5 argued that artists are ill-informed about the arts; because of the myths about freedom and autonomy they can"t see the full extent of the barriers. Therefore, many people enter the art world, who would not have entered, had they been able to see the barriers clearly. Because the control of numbers in the arts is informal rather than formal, people contemplating a career in the arts are usually ill-informed; they think the arts are more open than they really are and they are unaware of the extent to which informal monopolization characterizes the arts (thesis 106).

10 Conclusion Why does Margaret, in the earlier ill.u.s.tration, publicly deny her rela-tionship with an artist friend whose work she admires? And why is it so important for artists to be favored by the government? Margaret has pa.s.sed through the informal barrier that surrounds an attractive circle of young, successful avant-garde artists. She does not want to jeopardize her position by revealing herself as having too many inappropriate con-nections. Meanwhile, artists seek government recognition because it represents the informal barrier that distinguishes "good" from "bad" artists.

On the one hand, the economy of the arts is exceptional because there is little occupational regulation. No diplomas are required to practice art or to call oneself an artist. Admission to the existing bodies of knowledge in the arts is also not controlled. There is a taboo on both forms of con-trol because the arts need to protect their autonomous imago. The arts must appear to be open. On the other hand, however, the economy of the arts is exceptional because of the existence of many informal barriers that are dif.cult to ascertain and ultimately reduce the openness of the arts.

Successful artists and other gatekeepers control informal barriers. As was the case with Margaret, only limited numbers of artists are admitted into speci.c circles of recognition. Versatile rules develop and are applied during discourses among insiders, who don"t necessarily know one another. Using this kind of discourse reputations are built, a.s.sessed, or destroyed.

Reputations resemble property rights in the market because when experts and peers recognize the style of a particular artist or a group of artists, another artist or group can no longer lay claim to this style. Therefore, although artists cannot acquire patents to protect their work under the law, their innovations are nevertheless informally protected.

It turns out that in the introduction to this chapter both the artist and the economist were wrong in a.s.suming that few barriers exist in the arts. There are more barriers in the arts and the arts are more structured than one would expect in the absence of a formal control of numbers. People entering the arts are often not aware of the numerous barriers. They believe that all that matters is talent and hard work. Many artists will continue to think this way until their dying day. This att.i.tude is part of the artist"s habitus. Artists are apparently ill-informed. The importance of barriers is underestimated, and so artists come in droves and their average incomes are low. This means that another explanation for the large numbers who enter the arts and their low incomes is the relative invisibility of barriers in the arts.

The arts appear to be a rough .eld to enter. It seems that everybody is as bad off as everybody else is. Nevertheless, for reasons n.o.body quite understands, some .nd their way while others do not. This chapter has hopefully made it clear that there are underlying structures, which privilege some at the expense of others. In practice, areas of reduced risk in the arts are reserved primarily for those with suf.cient amounts of the right kind capital.

Discussion 1One view has the arts pictured as an extremely anarchistic sector where everybody only looks out for themselves. Another view of the arts is that it"s more like a battle.eld where successful artists com-mand armies of disciples and together with other gatekeepers they "organize" the arts in order to leave their mark on art history. What is your view?

2In this chapter, part of the explanation has been shifted to areas, which are not treated in this book. What is the origin of artistic devel-opment? How do informal structures and monopolization emerge and how do they develop? How do differences in capital arise? Can you elaborate on these subjects?

Chapter 12

Conclusion: a Cruel Economy

Why Is the Exceptional Economy of the Arts so Persistent?

Apologizing for not Going into the Arts Alex meets Marco at a cla.s.sical music concert. When Alex tells Marco he"s a visual artist, Marco con.des in Alex that a few years earlier he had con-templated about going to a music conservatory to study composition. He explains that he is a good pianist and that he has won some prizes at con-courses for young people. During their conversation, he reveals his regrets about going into information technology instead. But his regrets appear to be of the romantic kind; the sort of regrets people can indulge in. Alex is more struck by the fact that Marco is apologetic about his choice not to go into the arts, as if he has done something wrong and now must apologize. Maybe he feels the need to apologize because Alex did manage to go into the arts. In Marco"s opinion, Alex has done the right thing. This has happened to Alex before: people being apologetic for not choos-ing the arts. Marco is, however, the .rst who explains why he is apologetic. He notes that by letting the arts go, he feels that he missed out on some-thing special. By not becoming an artist, he has harmed himself, like he has mutilated himself. He could have put himself, his personality, into his com-positions, which would have allowed his personality to grow. He would have become a more complete human being. Moreover, he would have belonged, belonged to the world of art. But it"s not just he who has lost out Alex mustn"t think him arrogant but society also lost out because of this regrettable decision. If he had become the composer he wanted to be, he is sure he could have offered something signi.cant to society. He would have joined the group of artists who help shape the history of art, of civiliza-tion itself. Yes, he is ashamed of his choice and deep down he feels guilty. Alex tells him that despite his talents, his chances of actually making it as a professional composer would have been extremely slim. Marco says that this just makes things worse. It demonstrates that he is a coward, some-body who wants to play it safe. Alex has to admit that Marco doesn"t appear to be a very adventurous person. Moreover, Alex notices that he thinks Marco is "bourgeois", even though Alex knows he should be congratulating Marco in his decision to choose a lucrative career.

Alex has discovered people like Marco everywhere, even in a poor country like Brazil. Alex (the alter ego of the author) wrote this chapter in Recife, Brazil. One day, while he was in an alternative bar in the new part of Recife, Alex met a woman, Maria, who told him that she had always wanted to become a dancer but ultimately decided not to. It struck Alex that she talked about it in exactly the same apologetic tone of voice as Marco. On another night, Maria introduced Alex to a group of dancers. None of them were employed at that time. Nevertheless, some had been working for fringe dance companies in different cities in Brazil, and were hoping to con-tinue to do so. The amazing thing was that their descriptions of the Brazilian fringe dance scene sounded a lot like the fringe dance scene in the Nether-lands: the same kind of dedication, the same hardships, the same large groups of dancers working only once in a while. The fundamental beliefs that underlie the arts and the economy of the arts are more international than Alex had thought.

Marco"s apologetic behavior lies at the heart of the exceptional economy of the arts. While Marco may have regrettably decided to not pursue art, many others decide precisely the opposite. They enter the art world because the arts are extremely attractive, despite the prospects of low incomes. The arts offer something "extra" that makes Marco apologetic.

I set out to write this book to explain why incomes are so low in the arts and why the arts remain so attractive as well as the phenomenon of the large amounts of donations and subsidies the arts receive. During the process, it turned out that in many respects the economy of the arts is an exceptional economy. In this concluding chapter, I will list the aspects which makes the economy of the arts exceptional. I will also summarize the book"s .ndings with respect to low incomes and the large gift sphere. On top of that, I will try to a.n.a.lyze the results by attempting to answer, .rst, whether the economy of the arts can be quali.ed as a cruel or merci-less economy, and secondly, whether artists sacri.ce themselves or are sacri.ced within this merciless economy.

As an artist, I am aware that the arts did not bestow the romantic alter-native upon me I had hoped for. Being an artist is just a lot of hard work and also badly paid work. Nevertheless, I continue to believe that all my struggles will ultimately be worth the effort. I am convinced that in the years to come I will contribute something signi.cant to the history of art. Because the work is hard and badly paid I really need this kind of belief to keep me going. As a social scientist, I am now aware that the arts are a tough place for many of those who take the plunge. The economy is mer-ciless. It is also an exceptional economy. Because of all the myths that swaddle art, the economy of the arts is persistently exceptional.

The Economy of the Arts is an Exceptional Economy In the course of this book, I have drawn a picture of the economy of the arts that shows its exceptional nature. The following table lists several exceptional aspects as they appeared in the pages of this book. Taken together they portray an exceptional economy.

table 4 aspects contributing to the exceptional nature of the economy of the arts 1The valuation of art products tends to be asymmetric; one group looks up to the high art of the other group, while the latter looks down on the low art of the former. (Chapter 1) 2In the arts: (1) the economy is denied; (2) it is pro.table to be non- commercial; (3) commercial activities are veiled. (Chapter 2) 3 Art and artists have an exceptionally high status. (Chapter 1) 4 Artists overlook or deny their orientation towards rewards.

(Chapter 4) 5 Top incomes in the arts are extremely high; higher than in other professions. (Chapter 5) 6The large majority of artists earn less than other professionals do. Hourly income is low or even negative. In the modern welfare state, this is truly exceptional. (Chapter 5) 7Despite these low incomes, an unusually high number of young-sters still want to become artists. The arts are extremely attractive. (Chapter 5) 8 Beginning artists face far more uncertainty than the average beginning professionals. (Chapter 5) 9 Money represents a constraint rather than a goal for many artists.

(Chapter 4) 10Artists are (more than others) intrinsically motivated. (Chapter 4) 11Artists are (more than others) oriented towards non-monetary rewards. (Chapter 5) 12Artists are (more than others) inclined to taking risks. (Chapter 5) 13Artists are unusually ill-informed. (Chapter 5) 14A combination of myths reproduces misinformation about the arts. (Chapter 5) 15Artists more often come from well-to-do families than other pro-fessionals. (This is even more exceptional because usually the par-ents of "poor" people are also poor.) (Chapter 6) 16Poverty is built into the arts. Measures to relieve poverty do not work or are counterproductive. (Chapter 6) 17The arts are characterized by an exceptional high degree of inter-nal subsidization. By using non-artistic income artists make up the losses they incur in the arts. (Chapter 6) 18The gift sphere in the arts is large; subsidies and donations com-prise an unusually large portion of income. (Chapter 2 and 8) 19Unlike other professions, the arts do not have a protected body of certi.ed knowledge. Anybody can access it. (Chapter 11) 20Unlike other professions, there is no formal control of numbers in the arts. Anybody can pursue an arts career regardless of their quali.cations. (Chapter 11) 21Many informal barriers exist in the arts. (Chapter 11) The exceptional nature of the economy of the arts, as it emerged in the chapters of this book, is a relative exceptional phenomenon. The differ-ence between it and other sectors is a matter of degree. Nevertheless, given the combination and intensity of exceptions, the phrase "excep-tional economy of the arts" is justi.ed.

Despite the Many Donations and Subsidies Incomes are Low in the Arts This book has attempted to answer the questions of why income is low in the arts, why the arts are so attractive and why they receive so many donations and subsidies. The main answer to the .rst two questions was sought in the high status of the arts. It leads to overcrowding and there-fore to low incomes. A number of reasons were given for art"s high status. The denial of the economy both stems from the high status of the arts and contributes to this very status. Because the average artist cares less about money and more about non-monetary rewards than other pro-fessionals do, the high status of the arts

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