Course detail

Art, Commerce, Power

FaVU-ACP-LAcad. year: 2024/2025

The course deals with the relationship of art commerce and its relationship with power structures. How is value generated? The course will start with an excursion to 17th century Netherlands and the phenomenon of tulipmania and the consequent burst of the speculative bubble. What is the relationship between tulip bulbs and Damian Hirst's artefacts?
We will also look into trade with luxurious goods and art trade in 18th century France and England; we will compare these trade structures to those of the 19th century when art academies and a greater degree of institutionalization of art had a significant impact on artists' position at the market.
What is the relationship between the needs of the state, companies, or wealthy individuals to represent themselves through art and how does this need form the content of art?
We are also going to look at business manual for art lovers which should help them to get themselves oriented at the art market and contrast this text with the one which criticises the establishment of values.

We will look into the esthablishment of the myth of the artist, the expectations of the profession and of the professional conduct, and we will try to asnwer the question "why are artists poor," together with the texts by Hans Abbing.

We will also explore the norms and rules of the conduct of private galleries as they were researched Olav Velthuis from a sociological perspective.

Towards the end of the course, we are going to look at brand identity in commercial sphere, see how this can be related to the art world(s) and finish with general texts dealing with the critique of neoliberalism. We will see how art collecting can often be a means of financial investment and speculation.

Language of instruction

English

Number of ECTS credits

Mode of study

Not applicable.

Guarantor

Mgr. et MgA. Barbora Lungová

Department

Department of Art History and Theory (KTDU)

Offered to foreign students

The home faculty only

Entry knowledge

Students must be able to use English on academic level.

Rules for evaluation and completion of the course

Students will be assesed from discussing and writing short, in-class response papers about the assigned texts. Not having read those texts will count as an absence.
The answered quiz questions regarding each text for homework have to be uploaded to the shared drive a day before the class. Before the last class in the semester, students will have to have fulfilled at least 60% of the assignments in order to be able to finish the remaining assignments by the end of the exam period.
Students will be assessed from the regular, continuous work during the semester.

Attendance - max. two absences per semester.

Aims

Students should be more aware of deeper interconnectedness between the creation of value, social demand, social status, symbolic capital, and the distribution of power in society.

Students will become aware of the dynamics of both economic and symbolic value creation of artworks and artists through reading texts which analyze narratives and artistic institutions maily through the lens of sociology and art criticism.

Study aids

Not applicable.

Prerequisites and corequisites

Not applicable.

Basic literature

Abbing, Hans. Why Are Artists Poor. (EN)
Adam, Georgina. The Dark Side of the Boom. The Excesses of the Art Market in the 21st Century. (EN)
Goldgar, Anne. Tulipmania. (EN)
Graw, Isabelle. High Price: Art Between the Market and Celebrity Culture. (EN)
Perry and Cunningham. Academies, Museums, and Canons of Art (EN)
Solkin, David. Painting for Money. The Visual Arts and the Public Sphere in 18th Century England. (EN)
Velthuis, Olav. Talking Prices: Symbolic Meaning of Prices on the Market for Contemporary Art. (EN)

Type of course unit

Lecture

13 hod., optionally

Teacher / Lecturer

Mgr. et MgA. Barbora Lungová

Syllabus

The course syllabus is identical with the bibliography list. We will deal with one text per seminar.

Seminar

13 hod., optionally

Teacher / Lecturer

Mgr. et MgA. Barbora Lungová