What does bad conceptualism have to do with art sales?

Where I come from, we haven't really seen any upward movement from the private art market since the 90s (not even when almost everywhere else art sales boomed) and as a result there is now not only a high percentage of underpaid artists but an overpopulation of badly executed conceptual ideas.

Roughly speaking there are two main forces in the art world that control the market: the money flowing in from private and public buyers and sellers, but for the sake of simplicity let's call them the Private Sector and the government with it's subsidies, public funding and the general art collecting mechanism to fill national galleries with the selection of current and passed fine art. Usually both sides tend to cohabit the market and create counter forces to balance any problems that might arise. If for example the music industry and visual art are flourishing — people buying paintings by the truckload and nobody even thinks about torrenting someones music, but plays and musicals see a strong decline in visitors — the government will step in and help theatres with subsidies or an other form of financial support until everything gets back to normal. But what if it doesn't? What if the theatre becomes a deserted place, full of friends of friends of the performers and nobody ever buys a ticket again? Well, enter case study Slovenia. Since the private sector doesn't create the money to fund our hypothetical theatre problem, the government has to give out stipends to actors and other performers, directors get national founding for their projects and the theatre tickets get heavily subsidised so that they can be cheap to buy for those few that still attend shows. But a funny thing happens when such a way of no-commitment creative funding is let to roam free and uncontrolled by the wants and demands of the public, who, in a working economy, would decide which of the shows are good and which bad, and such decisions would be made with both financially and verbally, so that each project could be evaluated by several factors on why it either succeeded or failed (earnings and critiques most importantly). But the public doesn't pay the artists their salary anymore, the government does, so why should artists care if their work captivates the viewers that actually have an interest and some money, if they can now create entirely what their hearts desire without caring much about the receiving end (there is no "too conceptual" if the government is paying). But they do have to be careful not to get political. So now we have an interesting situation: artists can apply for founding and while not being the richest people in the world, they can live a normal life while making art full-time. But, that's good right? Well, the art that they produce doesn't have to be liked by anyone else then by the few people who handle the grand and funding proposals, so if a connection is formed there, like somebody knowing somebody, almost anything goes. And the question of quality disappears. And sure, one could say that the difference between good and bad art is a subjective grey area, and I agree, but speaking from experience such unbalances in the market have terrible consequences on the quality of the artistic production in any area. Therefore this time it isn't a question but a small piece of well meant advice; cherish every sale you make to a private collector, fan or company, they matter a lot and you should be immensely proud that your work is cherished for its quality in such a way because if helps others who are also skilled at what they do to have a chance to succeed. But if you see your work as too conceptual, not well understood by the public and you feel theory is something that will make you a happy artist and the execution of your work is a mere formality, maybe try aiming for grants and public funding rather than trying to find your luck in the open market. Not because conceptualism requires no talent, but because you do not have to focus on the "formalities" when nobody needs you to produce an aesthetically stimulating result. Or, just come to Slovenia, the heaven of conceptualism.

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Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://survivingart.com/2018/12/19/what-does-bad-conceptualism-have-to-do-with-art-sales/

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