THE ARTWORK IN THE FIELD OF ART: THE STAKE, THE CAPITAL, THE HABITUÉS

The article analyzes the relationship between agents of the art field and works created by them. The relevance of this topic is conditioned both by the growing social interest in the art and economic characteristics of this interest (rising prices and volume of art sales on the world market). The theoretical basis of the study is the theory of symbolic production fields created by P. Bourdieu, as well as criticism of this theory from the standpoint of sociological “returning to things” approach. Attempting to complement the agent-based approach of the theory of art field with the artwork consideration, we reveal the role of objects in the success of an agent in a symbolic game. The basis of our research consists of the fragmentary historical retrospective of art development, sales at different levels of the art market data and information obtained during author’s empirical research of the Ukrainian market of art. We postulate that works of art are involved in constructing the fields along with the agents, but do not operate in an independent or comparable to agents way, but perform delegated functions. Basing on the materiality of the artwork (if not physical, then legal and social), we consider the spatial and social relations, which the product being created is included in. These are the inclusion in the exhibition space, the storage and its terms, the spatial distribution in micro- and macro context, the movement and the sale. It is shown how physical and social space are interconnected: the transfer in one is immanent to the transfer in other. Analyzing the works in their relationship with the agents of the field of art, we find a parallelism of the trajectories of agents and objects that they have created, or which they are related to. Thus, the body of the artist’s works is understood as a socially marked out-object entity, structured by evolution of the author’s artistic style and at the same time structuringhis claims to change the position in the field. Looking at the social and individual significance of time and space, we prove the ability to treat a single work as the agent’s stake, which is a replica of his habitués at any given time. Agent’s success from this perspective is analyzed as determined by the winning of one or more of these stakes at the moment when they are relevant to the objective conditions, the definition of the field core value. In turn, for mediating agents the purchasing and possession of artworks is an attempt to both guess and provide to works a certain measure of symbolic power sufficient to win. Having considered the mentioned connections, we come to the conclusion that artworks are really involved in the structuring of art the field by obtaining capital and positions for agents with which they are associated. Since the examination of the objects through the research optics of fields theory helps to clarify the mechanism of symbolic game (struggle), we conclude that this approach may be useful in studying other fields of symbolic production, as well as to provide the basis for art field empirical studies.

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