Eikonomia Notes on Economy and the Labor of Art

7/25/2019 Eikonomia Notes on Economy and the Labor of Art

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Sotirios Bahtsetzis

Eikonomia:Notes on

Economy andthe Labor of Art

Much has been said about the dangerous impactof a superficial, lifestyle-based, money-orientedculture: it has often been invoked as theexplanation for why people become passive,docile, and easy to manipulate irrespective ofhow disadvantageous their economic conditionsare. Following the illustrative critique of twoeminent proponents of this criticism, TheodorAdorno and Max Horkheimer, the culture of our

times is endangered by the uncontrollableexpansion of the culture industry into higherartistic production Ð manipulating the massesinto passivity and cultivating false needs.1 ÒArtÓthat produces standardized cultural goodsreflects a peculiar type of aestheticization of theeveryday world: a dream-like immersion intomass-produced commodities. This immersion isequivalent to the adoption of behavioralstereotypes and tastes linked to a continuouslyadvertised petit-bourgeois phantasmagoria, andalso reflects the advanced commodification of

social life. Furthermore, this conviction has had anenormous impact on the current understandingof art as derivative of a monopolized marketwhich functions on the same terms as thegeneral financial market, a view that experts inart business share. What is at stake in thecontemporary art field, according to so many ofits critics, is that the art market, as formed in thenineteenth century, was replaced by art businessin the mid-1980s, not only reflecting the fact thatcontemporary art has become a serious signifierof wealth, but also making visible thedevastating influence of neoliberal financialdoctrines and uncontrollable fiscal policiesformulated by pirate capitalists and corporatelobbyists on an art system that now runs on thebasis of speculation and self-promotion.2

But is artÕs relation to money so transparentthat it can be seen solely as an heroic struggle ofart against its subjection to commodification, anattempt to assert its aesthetic autonomy? Theimplied dialectic of the autonomy of art, acentral concept in AdornoÕs critique, refers to acomplex condition that can only be understood

through a more dialectical critique. As PeterOsborne observes, the integration ofautonomous art into the culture industry is Òanew systemic functionalization of autonomyitself Ð a new affirmative cultureÓ Ð thatpromotes ÒartÕs uselessnessÓ for its own sake.3

Ultimately, the self-legislated Òlaws of formÓ inpure art Ð autonomous meaning production bythe work Ð are an illusion. ÒWorks of art are thusautonomous to the extent to which they producethe illusion of their autonomy. Art is self-conscious illusion.Ó4

Let us concentrate on this point, as it allowsfor a further meditation on the connection

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Ñ m a y 2 0 1 2 S o t i r i o s B a h t s e t z i s

E i k o n o m i a : N o t e s

o n E c o n o m y a n d t h e L a b o r o f A r t

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Bernardette Corporation, Is Everybody on the Floor , 2009. Digital inkjet print.

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Image from Ad Buster's 2011 "Buy nothing day" campaign.

between the art system, post-capitalisteconomic power, and official, mainstreampolitics. Considering how politics work, wewitness first that the systemic Òfunctionalizationof autonomyÓ observed by Osborne can also beseen as the grounding force of the post-democratic forms of hyper-capitalism. In otherwords, it appears that contemporary artÕsusefulness offers to contemporary politics a

model of moral justification, as art, in itself,becomes synonymous with the absoluteautonomization and aestheticization of bothcommercial pragmatism and politicalfunctionality. Art does not expose itsuselessness for its own sake, but rather reflectsthe uselessness of neoliberal administrationand, by extension, of a post-capitalist market. Post-capitalist economics and neoliberalpolitics mime artÕs claim of autonomy as one ofthe grounding ethical values of Westerncivilization. In other words, the alibi of autonomy,

which was the main assertion and declaration ofmodernism during its constitution in thehistorical avant-garde, works today for thebenefit of politics and the market ofcommodities, which act in disguise as (modern)art. For example, Andy WarholÕs conflation of artand business attacks the culture industry by

adopting its rules. On the other hand, this sameculture industry attacks WarholÕs subjectiveliberalism by adopting his artfulness. From thisstandpoint, art must reflectively incorporateneoliberal politics and the post-capitalist marketinto its procedures, not in order to remaincontemporary (neo-modern, postmodern, orÒalter-modernÓ), but in order to continue offeringontological proof for the contemporaneity, by

necessity, of both market and politics. Bycontrast, of course, the market and politicsguarantee the contemporaneity and validity ofart within a given system. This is a win-winsituation. Every artwork produced today thatdoesnÕt comply with this system of mutualrecognition is automatically ostracized anddisappears from global media and therefore fromthe public consciousness. But what exactly does this systemicfunctionalization of autonomy at work in both artand politics mean, in economic terms? What is

the material cause of such an interdependenceof art labor, fiscal games, and artful politics asseems to monopolize art discourse today? IsnÕtthe debate of autonomy versus heteronomy aveiled way of talking about the fetishism of thecommodity Ð one of the major concepts ofMarxian analysis Ð and by extension, arenÕt the

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Joseph Kosuth, One and Three Boxes, 1965.

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onto-theological conditions of afunctionalization of autonomy best described bythe term ÒcapitalÓ? In MarxÕs concept of commodity fetishism,capitalist exchange value is constituted at thelevel of social labor as a measure of abstractlabor. It is not the materiality of an object, whichassumes the objectÕs fetishistic nature, but thecommodification of labor that determines the

value of ÒobjectiveÓ commodities.5

Althoughfetishism is immanent to the commodity form, itconceals not simply the exchange value of thecommodity, but also the exchange value ofabstract labor that stands for the product oflabor.6 Based on that Marxian observation, bylinking it to the concept of the functionalizationof autonomy described above, we can view thefetishistic character of commodities as a form ofaesthetization of pragmatic human activity andautonomization, a disjoining of human actionfrom any moral or social realm. In this regard,

individuality and morality are evaluated in termsof their materialistic creditability. The conditionof alienation in modernity demands this level ofsophisticated abstraction between labor andvalue. IsnÕt this the real reason why we keepbuying our Nikes even though we are fullycognizant of the unbearable exploitation ofhumans in their production? Nike as ÒgoldencalfÓ is the emblem of commodity fetishism thatsustains, in a sensuous way, our alienatedunderstanding of our inter-subjective relation toothers: a totally crude form of paganism thatalso illustrates the theological nature of MarxÕsearly socio-economical thinking. Does art occupy a particular status quowithin this theoretical edifice? Drawing on MarxÕsseminal concepts of labor, alienation, andobjectified species-being (Gattungswesen) ofbeing human as described in the Manuscripts of1844, we can argue that an artwork represents aspecific type of product of human labor.7 It is notoutside the human condition and social-being(das gesellschaftliche Wesen), which means thatit partakes in humankindÕs universal sense ofalienation, which is an inevitable intermediate

stage in the so-called socio-historical process.However, the product of human labor as asovereign and self-contained force (unabhŠngigeMacht) independent from its producer,potentially entails the means to overcome thealienated stage of current social-being. Radicalizing this Marxian analysis, we canthen offer a more refined description ofautonomous art. Artworks are, in any case, aproduct like any other and thus a part of thecapitalist exchange system. However, they aredefined by a special type of resistance; not a

resistance to being subjected to their capitalistcommodification, but by another type of

immunity. They tend to refuse commodityÕs ownraw fetishization, which, when unconcealed Ðthat can happen at any time Ð simply exposes itsuselessness, drawing attention directly to themasked social constitution of capitalistexchange. It might be easy to see behind anysimple commodity as fetish and expose theexchange value structure that sustains it. Itbecomes, however, very difficult to look behind

an artwork as it constantly negates its capitalistexchange value while preserving theconcealment of abstract labor assigned to it. Drawing on the above consequences, wecan argue that art is somehow different from allother types of commodities. Above all, thedebate between the autonomy and heteronomyof art, or the fiscalization of art and theaestheticization of the everyday world, does nottake place between the value of ÒpureÓ orautonomous art and its exchange value as acommodity, but is rather a combat between two

forms of fetishistic character. In this regard, theartwork (either as pure, commercial, or evenanti-artwork) is a second-order fetishcommodity: an intensified fetish. Thefunctionalization of autonomy can be seen asthis second fetish character of art, constituting anotion of fetish the reverse of that described byMarx. This is a category immanent only to theartwork. It conceals not only the exchange valueof the product, but, most significantly, thegeneric fetish character of commodities orcapital in general, and, therefore, thecommodification of labor, which constitutes thevalue of ÒobjectiveÓ commodities. The work of art comes to be anacheiropoieton Ð not handmade Ð and thustheologized. This term is used in Byzantinetheology to describe icons, which are alleged tohave come into existence miraculously (notcreated by a human painter). According to AlainBesan•onÕs reading of HegelÕs Aesthetics, thenotion of modern art is closed to such a conceptof the icon.8 One might assume that, even afterthe Hegelian proclamation of Òthe end of art,Ó theconcept of art as an acheiropoieton prevails,

transcending artÕs demise despite its continuoussecularization and humanization. If artÕs functionwas once to make the divine visible (as in ancientGreece), its function in the modern era is to makethe visible divine. In other words, over and abovethe common phantasmagoria of the commodity(AdornoÕs position), we have also theÒasceticismÓ of the work of art. In this regard, anacheiropoieton appears to be outside humannature and the social order, possibly followinganother disposition or system Ð in other words, itcreates an illusion of autonomy from the (human)

labor from which it arises and to which itbelongs. An artwork has the tendency to reside

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Rem Koolhaas and CecilBalmond's 2006 Serpentine

Pavilion conceived as a hot airballon.

outside the normal mechanisms of the market,to exist as something that cannot be sold, assomething that resists exchange, thus creatingthe illusion of a non-alienated social-being,although it is in fact located at the very heart ofneoliberal speculation. Let me give you a banal example from theeveryday world of art business as evidence forsuch a paradoxical thesis. We can honestly say

that the reason for the hostility with whichgalleries face the mercantile practices of auctionhouses can be traced back to this double natureof the artwork. By simply offering an artwork foropen sale, an auction house degrades theartwork to a mere commodity with an exchangevalue. In this case, the artwork appears to be aninterchangeable equity, like real estate or stockmarket shares, stripped of mystification andnegating its character as intensified fetish, as anacheiropoieton. Usually we experience only thenegative results of this double bind between the

economy of commodity and the economy of theintensified fetish. The practice of an auctionhouse poses a potential threat to the controlledpricing and validation policy of a gallery; ittransforms an artistÕs career into a speculativebubble, with the attendant precipitous drop inprice due to uncontrolled manipulations.

Suddenly, the artwork loses its value; it becomesa nothing, a useless plaything Ð or, looking at itfrom another perspective Ð a non-alienatedproduct of human labor! On the other hand,galleries, through their preferences for particularbuyers (collectors and museums), often try toprotect the symbolic and ÒuniversalÓ value of theartwork as something that canÕt be sold. Havingenough cash doesnÕt make someone

automatically eligible to buy art. And this falseexclusivity is not simply a matter of theÒconspiracy of art,Ó or the privilege of insidertrading attached to art by its practitioners, asJean Baudrillard remarks, but an inherent qualityof the artwork. In other words, the conspiracy ofart lies precisely within this paradox: theartworkÕs unreachable nature in fact guaranteesthe commodityÕs disposability.9

It can be argued that the artworkÕs doublenature has enormous consequences for acapitalist market system. Actually, its character

as an intensified fetish safeguards any commodityÕs struggle to be presented as anacheiropoieton, which can thus be disguised andsold as a ÒpureÓ artwork. The new systemicfunctionalization of autonomy itself Ð a newÒaffirmative cultureÓ Ð is a coy description of thisfact. Such a belief is gloriously performed in the

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contemporary culture industry, which producescommodities that must be sold, howeverfrivolous, unnecessary, or even impossible (likeJapanese gadgets) they are. They only manage tocirculate if they can be masked with the aura offreedom that stands in for the allegedlyautonomous artwork. The culture of logos, luxurygoods, and cult objects benefits from this almosttheological dimension of the work of art. This

fact should be seen also as the true reason whycontemporary art is so valuable to the financialmarket and political business today, and notnecessarily the other way around. Can we go even further and argue thatcontemporary artÕs innate tendency to replacethe general fetishism of commodity with theÒparticular economy of the artworkÓ is the modelfor any and every semblance of societalpragmatism today? In light of such a comment,and if we ignore the fact that the art system isactually subjected to the dominant social

relations of capitalist exchange as argued above,every wealthy collector appears to be a radicaltrickster, idealizing himself as a romantic heroand spiritual Parsifal, as some collectors indeedclaim to be. Indeed, they might represent a kindof hero if we consider the fact that one can easilyearn more investing in the stock market andcurrencies, instead of buying art. Investing in artis simply not as lucrative. If we take thisstatement seriously, the choice between the twoforms of investment is actually a combatbetween two forms of commodity fetishism:labor versus the intensified fetish. Both types ofinvestment are potentially unstable and theydemand the readiness of the investor to takerisks. But only the second can safeguardcapitalÕs ontological foundation. We can expand this discussion and arguethat a work of art in times of economic crisis, asin the current crisis, actually represents theideological means for capitalÕs own survival.Economic crisis is linked to the fluctuation ofÒfictitious capitalÓ to which credit andspeculation capital belong.10According toNorbert TrenkleÕs analysis of the late-2000s

financial crisis, Òthe growth of fictitious capitalnot only provides an alternative choice forinvestors, but also constitutes, when viewed onthe macroeconomic level, a deferral of theoutbreak of crisis,Ó which is inherent to thecapitalist system. (Such a crisis is a crisis ofover-accumulation, or, to phrase it in thevocabulary of contemporary macroeconomics, acrisis of Òover-investment.Ó In this case, aproportion of capital becomes excessive Ðmeasured according to its own abstractrationality as an end in itself Ð and is, therefore,

threatened by devalorization.) The outbreak of aseries of capitalist crises from the 1970s to

today has demonstrated the extremeunreliability of credit and speculation capital;they threaten always to translate a particularcrisis of devalorization into a genuine global-market crisis. Credit and speculation capitalgrow too fast because of electronic transactionsÐ digitally automated Ð and, as a result, createvirtually instantaneous financial bubbles, alwaysready to burst.

Art as intensified fetish always masks itsown existence as fictitious capital, eliminating inthis way any moral consideration regarding itsspeculative nature. We can then assume thatartÕs fictitious capital represents the bestpossibility for a continuous deferral of theoutbreak of an unavoidable capitalist crisis, and,for that reason, view art on the macroeconomiclevel as the best option for safeguarding thesystem, deflecting a crisis of over-investment.Compared to the credit and speculation capitalof digitally multiplied finance, art represents in

this regard a slow type of fictitious capital. Itrequires its own investment time. This wouldmake art the perfect defense mechanism, anoptimal deferral of the possible outbreak ofsystemic crisis inherent to a capitalist system.Art would combat the stagnation of thevalorization of capital in the real economy. If so,collectors are indeed the heroes ofmacroeconomic planning. This is indeed true. However, in search of abetter understanding of the current status quo, itis important to choose an alternativeperspective. In the current state of hyper-capitalism, human labor guarantees both theover-productivity and the accumulation, not ofgoods, but of information-commodities. AsFranco ÒBifoÓ Berardi notes, for post-operaistthought (Paolo Virno, Maurizio Lazzarato,Christian Marazzi),

social labor is the endless recombination ofmyriad fragments producing, elaborating,distributing, and decoding signs andinformational units of all kinds. Everysemiotic segment produced by the

information worker must meet and matchinnumerable other semiotic segments inorder to form the combinatory frame of theinfo-commodity, semiocapital.11

If commodity fetishism conceals the exchangevalue of abstract labor (according to Marx), thenlabor today stands for the attentive and affectivetime we produce and consume. Labor today isboth a semiotic generator and a creator oforganic time (of attention, memory, andimagination) to be produced and consumed. Let

me give you a simple example. Televisionadvertisers purchase advertising time slots. The

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Claire Fontaine's neon sign at restaurant Grill Royal, Berlin.

question is, from whom do they buy this time?ArenÕt the millions of spectators who offer theirattention, cognitive engagement, and time whilewatching commercials the actual creditors ofmedia and creative industries? This ismodernityÕs credo. However, one must add thatinformation theory does not consider theimportance of the message, or its meaning Ðthose are matters of the quality of data, rather

than of its quantity and readability. In thisregard, the message quality distributed throughthe television is of no importance. Semiocapitalpays no attention to the importance ofdistributed messages. Such a disjuncturebetween informational quantity and the qualityof communication finds its equivalence in theeconomic system. Ever since the abandonmentof the gold parity rule, the value of monetarycurrency is determined according to itsÒinformationalÓ value, its exchangeability instock markets.

In addition to that, todayÕs extremeacceleration of production and distribution ofsemiocapital has reached capacity, so thatÒdeep, intense elaboration becomes impossible,when the stimulus is too fast.Ó12 What if thepresent-day crisis of capitalism, which hasobviously reached the critical moment of Òan

overwhelming supply of attention-demandinggoods,Ó is a crisis of goods that cannot beconsumed? What if the current crisis is not afinancial crisis, but a crisis of governance anddistribution of semio-time? What alternative tothis condition can art offer? Art represents a very particular type ofsemiocapital. In contrast to the accelerated anddigitally self-multiplied capital of the global

financial system, the semio-time produced andconsumed within the system of art is slow andpersonal. You need some ninety minutes towatch a film, but only seconds to consume a TVcommercial. With modifications, the sameapplies to the reading of a painting or a book ofpoetry. Furthermore, art deals primarily with theimportance of distributed messages, not with itsinformational quantity. In this regard, qualityequals the intellectual labor and cognitiveactivity invested by the production of art workersand the reception of connoisseurs of art. It is the

deceleration of intellectual labor and cognitiveactivity offered by art that makes the difference.Deceleration means to focus on the creation ofdeeper, slower, and intensified time, toconcentrate on the production and reception ofmeaning Ð ideally the maximum quantity ofinfinite and, for that reason, inconsumable

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Sylvie Fleury, C'est la vie, 1990. Collezione Leggeri, Bergamo.

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meaning! (This might be another way to describewhat Adorno has called artÕs ÒmutenessÓ; forAdorno art is critical insofar as it is mute, insofaras what it communicates is its muteness.) What if the present-day crisis ofsemiocapitalism is at the same time a crisis ofthe current political order? In order to elucidatethis last thesis, I would like to link the notion ofthe work of art with the notion of oikonomia as

analyzed by Giorgio Agamben. The theologicaldoctrine of oikonomia Ð originally meaningÒstewardship,Ó or wise and responsiblemanagement or administration of domestic life Ðwas first developed by early Christians tointerpret the divine intervention of a personalGod into the world. This concept was introducedin order to reconcile monotheism as an emergingstate religion with the doctrine of the divinenature of the Son (within the Trinity), and thusexplain and justify the intervention of GodÕshouse, the Church, into the earthly world. The

extremely sophisticated Byzantine discourse ofoikonomia is directly linked to an elaborateconceptualization of the icon (mainly that ofJesus and, by extension, of all imagery) as beingpart of both the heavenly and the earthlyrealms.13 Understanding oikonomia (or dispositio,in Latin) as a Foucauldian project, Agambeninterprets it as a general theological genealogy ofmodern economy and governmentality. Modernpolitical and economic doctrines, such as theinvisible hand of liberalism over a self-regulatedmarket and society, go back to these earlyChristian theological concepts, which refer toGodÕs activity in the world. Such a genealogy ofeconomy Ð meaning of a government of men andthings Ð is pertinent to a critical re-orientation ofthinking concerning key socioeconomic conceptssuch as the capitalist ethics of work (accordingto Max Weber) or the fetishism of commodities,alienation, and human labor (as per Marx). Notonly various political concepts, but also thetriumph of financial thinking over every otheraspect of life in our times, testifies to this closeconnection between modernity and thesecularized version of the theological concept of

economy and governance. The novelty ofAgambenÕs claim Ð echoing both WalterBenjaminÕs ideas of capitalism as religion andCarl SchmittÕs famous thesis about the moderntheory of state as a secularized theologicalconcept Ð is that modern power is inherent notonly in political and financial administration, butalso in Glory (doxa), meaning the ceremonial,liturgical acclamatory apparatus that has alwaysaccompanied it. As Agamben puts it:

The society of the spectacle Ð if we can call

contemporary democracies by this name Ðis, from this point of view, a society in

which power in its ÒgloriousÓ aspectbecomes indiscernible from oikonomia andgovernment. To have completely integratedGlory with oikonomia in the acclamativeform of consensus is, more specifically, thespecific task carried out by contemporarydemocracies and their government by consent, whose original paradigm is notwritten in ThucydidesÕ Greek, but in the dry

Latin of medieval and baroque treaties onthe divine government of the world.14

This is exactly the issue of what is perceived asthe visual manifestation of power sustained bythe semio-time offered by consumers-creditorsof semiocapitalism, which allows mediationregarding artÕs current state and future role. Inview of capitalismÕs tendency to commercializeeverything as part of global financialspeculation, could art Ð understood as affectiveand sensuous time Ð offer an alternative? If

economy alongside bio-politics is thesecularized pendant to oikonomia, and thetechnological spectacle produced by modernindustries of the imaginary is the equivalent toGlory, then the following question arises: If thework of art as a dispositif of acheiropoieton canbe turned back against the doctrines, whatcaused human labor to appear as a commodity atthe very beginning, and what caused currentsociety to look like a network simply of fiscalizedinfo-producers? It is pertinent to us that art permanentlyassumes its position as acheiropoieton Ð a slowand mute icon Ð offering the impression that it issituated outside the world of labor (semio-time)as part of a particular economy. In this regard,the economy of the artwork might be the hiddenequivalent of both the governmental machineryand the economic control power within ouralienated society. Because of this, art strives toinfiltrate current society with the ascetic notionof the acheiropoieton and to hijack the secretcenter of power: capitalismÕs political andfinancial mechanisms and the spectacularÒgloryÓ that sustains them. Eikonomia,15 an

economy of the work of art, can serve as a Trojanhorse against the appealing and seductivedeluge of accelerated information produced byÒcreativeÓ investment managers, film producers,software developers, and corporate advertisers,who sustain commodity fetishism and directconsensual political decision-making. Such analternative economy does not exist outside thegiven system of hyper-capitalism. It simplyworks outside the given informationalparameters of the system. It produces aninconsumable and intensified semiocapital,

slowing down affective and cognitive time Ð or, inthe words of Lazzarato, it creates novel Òtime-

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crystallization-machines.Ó16 This is its hiddensurplus value in view of a future society in whichlabor is not a commodity, but the production andconsumption of content-time. It is indeed difficult to imagine a world inwhich the economy of the artwork will have astronger influence on the global distribution ofimages, stock market courses, and the bio-politics of labor, and will be able to establish a

paradigmatic shift in society. But even if such aworld remains utopian at the moment, artÕsdouble nature, which intervenes both in cycles offinancial speculation and in the actualproductive economy of affective time, still offersoptions for working within the structures ofmanagerial, economic, and political control.Beyond any romantic ideas of a revolution thatwould end the evils of capitalism, themarketability of art should not be seen as itshandicap, but as its safeguarding screen Ð atrompe-lÕÏil until a universal economy of the

artwork can be established. This might notcancel out the condition of alienation inherent tothe human condition and create a society free ofconflicts Ð the romantic dream of all socialrevolutions Ð but it might be able to suspend itsforce to destroy our inherent social-being. Theprice to be paid is often very high: present-dayimpoverishment and precarization of intellectuallabor, which makes artists (as well as inventors,philosophers, therapists, and educators) appearsimply as ornamental accessories of theeconomy. Indeed, present-day ÒimmaterialÓ andcreative workers belong to the most exploitedpart of the labor society. Not so, though, if weevaluate this labor not according to economic,but eikonomic criteria. Nevertheless, in afuturistic post-human scenario, in whichsemiocapital is not only produced but is alsoconsumed by those who are able to deal with itsendless acceleration Ð meaning by ÒintelligentÓmachines Ð and in which humanity exists only asa beautiful, viral bubble within a gigantictechnological, informational, and fiscal Gestell(the beginning of which might be the so-calledInternet of Things), the intensified, non-

fiscalized, and creative time offered by art wouldbe our only recourses. Focusing more on labor as

praxis, as a bringing-forth that takes intoaccount human laborÕs product as anacheiropoieton and its specific oikonomia, mightoffer us some solutions: worshiping less thegolden calf of semiocapital and creating invisibledispositifs of intensified time! This project willrequire its own economists, theorists, andworkers. Even if, for now, leading a life that is ascreatively intense as it is economically effectiveshouldnÕt be regarded as taboo, one should also

urge: Be careful whom you offer credit to! !

Sotirios Bahtsetzis is a writer, curator and educatorbased in Athens and Berlin, with a PhD in Art History(TU Berlin) on the history of installation art. He iscurrently an adjunct professor at the Hellenic OpenUniversity. He taught at the London MetropolitanUniversity and was a Fulbright research scholar at theColumbia University in New York. His research focuseson methodology of visual studies, gender studies,history of presentation and display of art, continentalphilosophy including psychoanalysis.

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1Max Horkheimer and TheodorAdorno, The Culture Industry:Enlightenment as MassDeception (London: ContinuumInternational Publishing Group,1976), 121.

2Interestingly, the moral justification of this neoliberalcult coincides with thephenomenon of the artist assuperstar, which actually

commences with the so-calledthird phase of contemporary artÐ art since the mid-1980s Ð andshould be seen as symptomaticof an equivalent transformationin society. As Olav Velthuisremarks in his insightfulsociological analysis of the artmarket, 1980 was the first yearthat the highest price paid for awork of art was for a work by aliving artist, $1 million for thepainting Three Flags by JasperJohns. What is more significant,however, than the winner-take-all economic model that beganto inform the art market, is theso-called superstar circuit thatemerged in the New York art

world of the 1980s. According toVelthuis, Julian Schnabel is therepresentative case of an artistwhose work saw a rapid rise ofprice level (and equally fastdecline), and is characteristic ofthe new marketÕs mentality andÒaggressive superstar pricingstrategy.Ó (In a period of lessthan seven years, Schnabelprices soared from $3,000 to$300,000, improving theÒsymbolicÓ and financial positionof the artist, his dealers, and hiscollectors.) Warranted or not,this mixture of show businessand stock-market mentalitylinked to prospective financialsuccess has, since then,

infiltrated the art world andproduced a Darwinian networkof success or burn-out. OlavVelthuis, Talking Prices:Symbolic Meaning of Prices onthe Market for Contemporary Art(Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP,2005), 145.

3Peter Osborne, ÒImaginaryRadicalisms: Notes on theLibertarianism of ContemporaryArt,Ó in Verksted 8 (2006): 15.

4Ibid., 18.

5Stewart Martin, ÒCritique ofRelational Aesthetics,Óin Verksted 8 (2006): 113.

6Ibid., 106.

7Karl Marx, …konomisch-

philosophische Manuskripte(Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 2009),195.

8ÒThe sensible rises toward thedivine and enters art only at thestate of ideality, of the abstractsensible. Art thus Ôlies nearer to

the spirit and its thinking thanpurely external spiritless nature

does.Õ The matter it exerts itselfon is Ôa spiritualized sensibleappearance or a sensibleappearance of the spiritual.Õ ÓAlain Besan•on, The ForbiddenImage: An Intellectual History of Iconoclasm (Chicago: TheUniversity of Chicago Press,2000), 205.

9Obviously, the conflict betweengalleries and action houses aspresented here is a theoretical

example. The reality is oftensimpler: Because auctionhouses not only often presentthe appearance of a free market,but also a powerful system ofinterdependencies between agallery, an auction house, and aprivate or corporate collection,they control Ð and monopolize Ðprices and values.

10As Norbert Trenkle explains,Òcredit and speculation capitalare fictitious because they onlyapparently serve as capital. Theyyield high interest rates andspeculative gains for investors inthe relative absence of real

valorization, which alwayspresupposes that abstract laboris spent on the production ofcommodities and services andthat a proportion of it issiphoned off as surplus value.ÓSee http://www.krisis.org/2009/tremors-on-the-global-market#more-3383.

11Franco ÒBifoÓ Berardi,ÒCognitarian Subjectivation,Óin Are You Working Too Much?Post-Fordism, Precarity, and theLabor of Art, ed. Julieta Aranda,Brian Kuan Wood, and AntonVidokle (Berlin: Sternberg Press,2011), 135.

12Ibid., 138.

13See Marie-JosŽ Mondzain, Image, ic™ne,Žconomie: Les sourcesByzantines de lÕimaginairecontemporain (Paris: Seuil,1996).

14Giorgio Agamben, The Kingdomand the Glory: For a TheologicalGenealogy of Economy andGovernment (Stanford, CA:Stanford UP, 2011), xii. Doxa in

Greek means both Glory andÒcommon beliefÓ or Òpopularopinion.Ó

15I freely use the term eikonomiain reference to theoreticaldebates during Byzantineiconoclasm. See Emanuel Alloa,ÒBildškonomie. Von dentheologischen Wurzeln einesstreitbaren Begriffs,Ó in Image 2(2005): 13Ð24.

16MaurizioLazzarato, Videophilosophie.

Zeitwahrnehmung imPostfordismus (Berlin: B-Books,

2002).

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