Dickie's Institutional Theory Of An Art World example essay topic

ART -history, -theory, -world (Accounting for modern art with Dickie, Danto, and Weitz) Up until the twentieth century art theorists had consistently sought for a definition of art-a definition that would determine a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for something to be called art. But artists in the 20th century did not want to be defined, and they deliberately tried to create artworks that would not fit under some theorist's umbrella. We saw the Beatniks with their free verse; we saw the pop art of Andy Warhol; we saw the rise of abstractionist and surrealist painters; we saw "happenings", and we saw "ready-made" art, all of which combined to make the finding of a definition of art almost impossible. It's not a surprise that some theorists just gave up and argued that a definition of art, or an umbrella theory, was non-essential at least, and at most not possible. The artworks in themselves in the 20th century were too radical to fit a definition, so an attempt was made to turn the focus away from the artwork itself and instead focus on the "art world"-the institutional / historical world that was the practical force for deciding where the line between art and non-art was and how it moved.

This essay seeks to explain the theories of Weitz, Danto and Dickie, how they relate to one another, how they changed the focus of art theory from the artwork itself to the "art world", and the problems that an institutional / historical theory of art runs into. Both the theories of Arthur Danto and George Dickie are influenced by Morris Weitz's theory, so it is fitting to begin with Weitz. Weitz espoused a kind of anti-theory. He got fed up with all the aesthetic theorists that kept on arguing that previous theorists had it all wrong and that they had it right. Weitz believed that aesthetic theories throughout history tried in vain to come up with the "correct" necessary and sufficient set of conditions that would be able to fully answer the question: "What is the nature of art?" Thus, Weitz steps up to the plate and says, "Aesthetic theory-all of it-is wrong in principle in thinking that a correct theory is possible because it radically misconstrues the logic of the concept of art (184)". Weitz believes that the concept of art is an "open" one, in which case the "logic" of this concept is precisely one which requires that it remains undefined.

Weitz is influenced by Wittengenstein's open concept of a "game". Like "a game" art has no stagnant set of necessary and sufficient conditions because art is a product of an ongoing creative process in which its properties are in constant flux and always have the potential to be changed. If you try to think of a necessary condition for a game to be a game, there will always be some game that refutes the condition, or some game that we could invent that would not fit that condition, but could fit many others. The question of whether something is or is not art does not require us to see if all its properties fit into some specific set of necessary and sufficient conditions; rather, it requires us to ask whether or not we will make a decision to "enlarge the set of conditions for applying the concept (Weitz, 188)". For both games and art there are no essential properties, there are only "family resemblances", or relational similarities that allow us to recognize whether a thing is close enough to be considered "art" or "a game". Weitz offers a great summation of his argument concerning the "openness" of the concept of art: "What I am arguing, then, is that the very expansive, adventurous character of art, its ever-present changes and novel creations, makes it logically impossible to ensure any set of defining properties.

We can, of course, choose to close the concept. But to do this with "art" or "tragedy" or "portraiture", etc., is ludicrous since it forecloses on the very conditions of creativity in the arts (189)". So, Weitz's theory of art as an "open" concept, which cannot be defined due to the logic of the concept of "openness", seems like a vicious attack on all the previous aesthetic theories from the ancient Greek mimetic theories to the formalist theories of Kant and those following his tradition. How can he cast them all aside as false or useless when they have undoubtedly influenced the progression of art and helped to enrich people's experience of it along the way?

Weitz himself has undoubtedly spent much of his own time studying aesthetic theory and has been influenced by it to some good. Though Weitz concludes that art cannot be defined and the question of the nature of art is unanswerable, he does not think that all aesthetic theories are useless, rather he makes it explicit at the end of his essay that aesthetic theories should be taken seriously as an "evaluative" tool with which we can "praise" and uphold the standards and "excellence" of art. Arthur Danto was influenced by the way in which Weitz's "open" concept of art took the focus off of trying to find necessary and sufficient properties of the artwork. Danto agrees that finding and listing a set of empirical properties cannot account for the ever-changing concept of art, but Danto does believe that there is a necessary condition for something to be distinguished as art. This necessary condition is the art world.

The art world for Danto is the world that surrounds the artwork and holds it up as art. It is a world made by the complex of art theories and knowledge of art history. Danto claims that the average person would not know if they were on "artistic terrain" or not if they did not have a theory of art to tell them so. Intuitively this makes a lot of sense.

If I suddenly came upon a tree covered in bright yellow toilet paper in some well known park, I might be inclined to think that some Jr. High kids thought that a prank like this would be funny, but then imagine my reaction when my friend who knows much about art and art theory, explains to me that this was probably done by a prominent artist that has a gallery a few blocks away. This toilet papered tree, which I happen upon, could be construed as a prank or art, but it takes a theory of art and knowledge of the history of art to truly recognize an artwork as such, i.e. for something to be considered an artwork there must be recognition of it as such through an art world. How, for instance, do you think people responded to the first "ready-made" art? I'm sure many people had no idea what to say, and even more people probably mistook it for what it actually was. Marcel Duchamp who is considered one of the founders of "ready-made" art as well as the Dadaist movement once signed a men's urinal R. Mutt and put it on display and called it Fountain.

Without the Dadaist theory and the historical circumstances of post WWI absurdist reaction to what was considered classical or "high" western society, culture and art, Duchamp's Fountain would not have stood a chance at becoming accepted art. It is even hard today to try to get people who have no knowledge of the historical circumstances or Dadaist theory to accept Duchamp's Fountain as art (like my Grandparents who would claim that it's not art, it's just ridiculous). Danto uses the example of the beds made by Raushenberg and Oldenburg, which could easily be mistaken as beds, though they are meant to be art. If a simple man who has no theory of art saw one of these artistic beds, he could easily mistake them for actual, poorly kept, or poorly made beds. A simple man like this does not have the ability to distinguish the "is of artistic identification" (Danto, 206).

By this, Danto means that a simple man who sees Oldenburg's bed that has a rhomboid frame and declares that it is a bed is not wrong, because it is a bed, but he is unable to see that the artwork is a bed, which is also an artwork-he fails to comprehend the is that allows him to identify the thing as an artwork. This "is of artistic identification" is much more easily distinguished when presented in the right context and accompanied with a theory of art. The knowledge and context presented by an art world allows a simple man to become aware of a thing, like a bed, or a Brillo box, as not just the artifact, but as an actual work of art. Danto's argument is best summed up as follows: "To see something as art requires something the eye cannot decry-an atmosphere of artistic theory, a knowledge of the history of art: an art world (Danto, 209)". Dickie plays off of Danto's concept of an art world, but he modifies it by adding a greater, more complex framework to it, effectively turning Danto's historical / theoretical art world concept into an informal institution. Dickie's so called "institutional theory of art" has two requirements for a thing to be defined as an artwork: the first is that there must be an artifact, which Dickie defines as the regular dictionary definition of something made by humans with a purpose in mind, and second, the artifact must be presented to the informal human institution of the art world public.

Dickie believes that the institution of the art world public is an informal complex of all those people that play a role in the many activities that contribute to making a work of art what it is. The art world public is composed of artists, museum curators, connoisseurs, art theorists, art patrons, art brokers / dealers, art historians, art critics, etc., in short anyone who plays a role in the conventional activities of the institutional art world. Dickie's "institutional theory of art" essentially establishes a framework of conventions. These are dynamic conventions that are as open to change as the concept of art itself. All the varying conventions are tied together through a common understanding shared by the art world public that they are "engaged in an activity or practice within which there are a variety of roles: artist roles, public roles, critic roles, director roles, curator roles, and so on (Dickie, 221)". Dickie's art world is made up of many "individual art world systems", which are essentially just the systems that vary with each artistic medium like painting, poetry, or theatre, and each system is divided into many different roles, the core roles being those of artist and public.

Let us quickly run through an example of what all is involved in one art world system in order to better get a feel for how much is involved in Dickie's institutional theory of an art world. What all goes into making a theatre production what it is? I imagine that it starts with a playwright writing a script. Then the playwright has to find a producer who wants to put on his play. The producer finds a director, who finds actors, and then rehearsal begins. The play requires a theater to be performed in front of an audience.

The play may or may not require props, lighting, backdrops, different stage sets, etc. Then, after the play has been presented to the public, art critics offer critiques of the play. If it is a hit, maybe the play will go on tour, or get turned into a movie, and the cycle will begin anew; if it is a dud and nobody likes it, it might show a couple of more times before it dies. This is an elaborate system of conventions in which many of the conventions can be thrown out and the system can still be complete.

The two core conventions of any system is the creation of the artifact, a script to be performed as a play in this case, and the presentation of the play to the art world public. The institutional art world conceived in this way can account for an open concept of art because the art world public is a loosely defined, dynamic grouping of people who have the ability to adjust their recognition of what art is as the properties of artifacts and artistic movements change over time. Thus, Dickie's "institutional theory" is compatible with Weitz's open concept of art and does not seek to find the nature of art in any set of necessary and sufficient conditions manifest in the artwork itself. It also encompasses Danto's conception of an art world composed of art theory and a knowledge of art history with its informal conception of the art world public, which includes the activity of the roles of both art theorists and art historians. Both of these roles bring a certain enriching knowledge to the framework of conventions that the institution embodies.

So, Weitz's open concept theory and Danto's theory of an art world reach a kind of culmination under Dickie's "institutional theory" in which a framework of countless conventions are able to mold and adapt to new artifacts that are also intentionally presented to an art world public. This theory provides a full and flexible framework for the definition of all the modern art of today and of the future. However, what it fails to do is provide a means for judging good art from bad art; all it does is offer a broad criterion for whether something may or may not be considered an artwork. If an artifact is created by an artist and is presented to an art world public than it is to be considered a work of art.

If either of these conditions is not met, then it is not a work of art. In Weitz's theory, the aesthetic theories of the past uphold the standards for excellence in art and a knowledge of these theories allows for a standard of judgment that any person that can read may have access to. In Danto's theory the same standards for distinguishing what art is and whether it is good or not can be determined through knowledge of art theory and art history. So, it seems that although Dickie's theory is influenced by both Weitz's and Danto's theories, his falls short of establishing a standard way for the average individual to make judgments about whether art is good or bad. Dickie's theory requires that judgments of whether an artwork is good or bad be left to an art world elite who's specific role it is to make judgments of this kind, namely the art critics.

But, then again, it seems quite possible that anyone who educates themselves enough about the conventional framework of the art world necessarily becomes part of that public in which case the standard of judgment becomes similar to that of Weitz's and Danto's theories, i.e. the standard of judgment can be obtained through the acquisition of an education of aesthetic theory, history, and criticism. So, before taking this class I had virtually no art history or art theory, but now I have a nice overview of art theory through history, in which case my ability to make judgments about art has definitely been elevated. However, I don't feel that just because I have the knowledge offered by this class that I am now magically part of the art world public. In order to be able to claim that I am part of the art world public, I must take up a specific role; I must acquire a genuine "eye" for art-a desire to experience it, take serious interest in it, critique it, and buy it.

In other words, I can read all the books on art that I want and not be considered part of the art world public until I make use of that knowledge through participation in one of the many roles in any of the individual art world systems.