Devalue/Value/Surplus Value Between “work” and “art”
Participating artists: Bill Balaskas, Martha Dimitropoulou, Andreas Savva, Efi Spyrou, Vassilis Vlastaras, Theodoros Zafeiropoulos
Curator: Charis Kanellopoulou
Opening: Thursday, 31 March 2016, after 7.00pm
On Thursday, March 31, 2016 the Contemporary Greek Art Institute opens the exhibition Devalue/Value/Surplus Value; between “work” and “art”. The curation of the show and the text in the accompanying publication is a proposition by art historian Charis Kanellopoulou.
Faced with an ailing economy and operating in a weakened market as members of an ever-expanding artistic community, artists (and other professionals involved in art) are often expected to act simultaneously as intellectual creators, producers, service providers and self-employed professionals; their work is increasingly remunerated in terms of symbolic capital instead of being defined in monetary terms. Thus they are called upon to content themselves with an “emotional income” that comprises the benefits of “presence”, prestige, reputation or professional and social networking but comes nowhere near the material compensation which will help artists make a living as well as motivating and financing their subsequent artistic pursuits.
In view of all this, how does one set a value to art and artistic work in this age of economic and cultural crisis? Can the links in a work’s “value chain” remain together, from the original creative idea through its implementation to its ultimate impact on the cultural industry?
In this show at the Contemporary Greek Art Institute, six visual artists —Bill Balaskas, Martha Dimitropoulou, Andreas Savva, Efi Spyrou, Vassilis Vlastaras and Theodoros Zafeiropoulos— present their ideas and concerns about the conditions of artistic production, the evolution of their work in terms of both creativity and making a living, the twofold value of the artwork as “sublime” and commercial good, even in the “weak” market of the crisis, but also its possible dependence on it.
In contrast to the current reality, the exhibition also features material from the ISET archives about the terms of making art and the atmosphere of the Greek art market in decades past, in an era which favoured individualism, promotion of the artistic “name” and preservation of the artwork’s strong value in either aesthetic or economic terms through the pursuit of a successful presence in the system and the stock exchange of art.
Duration of the exhibition: 31 March – 25 June, 2016
Opening hours: Tuesday-Friday 10.00 - 17.00;
Saturday 10.00 - 15.00
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