This book provides numerous examples to support the first claim of a massive growth in the defining role of the market and its players during the art boom, who also increasingly have a say in establishing artistic value. There is indeed much to suggest that in recent years, whether or not an artwork was considered relevant in artistic terms depended to a greater extent on its market value. But this market value still depends on a "symbolic value" for its ultimate legitimacy. Without symbolic value, no market value--this is the book's second claim. For if it is true that society has been changing since the 1970s from industrial capitalism into what Antonio Negri has called "cognitive capitalism," then under such conditions, increased importance would once more be accorded to the symbolic meaning of an artwork. The art world is by definition a knowledge society, even if the spell of commercial success has long held sway over it.
Isabelle Graw is Professor for Art Theory and Art History at Staatliche Hochschule fur Bildende Kunste (Stadelschule), Frankfurt am Main, where she co-founded the Institute of Art Criticism. She is an art critic and co-founder of Texte zur Kunst in Berlin.
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