Contemporary Art - Institutions

Institutions

The institutions of the Art world are the art practices, private collectors, galleries, museums, dealers, art schools, publishing houses, auction houses, and philanthropists. Institutions are part of the art market.

Most well-known contemporary art is exhibited by professional artists at commercial contemporary art galleries, by private collectors, art auctions, corporations, publicly funded arts organizations, contemporary art museums or by artists themselves in artist-run spaces. Contemporary artists are supported by grants, awards and prizes as well as by direct sales of their work. Career artists train at Art school or emerge from other fields.

There are close relationships between publicly funded contemporary art organisations and the commercial sector. For instance, in 2005 the book Understanding International Art Markets and Management reported that in Britain a handful of dealers represent the artists featured in leading publicly funded contemporary art museums.

Outstanding books and magazines and individual collectors can wield considerable influence.

Corporations have integrated themselves into the contemporary art world: exhibiting contemporary art within their premises, organising and sponsoring contemporary art awards and building up extensive corporate collections. Corporate advertisers frequently use contemporary art prestige and Coolhunting to draw the attention of consumers to Luxury goods.

The institutions of art have been criticised for regulating what is designated as contemporary art. Outsider art, for instance, is literally contemporary art, in that it is produced in the present day. However, one critic argued it is not considered so because the artists are self-taught and are assumed to be working outside of an art historical context. Craft activities, such as textile design, are also excluded from the realm of contemporary art, despite large audiences for exhibitions. Art critic Peter Timms has said attention is drawn to the way that craft objects must subscribe to particular values in order to be admitted. "A ceramic object that is intended as a subversive comment on the nature of beauty is more likely to fit the definition of contemporary art than one that is simply beautiful."

At any one time a particular place or group of artists can have a strong influence on subsequent contemporary art; for instance The Ferus Gallery was a commercial gallery in Los Angeles and re-invigorated the Californian contemporary art scene in the late fifties and the sixties.