What is a capitalist artist?

George Lucas and Steven Spielberg

“Capitalist” and “artist” are both, of course, jargonizations.  Both terms have no fixed meaning; that is to say, their meanings are determined by the groups using them.  So, capitalist has a particular meaning when used by an economist in Chicago or a port worker in Shenzhen.  The meaning of artist, as I’ve discussed before, is usually debated between the market and the academy.

Capitalist artist has its own particular meaning, beyond a simple combination of the two terms.  Any artist’s work can be capitalized–made into money.  A classical definition of capitalist is one who owns the means of production.  Most artists produce the work, but they do not own the publishing house, or the distribution, or the marketing department.  An artist is a maker–this jargonization of an artist, however, runs into problems when we meet the conceptual artist.  What does a conceptual artist make, exactly?

Capitalist artist thus is a label that can be applied in many different ways.  From a certain perspective, we can think of any artist as a capitalist artist–or at least, potentially so.  Consider, for instance, Van Gogh.

Van Gogh, A pair of shoes

Van Gogh, like many other artists, died a pauper.  He had a few exhibitions while living, but lived mostly off of loans and the purchases of friends (other, more successful artists).  Yet we can posthumously jargonize Van Gogh as a capitalist artist–his works, in fact, sell for some of the highest prices of any artist (Portrait of Dr. Gachet sold first for $82.5, then later for $90 millions dollars).  So is Van Gogh a capitalist artist?  Of course, there is no “yes” or “no” answer to this question–it depends upon one’s own jargonization of the term.

Compare Pablo Picasso, wildly successful both before and after his death.  While living, Picasso teamed up with a pottery maker, and together they produced thousands of Picasso ceramics, many of which had only a few scribbles from Picasso and his signature.  Essentially, Picasso was selling his brand.

Picasso, Madoura pottery

These pieces of pottery made, and continue to make, money–for the same reason that an autograph or a sketch or a letter would make money: because they contain some kind of “spiritual” tie to the artist’s brand.

Another artist we can look at, when considering the concept of a capitalist artist, is Ai Weiwei.

Ai Weiwei, Seeds

Ai lives and works in a communist country, China.  Yet he is very much a contemporary conceptual artist, similar in method to Murakami or Warhol.  Consider his work “Sunflower Seeds”–millions of ceramic seeds were made by workers, not by Ai himself.  In effect, Ai, like Murakami and Warhol, owns the means of production–his brand.  His workers produce the art.  Sunflower Seeds sold for $560,000.

Steven Spielberg and George Lucas provide a more explicit, or traditional example of a capitalist artist.  They each own their own production studio, often hiring other directors and writers to produce their films.  They also both are skilled in marketing and merchandising their work, selling toys and video games modeled on their ideas.

So it simply won’t do to ask who is or is not a capitalist artist–there is no bright line between capitalism and the other forms (whatever they may be–anarchism? socialism? communism? mutualism?…).  Capitalist artist is, rather, a conceptual tool, a jargonization, a way of helping us to look at and think about the concept of the artist and the artist’s place in the world.  I could say that the entire purpose of this blog is to explore these nuances, to tease apart the pixels of this no-so-bright line.