Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology - uncopy

Finally, we must not forget to emphasize that the journals, the galleries and dealers have
no more or less a stake in these hierarchical and careerist economics than we ourselves do—
and so we have no privileged right to shake our fists at any of them.
BUT THROUGH REALIZING OUR SOCIALIZATION
I want now to take this further and talk about other conditions I am aware of, but which
are even more difficult at present to characterize. Hence the following remarks may be more
symptomatic than diagnostic. In the progressive history of capitalism, the concentration of
labor always creates conditions for the socialization of labor. Now, most of us are familiar with
the novel phenomenon in New York recently of “quasi-factory” conditions of art production
accompanied by the “factory-related” community, SoHo. It is plain that the currently “necessary”
concentration of production goes hand in hand with a concentration of population, and
also prompts a relocation of the market outlets. I doubt there has ever been such a concentrated
community of artists in contrast to a community of people of mixed occupations and interests.
One reaction to this is to assume that our present generation of artists identify their reality
only with their roles of “artist”—which, given the remarks above, is disturbing. If this is so, it
implies that the “other self” or “bureaucratized artist” in all of us has triumphed and we have
become inescapably reified in that role. However, the point to stress is this: the development of
a “factory-like” community, which sustains and encourages an exploitative market, also creates
uniquely different social conditions for that community and in turn may lead to social and
political awareness of the power of the community. 10
One noticeable outcome of this concentration and (some sort of) socialization of “art
labor” is the recent tendency to “unionize,” to form associations and organize the community
to have some efficacy of its own—and I think it is the first time conditions on such a scale
have existed where the idea of an artists’ union could be regarded as in any way realistic. There
are a number of examples: the old Art Workers’ Coalition, the SoHo Artists’ Association, growing
numbers of co-op galleries (“worker-controlled factories”) set up in opposition to traditionally
impersonal galleries (“managerial organizations”) and so on. Two instances I am slightly
familiar with raise a barrage of questions. The first is biased toward “production workers,” the
second is specifically a “non-production workers” case. The following comments are made in
the context of my earlier remarks and in the light of how I see my own “community” affairs.
In the case of the National Art Workers’ Community, while I am very sympathetic to
most of their proposed aims (as published in the Art Workers News, vol. 4, no. 6, September
ian burn the art market 329