An Integrative Paper on Approaches to Art History

Art as a Cultural System

It has been said that an object has value depending on a person’s perception. One makes meaning out of something and this is in relation to the way he/she sees things, which are first and foremost, affected by personal experiences which are shaped by the relationships that he has gone through, the joy and suffering he has felt, the values instilled in him, the state of the community and society in which he belongs to, and all other stimuli which affects his thoughts and convictions. This is made clearer by John Berger in Ways of Seeing, where he posits: “The way we see things is affected by what we know or what we believe. x x x We never look at just one thing; we are always looking at the relation between things and ourselves.”[i]

When I was younger, I was taught that there were different kinds of art –the fine arts (which refers to the Western idea of fine arts), and the crafts (of which the Philippine traditional arts were included along with our elementary art projects). Meaning, if I can produce paintings and sculpture, I will be considered an artist, and if I can do wonderful, breath-taking weaving(or embroidery, which I do pretty well), I will be seen as a “creative person”. Not that there was no honor in being creative, it was just that it seemed then that the recognition was not complete, and the nagging thought that some arts are just not “art enough” because they are not included in the “fine arts”.

Studying art today, I have become more aware of the western influences and biases that we have lived through and still continue to experience today. I am not going to bark on them and condemn them for throwing their weight about and harnessing the “colonial mentality” that I, like most Filipinos, have been guilty of. After all, it is just not the Filipinos who have “benefited” from these biases. In fact, western canons as we know today are laden with them. For example, the Western art style Gothic is actually a derogatory expression used by Italian Renaissance writers as a derogatory term for all art and architecture of the Middle Ages, which they regard as comparable to the works of barbarian Goths.[ii] Even the term barbarian, which means a savage and uncivilized, and uncultured person[iii] was used by the Romans to refer to the Goths, the Huns, the Vandals, the Vikings, the Teutons, the Franks, and the Angles because they lived outside the Hellenistic and Christian influence.[iv]

In studying art therefore, it is accepted that discernment and subjectivity can only minimize but can not completely dislodge cultural biases. Even Rustom Bharucha, in the Politics of Cultural Practice acknowledges this humanity in saying “In order to account for my cultural biases, from which no study of culturalism is entirely free, I should acknowledge that I feel much closer in my cultural and critical affinities.”[v]

This is so because we are as cultural as art, and art is cultural, in fact. Although some people have “managed to convince themselves that technical talk about art, however developed, is sufficient to a complete understanding of it; that the whole secret of aesthetic power is located in the formal relations among sounds, images, volumes, themes or gestures”[vi], it can not be denied that art is embedded in culture, and that to “study an art form is to explore a sensibility, that such a sensibility is essential to the collective formation, and that the foundation of such a formation are as wide as social existence and as deep”[vii]. Simply put, art is culturally significant because of the value and meaning the people in a particular community gives to it relative to the benefits that it brings to them as a result of their relationship with art. Clearly, “works of art are elaborate mechanisms for defining social relationships, sustaining social rules, and strengthening social values”[viii].

In the local context, the T’bolis and the Mandayas share a tradition of weaving which each and every member of their community has endeavored to nurture and keep alive to this day. This concerted effort in utilizing their weaving tradition, has not only given them something to live on, but it has also strengthened their identity as a people and prevented the extinction of their tradition since it has found a new meaning in the young people, particularly the young women, in the community: “they must help their mothers at a good source of extra income and at making something that is, after all, “theirs””.[ix]

The “discovery of a decorative detail or an unusual pattern in two different parts of the world, regardless of the geographic distance between and an often considerable historical gap”[x] reminds us of the humanity and universality of art and the fallibility of canons, research, and even science, to explain everything. It also encourages us to hurdle the barriers 6of cultural biases. Art will always be cultural and the biases from the Western influence and from us will always be there. However, although people go through different experiences and are exposed to different cultures, we all share the same humanity, the same pains, the same joys, the same need to feed not only our stomachs but our deep senses, as well, and this is evident in the different and similar ways we express our hearts and our arts.

Art of the Trade

In Africa, art objects and cultural artifacts are either acquired by African art traders from local villagers who, for financial or personal reasons, sell their “family heirlooms and ritual paraphernalia” or from artist who actually produce for export trade.[xi] In the Western world, especially in the 80’s, New York art professionals “operated as the art world’s power axis”.[xii] Here in the Philippines, we have several galleries in the metropolis, however, in the far-away provinces, especially those places where our ethno-linguistic groups live, valuable art objects and artifacts are sold to the “dayong mag-aantik” or visiting buyer of antiques. Similar to Africa, woven cloths made by the Bagobo and the B’laan groups in Davao, enter the market as “heirloom pieces bought by middlemen or “runners”, often from families in economic hardship. These costumes enter the antiquarian collectors market that runs parallel to the more tourist-, souvenir-, and fashion-oriented mass market”[xiii]

In trading art, art is also employed in the way these objects are marketed. Through the curators of galleries and auction houses, to the local African or Filipino art trader, creative marketing and publicity skills are used to introduce, arouse interest, and consequently encourage the purchase of these art objects, and more importantly, at a price that would be worth their attention. This goal is more clearly expressed as an ideal in the following:

What happens is that artists, dealers, and collectors have a shared taste and a common interest. The center of their attention is the work of art: it is a product of the artist, the commodity of the dealer, and the possession of the collector. The three types represent an alliance for the purpose of furthering the work both as a cultural sign and as an object on the market.[xiv]

Through the creative utilization of language and public relations, which is also publicity, they somehow re-invent the history of a particular art object, literally on some occasions. In the African art market, an art object is carefully presented, described(the history or origin of the object is re-told or re-constructed and information regarding cultural meaning and traditional use is provided), and altered, if necessary to “satisfy perceived Western taste and are intended to increase the likelihood of sale”.[xv] The future buyer and his pleasures are targeted, and is then pleasingly convinced that the object or opportunity being sold to him will make him happy and feel good about himself. “Publicity is, in essence, nostalgic. It has to sell the past to the future.[xvi]

However, the value of some art works does not lie anymore in its origin, its meaning, its size, or the stories that surround it—sometimes not even in its innate value. There are occasions and places where the sole determinant of an art’s worth is its price, and this price is upped by “how controversial” it is, and most importantly, “how much” a moneyed patron bids to acquire it, in competition with other bidders for prestige. Even during the mid-eighties, “artists and art professionals had become polarized by the idea that money was the driving force, even the focal idea, of an art system”[xvii]

One example would be Leonardo da Vinci’s painting, the Virgin and Child with St. Anne and St. John the Baptist. An American buyer wanted to buy it for 2.5 million pounds, and now innumerable copies of its reproductions have been sold by the National Museum which is holding the original—which is now sitting alone in a gallery enclosed in bullet-proof display case.

“It has acquired a new kind of impressiveness. Not because of what it shows –not because of the meaning of its image. It has become impressive, mysterious because of its market value.”[xviii]

In this kind of trade, where the value of an art work is dramatically ballooned to mirror the fat wallets of those who desires to own unbelievably priced objects, only the richest of the rich are able to participate, and the rest of us ordinary people will just have to content ourselves in viewing these works in postcards or reproductions, or in exhibits(if and when the owners decide to display their collections in preserve—again for prestige).

“What the modern means of reproduction have done is to destroy the authority of art and to remove its images which they reproduce –from any preserve. For the first time ever, images of art have become ephemeral, ubiquitous, insubstantial, available, valueless, free.x x x Yet very few people are aware of what has happened because the means of reproduction are used nearly all the time to promote the illusion that nothing has changed except that the masses, thanks to reproductions, can now begin to appreciate art as the cultured minority once did. Understandably, the masses remain uninterested and skeptical...”[xix]

It is in thinking about these expensive paintings that I have come to appreciate the wonders of the copy machines and the computer. With all the manipulation, the preparation, the publicity, the stories told to sell an art object, for it to be sold at a sky-rocketing amount, and for its eventual “sleep” in its new “home” or “grave” seems like a pity. But then again, why not, he who owns the golden hen gets the golden eggs. As much as a student like me would want to sour-grape, or badly want to own(not really) a Luna, or a Van Gough, or a BenCab, I don’t think that would be possible right now. But thanks to modern technology, I am not left wondering what their works really look like. I even have print-outs of some of their works stuck in my notebook. However, I am aware of the “greatness”, the “calmness”, and the history that an original can bring to your senses, on sight. And so today, little by little, beginning with my favorite traditional weavers, I build my own collection, also hoping that in striving to be a part of the art world, someday, I’ll be able to actively participate in the art of trading art.

Art as a Means of Transformation

Whenever an artist is talked about, almost everybody almost often thinks of the eccentric personality or the unconventional lifestyle that is implied by being that—an artist. It does not matter whether one is a painter, a singer, an actor, a musician, or a writer, as long as one is an art performer, the unexpected and the unorthodox is expected.

This expectation is further justified by imagining these irregularities part of their talent to wield that gift of performance, which is also, not natural to many people. Aside from this, they are also subject to extreme conditions which goes along with their being performing artists—pressure from the recording companies, television networks, paying audience and, the considerably, from themselves.

As an example, Glenn Gould, a performing musician, “neither ate nor slept, nor behaved socially like anyone else. He kept himself alive with drugs, his musical and intellectual habits were ringed with insomnia and endless quasi-clinical self-observation, and in every way imaginable he allowed himself to be absorbed into a sort of airless but pure performance enclave”, while his “outstanding virtuosity and rhythmic grace produced a sound clearer and more intelligently understood and organized than the sound produced by other pianists”[xx]. Simply speaking, “the phenomenally gifted Gould seemed never to have done anything that was not in some way purposefully eccentric”.[xxi] He is one way off the stage--weird, and another way when he’s performing—brilliant and totally in control.

There are many other stories of artists who are transformed by their art, but the most interesting I’ve heard and read so far did not come from the “professional” or “fine” artists, but from a local contest in Calabanga, Bicol, as described by Fenella Canell.

The most interesting of the examples that she cited was the Ms. Gay Calabanga contest. I have heard of Calabanga before from a gay friend. I thought it was just an expression since whenever he has finished something that he’s doing, he used to say “Haaayy, Ms. Calabanggaaaa here I come!”. I didn’t know that there was such a place or a name for a gay contest for that matter.

I know of many baranggays which hold gay contests during their fiestas, in fact, just this week, our baranggay, Sn. Vicente, just held one. The interesting thing about this “occurrence” and especially the discussion held in class was that it brought to my consciousness, the transformation that the “bakla” is indeed working hard for during these occasions. They, as queen of the parlors, making women beautiful, they who are “are more artful in altering appearances x x x and therefore occupy a very particular position as mediators of beauty and glamour”[xxii] are, for night, actually going to compete as beauty queens. They, who are unrecognized in the production of art in which women are the primary beneficiaries of, will for one night, perform and apply art to transform themselves as “objects of art and beauty” inside and out—not only in their appearance, but also in their gestures, in their speech, in their “dating”. For once, they leave the “vulgarity” of being and acting the bakla, and transform themselves into the “dalagang Pilipina, mahinhin, mayumi, maganda, at matalino”, and aspire to be the “star of the night”.

However, performers and creators of art are not the only ones who could be transformed by it. In reading about, looking at, appreciating, listening, and writing about art, one could also be transformed through the beauty and the truths that become clear in the discovery of what is art, really. In reading about transformation, and opening one’s mind, I believe that one is also welcoming transformation itself, but to what?

Self-transformation, through arts or through any other medium should be relevant, thoroughly thought of and should be decisive, in my opinion. There are many ways and medium which would encourage self-transformation especially with the advent of high tech advertising and publicity, pushing us to take advantage or purchase this and that lifestyle, product, or opportunity with dollar signs in mind. “Publicity proposes to each of us that we transform ourselves, or our lives buy buying something more. This more, it proposes, will make us in some way richer—even though we will be poorer by having spent our money. Publicity persuades us of such a transformation by showing us people who have apparently been transformed and are, as a result, enviable”.[xxiii] It is not right and it is not wrong, it is just the way it is.

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[i] Berger, John.Ways of Seeing, pp.8-9.
[ii] Hinkle, William M. “Gothic Art and Architecture”, Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia Standard 2002 Edition.
[iii] The New Webster’s Comprehensive Dictionary of the English Usage. p.78.
[iv] Ortiz, Aurora et.al. Art Perception and Appreciation. p. 180.
[v] Bharucha, Rustom. “Interculturalism and its Discriminations”, The Politics of Cultural Practice,p.13.
[vi] Geertz, Clifford. “Art as a Cultural System”, Local Cultures. p.96.
[vii]Geertz, Clifford. “Art as a Cultural System”, Local Cultures. p.99
[viii]Ibid.
[ix] Quizon, Cherubim. “Living the Ethnic in Mindanao”, Pananaw. p.37.
[x] Levi-Strauss, Claude. “Split Representation in the Art of Asia and America”, Structural Anthropology.p.245.
[xi] Steiner, Christopher. “The Art of the Trade:On the Creation of Value and Authenticity in the African Art Market”, The Traffic in Culture: Refiguring Art and Anthropology..p. 152.
[xii] Sullivan, Nancy. “Inside Trading: Postmodernism and the Social Drama of Sunflowers in the 1980’s Art World”, The Traffic in Culture: Refiguring Art and Anthropology. p. 257.
[xiii] Quizon, Cherubim. p.36.
[xiv] Sullivan, Nancy. “Inside Trading: Postmodernism and the Social Drama of Sunflowers in the 1980’s Art World”, The Traffic in Culture: Refiguring Art and Anthropology. p. 271. (Alloway,Lawrence. “The Great Curatorial Dim-Out”, Artforum May 13,1975, p.32
[xv] Sullivan, Nancy. P.157.
[xvi] Berger, J. p. 139
[xvii] Sullivan, Nancy. P. 266.
[xviii] Berger, J. p. 23
[xix] Ibid. p.32-33.
[xx] Said, Edward. “Performance as an Extreme Occasion”, Musical Elaborations. P.23.
[xxi] Ibid.p.22.
[xxii] Cannell, Fenella. “Beauty, Mimicry and Transformation in Bicol”. Discrepant Histories: Translocal Essays in Phlippine Cultures(Vicente Rafael,ed). P. 242.
[xxiii] Berger, J. p. 131