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Originally Posted by ploesj
indeed, which is quite a bad thing, since this is a time when art could really be available for everyone... it used to be an elitist thing because only the rich people could afford education, books, artworks. now it's an elitist thing because the majority of the population thinks it's rubbish.
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I see what you mean, and I also agree with Looking Glass Spectacle's point about the irony of those kinds of art that're designed to break down barriers but which often build even higher ones as a result. The problem really kicked in I suppose after WW1, when form itself became politicised, and that, as a way of 'protecting' art from the ravages of the market, it adopted a deliberately 'difficult' style.
The further problem for art in the twentieth century (in Europe at least) was that it tried to seperate itself from what it saw as a corrupt European cultural tradition and so was more about destroying the values of that tradition than anything else. This never really happened in the US, which at the time was more keen to find a footing within the arts establishment. Even now, the US has never really taken on the idea of an anti-art tradition with quite the same energy as it has been in Europe. The problem now of course is that the anti-art tradition has been largely absorbed by the art market itself.