Savremeni umetnik: baštinik ili kritičcar savremenih sistema vrednosti?

Abstract

Uvođenjem predmeta svakodnevice u umetnička dela još u moderno doba sa prvim kolažima i redi-mejd objektima, pa sve do savremenog doba i kreiranja svojevrsnih umetnikovih instalacija, kolekcija sačinjenih od robe, neretko odbačenih proizvoda, reprezenata konzumerističke kulture, vremenom se postavljaju pitanja o autentičnosti umetnosti u odnosu na stvarnost, vrednosti umetničkih dela, odnosno položaju umetnika kao kritičara vladajućih vrednosnih sistema. U radu će biti preispitivana vrednost predmeta, odnosno vrednost umetničkih dela koja inkorporiraju predmete široke potrošnje. Vrednost predmeta uvedenog u Svet umetnosti u savremenoj umetničkoj praksi biće dovedena u vezu sa vrednosti predmeta kao nosioca memorije i svedoka određene epohe, odnosno vrednosti u baštinskom kontekstu. Najzad, posmatranjem predmeta koji predstavljaju sastavni deo kolekcije – umetničkog dela, težiće se razumevanju zašto umetnik odbačene predmete, koje često nalazi na buvljim pijacama i đubrištima koristi kao osnovne elemente svojih dela. Umetnik, svestan značenja koja određene kolekcije predmeta nose, menja sisteme vrednosti u kolekcionarskoj paradigmi i odabiru predmeta koji će biti sakupljani u prethodnim decenijama u odnosu na ranije vekove. Ovakav umetnikov stav konačno svedoči i o postojećim i mogućim promenama sistema vrednosti u savremenom stvaralaštvu.

Today’s world abounds of artists who collect different mass produced objects and commodities and create works of art out of these particular collections. Artists become the ones who bring back to memory the forgotten and rejected objects - which they often find on valueless areas on the outskirts of the big industrial cities, on the flea markets - by introducing them to the art world and giving them new meanings. It is also many times said that in the contemporary, consumerist culture, the only field of the open critic is the field of art. Still, in order to understand what are those value systems which artists criticize through different installations, and what is, if not the aesthetical, the value of the contemporary art works – collections of artists, it is important to understand the term value and to understand different points of view when it comes to the value of one object. Therefore, the first part of this paper discusses the term value and its meaning, while the next part tries to decipher the value of a produced object, commodity observed through the prism of economy. Understanding that the produced object is not always a commodity, but it can also be singularized or rejected, the biographical method of things is introduced in the third part of this paper. Therefore following biography of things, objects are observed and valued in all their lives and different values are given to them on different occasions. As objects which end up in artists’ collection – installation whiteness some period or somebody’s memory, the artwork itself becomes a particular museum, while its parts have a special, documentary value. Therefore, the value of object in museological sense is also observed. The Modern, post-industrial age brings new value-systems, so in one segment of this paper, it is discussed what the time of reevaluation of all values brings to the art world. Questions of the difference between the reality and art when it comes to imitating mass produced objects by artists or using every-day objects for the works of art creation are raised in the last part of this paper. Finally, examining objects which are constitutive elements of a collection – art work, it is tended to understand why artists use objects which they often find on the flee markets and in the trash as the base for art works. When comparing last couple of decades to the previous centuries, we can conclude that artists are aware of the historical models of collecting and the meaning which particular collections of objects had, and they change value systems in this collecting paradigm and the choice of objects which will be preserved. This kind of the artists’ attitude finally testifies also about the existing and potential changes of value systems in the contemporary art.