Kunstmarkt: Feld als Raum

Die österreichischen Galerien zeitgenössischer Kunst 1991–1993

Abstract

In scholarly publications on visual arts, the terms art-world, artistic field or art system are often used parallelly, to some extent even synonymously. Despite the theoretical discrepancies of the terms, this becomes possible due to the implicit assumption that worlds, fields and systems are nothing but areas where art is taking place. Fields, however, can be grasped more adequately as spaces, or more precisely: as vector spaces. The paper develops this idea by dint of a specific research construction: the field of Austrian galleries of contemporary visual arts 1991–1993. By integrating its two most important dimensions (i.e. artistic field and market-field) this field of galleries is apporached as an art market-field. In doing so, the practices of galleries can be explained as stakes in the art market. The paper discusses the peculiarities of Austrian art galleries in the early 1990s as well as invariant aspects of markets of contemporary art. Particular attention is given to the explanation of the methodic-technical approach (among others by means of multiple correspondence analysis) and the theoretical-conceptual conclusions that can be drawn.