미술과 돈에 관한 몇 가지 이야기들

A Couple of Stories on Art and Money

In this essay, I try to examine the economical mechanism in pricing arts and raise several questions surrounding the connection between the economic and aesthetic evaluation of artworks. A couple of stories ranging from a personal episode to the social phenomenon would present how an art historian(myself), ordinary people(like my mother), an artist(Yves Klein), and the market of a country(Goodmorning Shinhan Stock Company) are responding to, joining in, or accepting the process of the pricing system of artworks. From the economic point of view, an artwork has not only the aesthetic value but the social value for collecting and investment like other products. However, according to the social studies, pricing of artworks is based on a symbolic mechanism which has no direct connection to the ‘value’ of the works. The connection between value and pricing needs the conventional interpretation of the artworld. Many art historians and critics divide the price and cultural value of artworks to understand the process of art market. Some say that the cultural and aesthetic value of artworks is not affected by the law of supply and demand. However, others say that the connection to the pricing ‘contaminates’ the cultural value of artworks. Here, my question is whether we could talk about the aesthetic value of art without considering its economic value.