INSIGHTS 43
Commissioners too felt that social projects commanded
less high status than other, more conventional forms of gallerybased
art:
I always call it “the proper arts world”
which is really awful. In the white
cube arts world, we don’t really make
a dent, but every now and then we’ll
do a project that does get that kind of
press (Commissioner, 3B)
Others suggested that the art world seemed reluctant to
engage critically with the outcomes of social practice, tending
to limit its impact to the education or audience development
wings of an institution:
It shouldn’t be just, oh this is our
outreach programme and that’s just to
do outreach, or, these artists are just
to engage local people. It should be
really embedded (Artist, 7A)
Many felt that the conventional spaces of the art world did
not do enough to support social practice and treated practitioners
differently to artists working in other ways:
Socially engaged art is still seen as
low brow, I think, in a lot of the art
worlds (Artist, 7A)
The work is sometimes dismissed and
not recognised as an art practice in
itself…people and organisations can be
quite dismissive (Artist, 10A)
For some, this was reflected in a lack of financial support
for social practice, as well as a lack of promotion for those social
projects that did receive funding from an institution:
I don’t feel that a lot of galleries
take it seriously in terms of money,
but also in terms of platform — based
on their online presence but also on
their space (Artist, 3A)
In addition, both artists and commissioners felt that social
practice was more contested than studio-based practices,
particularly within the mainstream art world. At a basic level,
this meant that practitioners and funders had to work harder to
justify social practice in ways that were rarely expected of more
established art forms, like painting and sculpture:
That space [of validation] is secured
for them. People come in, they respect
the work. For us, we’re constantly
having to battle with people just to
get our project somewhere (Artist, 6A)
For commissioners, this sometimes meant that it was more
difficult to get support for social projects:
I think it would be easier to commission
stuff if the status of socially
engaged art in the arts world was
higher…It’s starting to happen, but
it’s still a bit of a poor relation
(Commissioner, 9B)
Researchers too felt that social practice — and the research
concerned with it — lacks visibility in the art world, calling for
more channels to share work being done:
You can do a great project and no one
will see it (Researcher, 1C)