Becker Art as Collective Action

7/28/2019 Becker Art as Collective Action

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Art As Collective ActionAuthor(s): Howard S. BeckerReviewed work(s):Source: American Sociological Review, Vol. 39, No. 6 (Dec., 1974), pp. 767-776Published by: American Sociological AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2094151 .

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AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEWDECEMBER,1974 VOLUME 39, NO. 6

ART AS COLLECTIVE ACTIONHOWARDS. BECKER

NorthwesternUniversityAmerican Sociological Review 1974, Vol. 39 (December): 767-776

Art workscan be conceivedas theproductof thecooperative ctivityof manypeople.Someofthese people are customarilydefined as artists, others as supportpersonnel. The artist'sdependenceon supportpersonnelconstrains he rangeof artisticpossibilitiesavailable o him.Cooperation s mediatedby the use of artisticconventions,whoseexistenceboth makestheproductionof workeasierandinnovationmoredifficult.Artistic nnovations ccurwhenartistsdiscoveralternatemeansof assembling heresourcesnecessary.Thisconceptionof anartworldmadeup of personnelcooperatingviaconventionshasimplications or thesociologicalanalysisof socialorganization.A distinguishedociologicalradition oldsthat art is social in character, his beingaspecific instance of the more generalproposition that knowledge and culturalproducts are social in character or have asocial base. A variety of languagehas beenused to describe the relations between artworks and their social context. Studies haverangedfrom those that attemptedto correlatevarious artistic styles and the culturalemphasesof the societies they were found into those that investigatedthe circumstancessurrounding the production of particularworks. Both social scientists and humanisticscholarshavecontributed o this literature. Arepresentative ampleof work canbe foundinAlbrecht,Barnettand Griff, 1970).Much sociological writing speaks of orga-nizationsor systems without reference to thepeople whose collective actions constitute theorganizationor system.Muchof the literatureon art as a social product does the same,demonstrating correlations or congruenceswithout reference to the collective activitiesby which they came about, or speaking ofsocial structures without reference to theactions of people doing things together whichcreate those structures.My admittedly scat-tered reading of materials on the arts, theavailable sociological literature, (especiallyBlumer, 1966, and Strausset al., 1964) andpersonal experience and participation inseveralart worldshaveled me to a conceptionof art as a formof collective action.

In arrivingat this conception, I havereliedon earlier work by social scientists andhumanists in the traditions I have justcriticized.Neither the examples I use nor thespecific points are novel;but I do not believethey have been used in connection with theconception of collective activity here pro-posed. None of the examples stands asevidence for the theory. Rather, theyillustratethe kindsof materialsa theory aboutthis area of human life must take account of.Applying such a conception to the areaof artgenerates some broader ideas about socialorganization in general, which I consider inconclusion.They areevidence that a theory ofthe kindproposed s necessary.

COOPERATIONAND COOPERATIVELINKSThink, with respect to any work ofart, of all the activities that must becarried on for that work to appear as itfinally does. For a symphony orchestra togive a concert, for instance, instrumentsmust have been invented, manufacturedand maintained, a notation must havebeen devised and music composedusingthatnotation, people must have learned to play

the notated notes on the instruments,timesand places for rehearsal must have beenprovided,ads for the concert must have beenplaced, publicity arranged and tickets sold,and an audiencecapableof listeningto andinsome way understandingand respondingtothe performancemust have been recruited. A767

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768 AMERICAN OCIOLOGICALEVIEWsimilar list can be compiled for any of theperforming arts. With minor variations(sub-stitute materials for instrumentsand exhibi-tion for performance),the list appliesto thevisualand (substituting anguageandprintformaterials and publication for exhibition)literary arts.Generally peaking, he necessaryactivitiestypically include conceivingthe ideafor the work, making the necessaryphysicalartifacts,creatinga conventionallanguageofexpression, training artistic personnel andaudiencesto use the conventional anguage ocreate and experience, and providing thenecessary mixture of those ingredientsfor aparticularwork or performance.

Imagine, as an extreme case, one personwho did all these things: made everything,invented everything, performed, created andexperienced the result, all without theassistanceor cooperation of anyone else. Infact, we can barelyimagine such a thing, forall the arts we know about involve elaboratenetworks of cooperation. A division of thelabor required takes place. Typically, manypeople participate n the work without whichthe performance or artifact could not beproduced. A sociological analysisof any arttherefore ooks for that divisionof labor. Howare the various asksdividedamongthe peoplewho do them?Nothing in the technology of any artmakes one division of tasks more "natural"than another. Considerthe relationsbetweenthe compositionandperformanceof music.Inconventionalsymphonic and chambermusic,the two activities occur separately;althoughmany composers perform, and many per-formerscompose, we recognizeno necessaryconnection between the two and see them astwo separate roles which may occasionallycoincide in one person.Injazz, composition isnot important, the standard tune merelyfurnishing a framework on which theperformer builds the improvisationlistenersconsider important. In contemporary rockmusic, the performer ideally composes hisown music; rock groups who play otherpeople's music (Bennett, 1972) carry thederogatory title of "copy bands." Similarly,some art photographersalways make theirown prints;othersseldomdo. Poets writing nthe Western tradition do not think itnecessary to incorporate their handwritinginto the work, leaving t to printers o put thematerial in readable form, but Oriental

calligrapherscount the actual writing anintegralpartof the poetry. In no case does thecharacter of the art impose a naturaldivisionof labor; the division always results from aconsensual definition of the situation. Oncethat has been achieved,of course,participantsin the world of art' regard t as naturalandresist attempts to change it as unnatural,unwise or immoral.Participants n an art worldregard ome ofthe activities necessaryto the production ofthat form of art as "artistic,"requiringthespecial gift or sensibility of an artist. Theremainingactivities seem to them a matterofcraft, business acumen or some other abilityless rare, less characteristic of art, lessnecessary to the success of the work, andlessworthy of respect. They define the peoplewho performthese special activitiesas artists,and everyone else as (to borrow a militaryterm) supportpersonnel.Art worldsdiffer inhow they allocate the honorific title of artistand in the mechanismsby which they choosewho gets it and who doesn't.At one extreme,a guild or academy (Pevsner, 1940) mayrequire ong apprenticeshipand preventthoseit does not license from practicing. At theother, the choice may be left to the lay publicthat consumesthe work,whoeverthey acceptbeing ipso facto an artist. An activity'sstatusas art or non-art may change, in eitherdirection. Kealy (1974) notes that therecordingengineer has, when new technicalpossibilities arose that artists could useexpressively,been regardedas somethingof anartist. When the effects he can producebecome commonplace, capable of beingproduced on demand by any competentworker,he loses that status.How little of the activity necessary or theart can a person do and still claimthe title ofartist?The amount the composercontributesto the materialcontainedin the finalworkhasvariedgreatly. Virtuoso performersfrom theRenaissancethrough the nineteenth centuryembellishedand improvised on the score thecomposer provided (Dart, 1967, and Reese,1959), so it is not unprecedented for

'The concept of an art world has recently beenused as a central idea in the analysis of key issues inaesthetics. (See Dickie, 1971, Danto, 1964, andBlizek, n.d.). I have used the term in a relativelyunanalyzed way here, letting its meaning becomeclear in context, but intend a fuller analysis inanother paper.



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ARTAS COLLECTIVE CTION 769contemporary composers to prepare scoreswhich give only the sketchiest directions tothe performer (though the counter-tendency,for composers to restrict the interpretativefreedom of the performer by givingincreas-ingly detailed directions, has until recentlybeen more prominent). John Cage andKarlheinz Stockhausen (Worner, 1973) areregarded as composers in the world ofcontemporarymusic, though many of theirscores leavemuchof the material o be playedto the decision of the player.Artists need nothandle the materialsfrom which the art workis made to remain artists;architectsseldombuild what they design. The same practiceraises questions, however, when sculptorsconstruct a piece by sending a set ofspecifications to a machine shop; and manypeople balk at awarding he title of artist toauthors of conceptual works consisting ofspecifications which are never actually em-bodied in an artifact. Marcel Duchampoutraged many people by insisting that hecreated a valid work of art when he signedacommercially produced snowshovelor signeda reproductionof the Mona Lisa on whichhehad drawn a mustache, thus classifyingLeonardoas support personnelalongwith thesnowshovel'sdesignerand manufacturer.Out-rageousas that ideamay seem,something ikeit is standard n makingcollages, n whichtheentire work may be constructed of thingsmade by other people. The point of theseexamples is that what is taken, in any worldof art, to be the quintessentialartisticact, theact whose performancemarksone as an artist,is a matterof consensualdefinition.Whatever he artist, so defined,does not dohimself must be done by someone else. Theartist thus works in the center of a largenetwork of cooperatingpeople, all of whosework is essential to the final outcome.Wherever e dependson others,a cooperativelink exists. The people with whom hecooperates may share in every particularhisidea of how their work is to be done. Thisconsensus is likely when everyone involvedcan perform any of the necessaryactivities,sothat while a division of labor exists, nospecialized functional groups develop. Thissituation might occur in simple communallysharedart forms like the square dance or insegments of a society whose ordinarymembers are trained in artistic activities. Awell-brednineteenth century American, for

instance, knew enough music to take part inperforming he parlorsongsof StephenFosterjust as his Renaissance counterpart couldparticipate in performingmadrigal. In suchcases,cooperationoccurssimplyand readily.Whenspecialized professionalgroups takeover the performance of the activitiesnecessary to an art work's production,however, their members tend to developspecialized aesthetic, financial and careerinterests which differ substantiallyfrom theartist's. Orchestralmusicians,for instance,arenotoriously more concerned with how theysoundin performance hanwith the successofa particularwork;with good reason, for their

own success depends in part on impressingthose who hire them with their competence(Faulkner,1973 a, 1973b). They may sabotagea new work which can make them sound badbecause of its difficulty, their career nterestslying at cross-purposeso the composer's.Aesthetic conflicts between support per-sonnel and the artist also occur. A sculptorfriend of mine was invited to use the servicesof a group of master lithographicprinters.Knowing little of the technique of lithog-raphy, he was glad to have these. mastercraftsmendo the actualprinting,this divisionof labor being customary and having gen-erated a highly specialized craft of printing.He drewdesignscontaining argeareasof solidcolors, thinking to simplify the printer's ob.Instead, he made it more difficult. When theprinter rolls ink onto the stone, a large areawill requiremore than one rolling to be fullyinked and may thus exhibit roller marks.Theprinters,who pridedthemselves on being thegreatest in the world, explainedto my friendthat while they could print his designs, theareasof solid color could causedifficultywithroller marks.He had not known about rollermarksand talked of using them as partof hisdesign.The printerssaid, no, he could not dothat, because roller marks were an obvioussign (to other printers)of poor craftsmanshipand no print exhibiting roller marks wasallowed to leave their shop. His artisticcuriosity fell victim to the printers' craftstandards,a neat example of how specializedsupport groups develop their own standardsandinterests.2My friendwas at the mercyof the printers

2The arrangements between artists, printers andpublishers are described in Kase (1973).



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770 AMERICAN OCIOLOGICALEVIEWbecause he did not know how to printlithographs himself. His experience exem-plified the choice that facesthe artistat everycooperative link. He can do things the wayestablished groups of support personnel areprepared o do them;he can try to makethemdo it his way: he can train others to do ithis way; or he can do it himself. Any choicebut the first requiresan additional nvestmentof time and energyto do whatcouldbe doneless expensively f done the standardway. Theartist's involvementwith and dependence oncooperativelinks thus constrainsthe kind ofarthe canproduce.Similarexamplescan be found in any fieldof art. e.e. cummingshad troublegettinghisfirst book of poetry published becauseprinterswere afraid to set his bizarre ayouts(Norman, 1958). Producinga motion pictureinvolves multiple difficulties of this kind:actors who will only be photographed inflattering ways, writers who don't want aword changed,cameramenwho will not useunfamiliarprocesses.Artists often create works which existingfacilities for productionor exhibition cannotaccommodate. Sculptors build constructionstoo large and heavy for existing museums.Composerswrite music which requiresmoreperformers than existing organizationscanfurnish.Playwrightswrite plays too long fortheir audience'staste. Whenthey go beyondthe capacities of existing institutions, theirworks are not exhibited or performed:thatremindsus that most artistsmake sculptureswhich are not too big or heavy, composemusic which uses a comfortable numberofplayers,or write plays whichrun a reasonablelength of time. By accommodating theirconceptions to available resources, conven-tional artists accept the constraints arisingfrom their dependenceon the cooperation ofmembers of the existing art world.Whereverthe artist depends on others for somenecessary component he must either acceptthe constraints they impose or expend thetime and energynecessaryto provideit someotherway.To say that the artist must have thecooperation of others for the art work tooccur as it finally does doesnot meanthathecannot work without that cooperation. Theart work, after all, need not occur as it does,but can take many other forms, includingthose which allow it to be done without

others' help. Thus, though poets do dependon printers and publishers (as Cummings'example indicates), one can produce poetrywithout them. Russian poets whose workcirculates in privately copied typescriptsdothat, as did EmilyDickinson(Johnson, 1955).In both cases, the poetry does not circulate nconventional print because the artist wouldnot accept the censorship or rewritingimposed by those who would publish thework. The poet either has to reproduceandcirculate his work himself or not have itcirculated. But he can still write poetry. Myargument thus differs from a functionalismthat asserts that the artist must havecooperation, ignoringthe possibility that thecooperation can be foregone, though at aprice.The examples given so far emphasizematters more or less external to the artwork-exhibition space, printing or musicalnotation. Relations of cooperation andconstraint, however, penetrate the entireprocess of artistic creation and composition,as will become clear in looking at the natureandfunction of artisticconventions.

CONVENTIONSProducing art works requires elaboratemodes of cooperation among specializedpersonnel.How do these people arriveat theterms on which they will cooperate? Theycould, of course, decide everythingfresh oneach occasion. A group of musicians coulddiscuss and agree on such matters as whichsoundswould be used as tonal resources,whatinstruments might be constructed to makethose sounds, how those sounds would becombined to create a musical language,howthe languagewouldbe usedto createworksofa particularength requiring givennumberofinstruments and playable for audiencesof acertain size recruited in a certain way.Something ike that sometimeshappens n, forinstance, the creation of a new theatricalgroup, although in most cases only a small

number of the questions to be decided areactuallyconsideredanew.People who cooperate to produce a workof art usually do not decide things afresh.Instead, they rely on earlieragreementsnowbecome customary, agreements that havebecome partof the conventionalway of doingthings in that art. Artistic conventionscover



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ARTAS COLLECTIVE CTION 771all the decisions that must be made withrespect to works produced in a given artworld, even though a particular conventionmay be revised for a given work. Thus,conventions dictate the materials o be used,as when musicians agree to base their musicon the notes contained in a set of modes, oron the diatonic, pentatonic or chromaticscales with their associated harmonies. Con-ventions dictate the abstractions o be used toconvey particular ideas or experiences, aswhen painters use the laws of perspectivetoconvey the illusion of three dimensions orphotographersuse black, white and shades ofgray to convey the interplay of light andcolor. Conventionsdictate the form in whichmaterials and abstractionswill be combined,as in the musicaluse of the sonata form or thepoetic use of the sonnet. Conventions uggestthe appropriate dimensions of a work, theproper length for a musicalor dramatic vent,the proper size and shape of a painting orsculpture. Conventions regulate the relationsbetween artists and audience, specifying therightsand obligationsof both.Humanistic scholars-art historians,music-ologists and literary critics-have found theconcept of the artistic convention useful inaccountingfor artists' ability to produce artworks which produce an emotional responsein audiences. By using such a conventionalorganizationof tones as a scale, the composercan create and manipulate the listener'sexpectations as to what soundswill follow. Hecan then delay and frustrate the satisfactionof those expectations, generating ension andrelease as the expectation is ultimatelysatisfied (Meyer, 1956, 1973; Cooper andMeyer, 1960). Only because artist andaudience share knowledge of and experiencewith the conventions invoked does the artwork produce an emotional effect. Smith(1968) has shown how poets manipulateconventionalmeansembodied n poetic formsand diction to bring poems to a clear andsatisfying conclusion, in which the expecta-tions produced early in the lyric aresimultaneously and satisfactorily resolved.Gombrich (1960) has analyzed the visualconventions artistsuse to create the illusionfor viewers that they are seeing a realisticdepiction of some aspect of the world. In allthese cases (and in others like stage design,dance, and film), the possibility of artisticexperiencearises rom the existenceof a body

of conventions that artistsand audiencescanreferto in makingsenseof the work.Conventionsmake art possible in anothersense. Becausedecisions canbe made quickly,becauseplans can be made simply by referringto a conventionalway of doing things, artistscan devote more time to actually doing theirwork. Conventions thus make possible theeasy and efficient coordination of activityamong artists and support personnel. Ivins(1953), for instance, shows how, by using aconventionalizedscheme for renderingshad-ows, modeling and other effects, severalgraphicartists could collaborate n producinga single plate. The same conventions made itpossible for viewers to read what wereessentially arbitrarymarks as shadows andmodeling. Seen this way, the concept ofconvention provides a point of contactbetween humanists and sociologists, beinginterchangeablewith such familiar ociologicalideas as norm, rule, shared understanding,custom or folkway, all referring n one way oranother to the ideas and understandingspeople hold in common and through whichthey effect cooperative activity. Burlesquecomedians could stage elaborate three manskits without rehearsalbecausethey had onlyto refer to a conventionalbody of skits theyall knew, pick one and assignthe parts.Dancemusicianswho are total strangerscan play allnight with no more prearrangementhan tomention a title ("Sunny Side of the Street,"in C) and count off four beats to give thetempo; the title indicates a melody, itsaccompanying harmony and perhaps evencustomary backgroundfigures. The conven-tions of characterand dramaticstructure, nthe one case, and of melody, harmony andtempo, in the other, are familiarenough thataudiences have no difficulty in respondingappropriately.Though standardized, conventions areseldom rigid and unchanging.They do notspecify an inviolate set of ruleseveryonemustrefer to in settling questions of what to do.Even where the directionsseem quite specific,they leave much unsettledwhich gets resolvedby reference to customarymodes of interpre-tation on the one hand andby negotiationonthe other. A tradition of performancepractice, often codified in book form, tellsperformers how to interpret the musicalscores or dramatic scripts they perform.Seventeenth century scores, for instance,



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772 AMERICAN OCIOLOGICALEVIEWcontained relatively little information; butcontemporarybooks explained how to dealwith questions of instrumentation, notevalues, extemporizationand the realizationofembellishments and ornaments. Performersread their music in the light of all thesecustomary styles of interpretationand thuswere able to coordinatetheir activities(Dart,1967). The same thing occurs in the visualarts. Much of the content, symbolism andcoloring of Italian Renaissance religiouspainting was conventionally given; but amultitudeof decisionsremained or the artist,so that even within those strict conventionsdifferent workscould be produced.Adheringto the conventional materials, however,allowed viewers to read much emotion andmeaning into the picture. Even wherecustomary interpretations of conventionsexist, havingbecome conventionsthemselves,artists can agree to do things differently,negotiationmakingchangepossible.Conventions place strong constraints onthe artist. They are particularlyconstrainingbecause they do not exist in isolation, butcome in complexly interdependentsystems,so that making one small change oftenrequiresmakingchangesin a varietyof otheractivities. A system of conventions getsembodied in equipment, materials, training,available facilities and sites, systems ofnotation and the like, all of which must bechanged f any one segment s.Considerwhat a change from the conven-tional western chromatic musical scale oftwelve tones to one including orty-two tonesbetween the octaves entails. Such a changecharacterizes the compositions of HarryPartch (1949). Western musical instrumentscannot produce these microtones easily andsome cannot produce them at all, soconventional instruments must be recon-structed (as Partch does) or new instrumentsmust be invented and built. Since theinstruments are new, no one knows how toplay them, and playersmust train themselves.ConventionalWesternnotation is inadequateto score forty-two tone music, so a newnotation must be devised, and players mustlearnto read it. (Comparable esourcescan betaken as given by anyone who writes for theconventional twelve chromatic tones). Con-sequently, whereas a performance of musicscored for the conventional set of tones canbe performedadequately after relatively few

hours of rehearsal, forty-two tone musicrequires much more work, time, effort andresources. Partch'smusic has typically cometo be performed in the following way: auniversity inviteshim to spend a year. In thefall, he recruitsa groupof interestedstudents,who build the instruments (which he hasalready invented) under his direction. In thewinter, they learnto play the instrumentsandread the notation he has devised. In thespring,they rehearseseveralworks and finallygive a performance.Seven or eight months ofwork finally result in two hours of music,hours which could have been filledwith othermusic after eight to ten hours of rehearsal ytrained symphonic musicians playing thestandard repertoire. The difference in theresourcesrequired measures the strength ofthe constraint imposed by the conventionalsystem.Similarly, conventions specifying what agood photograph should look like areembodied not only in an aesthetic more orless acceptedin the world of artphotography(Rosenblum, 1973), but also in the accep-tance of the constraintsbuilt into the neatlyinterwoven complex of standardizedequip-ment and materials made by major manu-facturers. Available lenses, camera bodies,shutter speeds, apertures,films, and printingpaper all constitute a tiny fraction of thethingsthat could be made, a selection that canbe used together to produceacceptableprints;with ingenuity they can also be used toproduce effects their purveyorsdid not havein mind. But some kinds of prints, oncecommon, can now only be produced withgreat difficulty because the materials are nolonger available.Specifically, the photosensi-tive material n conventionalpapersis a silversalt, which produces a characteristic look.Photographers once printed on paper sensi-tized with platinumsalts,until it went off themarketin 1937 (Newhall, 1964, p. 117). Youcan still make platinumprints, which have adistinctivelysofter look, but only by makingyour own paper. Not surprisingly, mostphotographersaccept the constraintandlearnto maximizethe effects that can be obtainedfrom available silver-basedmaterials. Theylikewise prize the standardization and de-pendabilityof mass-producedmaterials;a rollof Kodak Tri-X film purchasedanywhere inthe world has approximately the samecharacteristics and will produce the same



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ARTAS COLLECTIVE CTION 773results as any other roll, that being theopportunity that is the obverse of theconstraint.The limitations of conventional practice,clearly, are not total. One can always dothingsdifferentlyif one is prepared o pay theprice in increasedeffort or decreasedcircula-tion of one's work. The experience ofcomposer Charles Ives exemplifies the latterpossibility. He experimented withpolytonality and polyrhythms before theybecame part of the ordinary performer'scompetence. The New Yorkplayerswho triedto play his chamberand orchestralmusic toldhim that it was unplayable, that theirinstruments could not make those sounds,that the scores could not be played in anypractical way. Ives finally accepted theirjudgment, but continued to compose suchmusic. Whatmakeshis case interesting s that,according to his biographers (Cowell andCowell, 1954), though he was also bitterabout it, he experienced this as a greatliberation. If no one could play his music,then he no longer had to write music thatmusicianscould play, no longerhad to acceptthe constraints imposed by the conventionsthat regulated cooperation between con-temporary composer and player. Since, forinstance, his music would not be played, henever needed to finish it; he was quiteunwilling to confirm John Kirkpatrick'spioneer reading of the Concord Sonata as acorrectone becausethat would mean that hecould no longer changeit. Nor didhe have toaccommodate his writing to the practicalconstraints of what could be financed byconventional means, and so he wrote hisFourth Symphony for three orchestras. Thatimpracticalityessened with time; LeonardBernsteinpremiered the work in 1958 and ithasbeenplayed many times since.)In general,breaking with existing conven-tions and their manifestations in socialstructure and material artifacts increases theartist's trouble and decreases the circulationof his work, on the one hand, but at the sametime increaseshis freedom to choose uncon-ventional alternativesand to depart substan-tially from customary practice.If that is true,we can understandany work as the product ofa choice between conventional ease andsuccess and unconventional trouble and lackof recognition, looking for the experiencesand situational and structural elements that

disposeartists n one directionor the other.Interdependent ystems of conventions andstructures of cooperative links appear verystable and difficult to change. In fact, thougharts sometimes experience periods of stasis,that does not mean that no change orinnovation occurs (Meyer, 1967). Smallinnovations occur constantly, as conventionalmeans of creatingexpectations and delayingtheir satisfaction become so well-knownas tobecome conventional expectations in theirown right. Meyer(1956) analyzesthis processand gives a nice example in the use of vibratoby string instrument players. At one time,string players used no vibrato, introducing t

on rare occasions as a deviation fromconvention which heightened tension andcreated emotional response by virtue of itsrarity. String players who wished to excitesuch an emotional response began usingvibratomore and more often until the way toexcite the emotional response it had onceproduced was to play without vibrato, adevice that Bartok and other composersexploited. Meyer describes the process bywhich deviations from convention becomeaccepted conventions in their own right as acommon one.Such changes are a kind of gradualistreform in a persisting artistic tradition.Broader,more disruptivechangesalso occur,bearinga marked resemblance o politicalandscientific revolutions (Kuhn, 1962). Anymajor change necessarilyattacks some of theexisting conventions of the art directly, aswhen the Impressionistsor Cubistschanged

the existing visual language of painting, theway one read paint on canvas as arepresentationof something. An attack onconvention does not merely mean an attackon the particular tem to be changed. Everyconvention carries with it an aesthetic,according to which what is conventionalbecomes the standardby which artisticbeautyand effectiveness is judged. A play whichviolates the classical unities is not merelydifferent, it is distasteful,barbaricandugly tothose for whom the classicalunitiesrepresenta fixed criterionof dramaticworth. An attackon a convention becomes an attack on theaesthetic related to it. But people do notexperience their aesthetic beliefs as merelyarbitrary ndconventional; hey feel that theyare natural,properand moral. An attack on aconvention and an aesthetic is also an attack



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774 AMERICAN OCIOLOGICALEVIEWon a morality. The regularity with whichaudiences greet major changes in dramatic,musical and visualconventions with vitupera-tive hostility indicates the close relationbetween aesthetic and moral belief (Kubler,1962).An attack on sacred aesthetic beliefs asembodiedin particularconventions s, finally,an attack on an existing arrangementofranked statuses, a stratification system.3Remember that the conventional way ofdoing things in any art utilizes an existingcooperativenetwork, an organizedart worldwhich rewards those who manipulate theexisting conventions appropriatelyn light ofthe associatedsacredaesthetic.Supposethat adance world is organizedaround the conven-tions and skills embodiedin classicalballet.IfI then learn those conventions and skills, Ibecome eligible for positionsin the best balletcompanies; the finest choreographerswillcreate ballets for me that arejust the kind Iknow how to dance andwill look good in; thebest composers will write scores for me;theaterswill be available; will earnas good aliving as a dancercan earn;audienceswill loveme and I will be famous. Anyone whosuccessfully promotes a new convention inwhich he is skilled and I am not attacksnotonly my aestheticbut also my highposition inthe world of dance. So the resistanceto thenew expresses he angerof those who will losematerially by the change, in the form ofaesthetic outrage.Others than the artist have somethinginvested in the status quo which a change inacceptedconventionswill lose them. Considerearthworksmade, for instance,by a bulldozerin a square mile of pasture.Such a sculpturecannot be collected (though a patroncan payfor its constructionandreceivesignedplansorphotographsas a document of his patronage),or put in museums thoughthe mementos thecollector receives can be displayed). Ifearthworks become an important art form,the museum personnel whose evaluationsofmuseum-collectableart have had importantconsequencesfor the careersof artistsand art

movements lose the power to choose whichworks will be displayed,for their museumsareunnecessary for displaying those works.Everyone involved in the museum-collectablekind of art (collectors, museum curators,galleries,dealers, artists) loses something.Wemight say that everycooperativenetworkthatconstitutes an art world createsvalue by theagreement of its members as to what isvaluable (Levine, 1972; Christopherson,1974). When new people successfullycreateanew world whichdefines otherconventionsasembodying artistic value, all the participantsin the old world who cannot make a place inthe new one lose out.Every art world develops standardizedmodes of support and artists who supporttheir work throughthose conventionalmeansdevelop an aesthetic which accepts theconstraints embedded in those forms ofcooperation. Rosenblum (1973) has shownthat the aestheticof photographers arieswiththe economic channels through which theirwork is distributed n the sameway that theircustomarywork styles do, and Lyon (1974)has analyzedthe interdependenceof aestheticdecisions and the means by which resourcesare gathered in a semi-professionaltheatergroup. One example will illustratethe natureof the dependence.The group depended onvolunteer help to get necessary work done.But people volunteeredfor non-artistickindsof worklargelybecausethey hoped eventuallyto get a part in a play and gain some actingexperience.The people who ran the companysoon accumulatedmany such debts and wereconstrained to choose plays with relativelylargecasts to pay them off.4

CONCLUSIONIf we focus on a specificartwork,it provesuseful to think of social organizationas anetworkof people who cooperate to producethat work. We see that the samepeople oftencooperate repeatedly, even routinely, insimilarways to produce similarworks.Theyorganizetheir cooperationby referring o the

conventions current amongthose who partici-'I am indebted to an unpublished paper byEverett C. Hughes (n.d.) for the argument that anattack on the mores is an attack on social structure.He develops the argument by combining two pointsin Sumner's Folkways, that 1) the folkways createstatus, and 2) sects (whether religious, political, orartistic) are at war with the mores.

4The problem of financial and other resourcesand the institutions which have grown up to providethem for artists deserves much more extendedconsideration than I give it here, and somesociological and social-historical literature is available(see, for instance, White and White, 1965; Hirsch,1972; Grana, 1964;Coser, 1965;Haskell, 1963).



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ART AS COLLECTIVE CTION 775pate in the production and consumption ofsuch works. If the same people do notactually act together in every case, theirreplacements are also familiar with andproficient in the use of the sameconventions,so that the cooperation can go on withoutdifficulty. Conventionsmake collectiveactionsimpler and less costly in time, energy andother resources; but they do not makeunconventionalwork impossible, only morecostly and more difficult. Changecan occur,as it often does, wheneversomeone devisesaway to gather the greaterresourcesrequired.Thus, the conventionalmodes of cooperationand collective action need not recurbecausepeople constantly devisenew modes of actionand discover the resources necessaryto putthem into practice.To say all this goes beyond the assertionthat art is social and beyond demonstrationsof the congruencebetween forms of socialorganizationand artisticstyles or subjects.Itshows that art is social in the sense that it iscreated by networks of people actingtogether, and proposesa framework n whichdifferingmodes of collectiveaction, mediatedby acceptedor newly developedconventions,can be studied. It places a number oftraditionalquestionsin the field in a contextin which their similarity to other forms ofcollective action can be used for comparativetheoreticalwork.The discussion of art as collective actionsuggestsa generalapproachto the analysisofsocialorganization.Wecan focus on any event(the more general term which encompassesthe production of an art work as a specialcase) and look for the network of people,however large or extended, whose collectiveactivity made it possible for the event tooccur as it did. We can look for networkswhose cooperative activity recurs or hasbecomeroutineandspecifythe conventions bywhich their constituent members coordinatetheirseparate ines of action.Wemight want to use such terms as socialorganization or social structure as a meta-phorical way of referringto those recurringnetworks and their activities. In doing so,however, we should not forget their meta-phorical characterand inadvertentlyassertasa fact implied in the metaphorwhat can onlybe discoveredthroughresearch.Whensociolo-gists speak of social structure or socialsystems,the metaphor mplies(thoughits user

neither proves nor arguesthe point) that thecollective action involved occurs "regularly"or "often" (the quantifier,being implicit, isnon-specific) and, further, that the peopleinvolved act together to produce a largevariety of events. But we should recognizegenerally,as the empiricalmaterialsrequireusto do in the study of the arts, that whetheramode of collective action is recurrent orroutine enough to warrant such descriptionmust be decided by investigation, not bydefinition. Some forms of collective actionrecur often, others occasionally, some veryseldom. Similarly,people who participateinthe networkthat producesone event or kindof event may not act together in art worksproducing other events. That question, too,mustbe decidedby investigation.Collective actions and the events theyproduce are the basic unit of sociologicalinvestigation. Social organizationconsists ofthe specialcase in which the same people acttogether to produce a variety of differentevents in a recurringway. Social organization(and its cognates)arenot only concepts, then,but also empiricalfindings.Whetherwe speakof the collectiveacts of a few people-a familyor a friendship-or of a much largernumber-aprofession or a class system-we need alwaysto ask exactly who is joining together toproduce what events. To pursue the general-ization from the theory developedfor artisticactivities,we canstudy social organizationsofall kinds by looking for the networksresponsiblefor producingspecific events, theoverlaps among such cooperative networks,the way participants use conventions tocoordinate their activities, how existingconventionssimultaneouslymakecoordinatedactionpossibleandlimit the formsit can take,and how the development of new forms ofacquiringresourcesmakes changepossible. (Ishould point out that, while this point of viewis not exactly commonplace, neither is itnovel. It can be found in the writings of,among others, Simmel [1898], Park [1950,1952, 1955 passim], Blumer [19661 andHughes[1971, esp. pp 5-13 and 52-64]).

BIBLIOGRAPHYAlbrecht, Milton C., James H. Barnett and MasonGriff (eds.)1970 The Sociology of Art and Literature: AReader. New York: PraegerPublishers.Bennett, H.S.1972 Other People's Music. Unpublished doc-toral dissertation, Northwestern University.



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776 AMERICAN OCIOLOGICAL EVIEWBlizek, Williamn.d. "An institutional theory of art." Unpub-lished paper.Blumer, Herbert1966 "Sociological implications of the thoughtof George Herbert Mead." American

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