| The dissertation is a sociological and ethnographic analysis of change in New York's contemporary art world during the largest art boom in history. It is focused on galleries, the site of the intersection of the art world's creative and commercial aspects. Three prominent galleries (Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, the Pace Gallery, and Metro Pictures gallery) serve as examples of gallery ideal types--commitment, professionalism and affinities--that confront diverse opportunities and challenges in booms. Booms, in turn, are discussed as modernizing transformations in the art world. Their analysis is an occasion for a sustained inquiry into the effects of modernity on present-day cultural industries. In addition to the sections on galleries, the dissertation includes an overview of the New York art world's history as well as an examination of the causes of the 1980s boom--an event borne out of historical coincidence. The concluding chapter sketches out a sociological theory of artistic legitimation that shows how sudden modernizing transformations in cultural fields like the art world result in pervasive anxiety--a response to the challenge to those institutional legitimators which function as the guardians of agreement on values in such worlds. The gallery history tables of the appendix include a comprehensive record of every exhibition from the date of each gallery's funding until 1993, illustrating the temporal institutional narrative that lies at the heart of galleries' legitimating efforts. |
