Paper short abstract:

By performing an ethnographic research with plastic artists that sell their works at handicraft markets in Fortaleza, Brazil, we discuss a widely spread idea about artistic production made by lower classes: the correlation between their strong link with sale and their supposedly non-creative manner.

Paper long abstract:

By performing an ethnographic research with plastic artists that sell their paintings next to craftsmen at handicraft markets in Fortaleza, Brazil, we discuss a very common idea about artistic production made by lower classes: the correlation between their strong link with sale and their supposedly non-creative manner, because it would be based on the reproduction of aesthetic standards, materials and techniques that would guarantee their commercial acceptance, mainly by tourists, in the case studied. We would try to demonstrate how the sale situation, apart from being a moment to obtain necessary resources to their means of living, consists many times in an important mechanism that the artists use to evaluate and confirm the specific artistic value of their products. On the other hand, we will show that many of those plastic artists do not consider their work as repetitive, they mention a series of frequent innovations that are not always acknowledged by customers and descri

> be creative experiences that lead them to create very special pieces, whose value would only be recognised by a capacitated public which wouldn't normally attend these markets. The acknowledgment of a public and exhibitions spaces hierarchy together with an acknowledgment of the artists' legitimacy to participate directly in sale operations — which they should ideally stay away from, and focus solely on art creative processes - turn the sale of these pieces at markets into a tense experience for plastic artists who have already sold works at spaces like galleries and have been submitted to specialised public.

Paper Download (220 KB)