Open AccessL’Art pour l’Art or L’Art pour Tous?
Author(s) -
Laura Prins
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
international journal for history culture and modernity
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2213-0624
DOI - 10.18352/hcm.505
Subject(s) - art , visual arts , contemporary art , compromise , autonomy , art world , art history , performance art , sociology , law , political science , social science
Between 1896 and 1903, Jean Grave, editor of the anarchist journal Les Temps Nouveaux , published an artistic album of original prints, with the collaboration of (avant-garde) artists and illustrators. While anarchist theorists, including Grave, summoned artists to create social art, which had to be didactic and accessible to the working classes, artists wished to emphasize their autonomous position instead. Even though Grave requested ‘absolutely artistic’ prints in the case of this album, artists had difficulties with creating something for him, trying to combine their social engagement with their artistic autonomy. The artistic album appears to have become a compromise of the debate between the anarchist theorists and artists with anarchist sympathies.