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International Journal of
ARTS, DESIGN AND ART THEORY I JAD AT
PRESS Vol. 1 No. 1, June 2021

SOCIAL MEDIA AND CONTEMPORARY ART: A THEORETICAL ANALYSIS OF THE

COMMODIFICATION OF ART AND DEBASEMENT OF THE CREATIVE ACT THROUGH
VIRTUAL EXHIBITIONS

Dr Clement Emeka Akpang FRSA

Department of Visual Arts and Technology
Faculty of Environmental Sciences
Cross River University of Technology CRUTECH, Calabar
Email: clementakpang@yahoo.com

Abstract

The proliferation of social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest,
Behance and many others have contributed to increased global interconnectivity through instant
sharing of ideas and contents. The pictorialism of these platforms have impacted art and design
disciplines by providing artists and designers global visibility, inspiration and reckoning. However,
the digital promotion of art and design through virtual exhibitions using social media adversely
alters the conventions of artistic display of tangible objects where space specificity and mounting
are crucial variables needed to extend the context, concept and meaning of art. The objective of
this paper is to examine how social media affects the value and authenticity of artworks. Using
Conceptual Analysis as a methodology, the concept of virtual art display through digital platforms
is subjected to in-depth examination. Findings demonstrate that besides the promotion of artists
and their works, virtual exhibitions lead to the commodification and debasement of art/artworks.
This is because social media platforms truncate the creative act and overarchingly emphasises
aesthetics over the context and content of artworks. This research, therefore, contends that
because virtual exhibitions deny artworks contextual display and audience experience central to
completing the creative act, it is illogical to canonize and promote social media as a suitable
replacement for traditional art galleries and museums in the dissemination of artistic forms and
their codified contents.

Keywords: Social Media, Virtual, Galleries, Exhibition, Commodification, Art, Contemporary

Introduction

Contemporary advancement in digital technology especially the invention of social media

platforms is central to the growth of global interculturalism that defines the world today. With
social media, the internet and communication mechanisms, it is now possible to remotely
connect to diverse parts of the world instantaneously from any location. This heightened
connectivity has also rapidly increased the exchange of ideas, thus, contributing to the
sophistication and complexity of contemporary life. The impact of social media is unprecedented
and spans all spheres of human endeavour, the arts inclusive. Artists and designers have

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embraced social media platforms as impetus for creative inspirations, digital means for display
and populous validation of their artistic ingenuity. Even art institutions such as museums and
galleries depend on social media platforms as communication frameworks to drive traffic to
featured exhibitions. In terms of studio practice, exposition to various artistic ethos and styles of
artists across the world has helped many practitioners define their stylistic import and creative
visions through appropriation and re-contextualization of surveyed artifactualities. In this sense
social media serves contemporary art in many ways – namely inspiring the content of art,
influencing style and promoting artist. This is because many artists now explore social media’s
prevalence in today’s society by applying facets of the most popular social networking sites and
apps to their works to inform their formal/compositional configuration, extend meaning or codify
content. What this accentuates is a relationship between tangible art and digitally disseminated
intangible concepts, thus, further revealing a profound truth about the stronghold social media
has over free artistic expression which it now largely contributes to shape. Sokolowsky argues
that social media in this context has become so powerful that it curates and determines the
notion of what now passes as art in some quotas and amongst certain demography. The author
opines thus,

Beyond generating awareness and attendance, social media is also being used more
directly to create or curate art. In 2014, the Frye created an entire exhibition,
#SocialMedium, based on public votes from various social media. The most “liked”
paintings from the museum’s Founding Collection were shown in the galleries along with
the names and comments of nearly 4,500 people around the world who voted
(Sokolowsky 2020, p.1).

Sokolowsky alludes in this extract to a real-world situation in contemporary artworld in which

social media now even influences who galleries represent and what art is displayed for public
viewing. Big technology companies have become art sensors and curators that even control free
expressionism that is the life wire of an artist’s artistic persona.

The foregoing is an indication of the immense impact social media has in the promotion of art,
artists and artworks. It has expanded the enjoyment and appreciation of art across board and
made art far more accessible to a wider audience than previously thought possible. The rationale
is that besides contributing to shaping artifactuality, social media eliminates the barriers of cost
and distance of travel to visit galleries and museums or experience different cultures that inspire
the art forms that art lovers may be attracted to. Miah a contemporary analyst of social media
and art corroborates this view point by suggesting that social media has made the arts
community larger as well as influencing art patronage and galleries’ decision on which artists to
represent based on how many people are following a particular artist on social media platforms
(Miah 2020). Social media has, therefore, assume a curating and authenticating role in the
contemporary artworld. But while this is the case, other schools of thoughts argue that social
media demeans and defy the sanctity of high art. For example, in the words of fine artist and film
maker Ascher, “I definitely think that social media has made it possible for a lot of artists to access

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their audiences better, but I also think that the threshold for calling yourself an artist has become
a lot lower” (Ascher quoted in McLogan 2018, p.19). Ascher sees a correlation between social
media and the erosion of artistic standards as well as the authentication of who is canonized as
an artist or designer. The proliferation of digital platforms has made it possible for anybody to
pass as an artist or designer or for anything to be celebrated as a trending art form. Social media
facilitates the bypassing of classical emphasis on manual dexterity and creative ingenuity that
defined artists, and the formalistic/aesthetic configurations objects needed to incorporate and
exhibit to pass as artworks. What these opposing theories allude to is the existence of pros and
cons associated with the impact of social media (virtual exhibition) on contemporary art.

The objective of this paper is to examine such pros and cons by answering certain critical
questions such as, what is the impact of social media on art appreciation and patronage? And
does social media emphasis on pictorialism lead to the commodification of art and truncation of
the creative act? To address these questions, it suffices to draw upon conceptual analysis as a
theoretical framework for this inquiry.

Methodology

Conceptual Analysis

A concept is a theoretical term which refers to a property or construct (often a complex entity or
phenomenon) which suggests the role it plays in a theory, or in relation to other concepts; it is
the idea which is represented by a term or word. The origin of conceptual analysis can be traced
to Plato who argued that a grasp of the relevant concept is central to understanding truth and
knowledge. For Plato, first deconstructing the main crux of a concept, theory or phenomenon is
central to understanding how it impacts other concepts or phenomena in relation to it. Thus,
conceptual analysis helps in understanding the meaning of an idea or concept as well as how that
idea or concept affects other philosophical problems or phenomenon. Since conceptual analysis
facilitates understanding of a concept or idea as a resonating manifestation of another concept
or phenomenon, it is drawn upon in this study to analyse the proliferation and enthronement of
social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, Behance etc., as
frameworks for virtual exhibitions, to interrogate their impact on art promotion, patronage,
authenticity and the creative act in the contemporary art-space.

Social Media and Art Promotion

Our best-selling exhibitions have without fail been those where the artist has a decent social
media following, posts regularly, and engages in an authentic way with their followers. The
exhibitions that have sold the least have been those where the artist isn’t on social media,
or is but didn’t use it to promote their show. This has become important enough that I now
take an artist’s social media presence into consideration when deciding whose work I will
show — something I didn’t do when I first started the gallery (Heylen 2019).

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This extract from the curator of Platform Gallery in Australia demonstrates a clear link between
social media and the proliferation of art today. Beyond its power to promote art, social media seem
to determine the popularity of artists, hence influencing the decision of galleries on which artists to
represent. One may ask how does social media promote art to this unprecedented degree? Firstly,
social media platforms help to facilitate global interconnectivity so that what is posted online travels
with the speed of light across the globe in just seconds. This speed as wells as the pictorialism that
social media platforms offer, rapidly increases the popularity of artists and designers by making sure
that their works are accessible to a broader audience across different continents. Thus, the more an
artist posts on these platforms, the more his or her popularity grows and their style/work embraced
by a larger audience. Social media in this context facilitates the dissemination of an artist’s aesthetic
vision, which then translates to more patronage and sales. It suffices therefore, to establish that
social media platforms foster artistic proliferation, artists/designers’ popularity and art patronage.
This is why as Heylen opines, today galleries check artists’ social media presence before deciding
whether to represent them or not since popularity translates to a jampacked auction house and
sales for many galleries.

Besides the promotion of artistic popularity, social media also constitute an inspirational tool that
artists draw impetus from for their creative endeavours. Social media platforms connect artists and
designers to the global community and the prevalent interculturalism that defines contemporary
existence. Thus, artists are exposed to different schools of thoughts, notions of art and stylistic ethos
that inspire their own creative processes and artistic expressionism. What this means is that social
media now affects the conception and production of art to a large extent. According to Bartel an
illustrator and marvel comic artist, “I’ve discovered so many new artists who inspire me every day
just from their social media posts,” (Bartel 2020, p.1). What Bartel alludes to is that social media
constitute a viable tool for creative inspiration, art/design promotion and populist authentication of
the creative ingenuity of various artists and designers. Although the aforesaid is an establish fact,
social media also impact art negatively and exploring such adverse impacts constitutes the core of
this research.

Adverse Impact of Social Media and Virtual Exhibitions on Art

The currency of high art is determined by varying factors ranging from ideation, technical
proficiency, stylistic expressionism, conceptualism and display. These variables are inseparable
philosophical constructs that contributes to defining the artifactuality of an object. For the
creative act to be complete, experience is required and because the virtual world cannot provide
tactile experiences, it means that the current digitisation of artistic display through social media
in as much as it promotes publicity and marketing also consternates the sanctity and purity of art
as conceived and defined in classical and renaissance conventionalism. Research conducted
during this study reveals that social media and virtual galleries are inimical to art in the following
ways:

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a). Commodification of Art

Art, whether traditional or contemporary has been combined with the media forms. Here
media, informs the people about the various art forms and the way it can be utilized for
beautification or for any psychological influence, thus leading to its commercialization.
Moreover, it is the media that has led to conservation of art by commercializing it.
Commercialization of art through the help of media, gave the artisans and artists
important place in the society thus contributing to their economic growth (Heller 2020,
p.1).

Social media platforms promote pictorialism as opposed text. This means that pictures are easily
circulated without accompanying text that deconstruct the ideology of the composition of such
pictures. The emphasis in virtual exhibitions through social media is to pictorially reach broader
audience through skilfully manipulated images in order to draw attention and captivate the
viewers to the point of monetary commitment. This leads to a form of generalised
commodification of everything pinned online and such commodification commercialises objects
and in doing so reduce the value of that which is commercialised especially where context is
lacking to extend content. Although social media platforms provide popularity that encourages
sales, the ethos or crux of artistic expressionism is not entirely commercial. The nature of art is
to communicate, express, instigate and question in fact Kosinski argues that the true nature of
art is to evoke rather than represent (Kosinsky 2009). What this means is that artworks have a
higher social, political, philosophical and cultural implication beyond their commercial value. In
fact, their commercial value is supposed to be determined by their non-commercial content and
connections – something only pictures uploaded online are incapable of proffering. Social media
emphasis on publicity for economic gains undermines the concept of contemporary art; as Heller
opines, social media popularises art which leads to commercialisation and commodification of
art. This is premised on the fact that the display of works of art on social media targets likes and
shares rather than promoting artistic content. Thus, through virtual exhibitions art is popularized
at the expense of its conceptualism and artifactuality. Besides the commodification and
commercialisation of art as an economic item, social media and virtual exhibitions equally
truncates the creative act.

b). Truncation and Debasement of the Creative Act

Virtual exhibitions take away audience experience necessary to complete the creative act by
illusionising scale, proportion and tactility. In the ‘Creative Act 1954’ the legendary avant-garde
and inventor of the readymade Duchamp argues that an artist is a mediumistic being and that
artistic production is a process from intention to realization through a chain of totally subjective
reactions which does not end with the marker alone. He continues that creativity is like an

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arithmetical relation between the unexpressed but intended and the unintentionally expressed;
and that all in all, art production is only complete when the artist brings the work in contact with
the external world where the spectator deciphers and interprets its inner qualifications to
complete the creative act (Duchamp 1957). What Duchamp means is that art is a process that
only ends when spectators come in contact with and experience a work of art for it to come to
life. Unless this happens, the creative act is incomplete. Herein lies the problematic with social
media; because virtual exhibitions emphasises pictorialism, it truncates the creative act and
process by denying spectators that physical encounter necessary to bring a work of art to life.
Social media platforms offer illusionistic approximation of size, texture and scent of artworks
hence taking away physical artistic experiences central to understanding art. This is problematic
to contemporary art explaining why James postulates the following theory;

Social media is eroding the role of art and literature, and there must be pragmatic steps
taken to separate it from its sphere of influence. The Internet has democratized art, which
is a good thing, but art is now competing with media that is produced to briefly wow for
cheap validation. Social media is a consumable, that allows only a quick superficial
interaction with the art. Art and literature need to become public events completely
outside of social networks. Just as the Romantic poets looked back to nature at the
beginning of the 19th century for wisdom, we must use physical space to host physical
works of art. Similarly, we must continue to promote events that allow for intimate
conversation with authors, poets, and other speakers (James 2014, p.2).

Virtual exhibitions allow only for superficial interaction with art for cheap validation and this is
not enough to understand, appreciate and embrace an artistic form. Key to art appreciation is
experience and contact which allows the viewer to experience textures, smell, scale and
functionality of artforms needed to demystify art - where this is absent, a comprehensive
appreciation or critique is impossible (Akpang 2020). Take for example the performative and
interactive installation art ‘Colour Me 2019’ by Andrew Neyer and Andy J. Miller; a photograph
of this installation reveals a conceptual and stylized Picassoesque drawing travelling over a large
expanse with multiple recognisable forms from popular culture and social life carefully and
creatively woven into a unique drawing scale (see figure 1).

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Fig. 1: Andrew Neyer and Andy J. Miller ‘Interactive art Colour Me 2019’ (Source: MoMA).

But this exhibition in social space falls short in revealing the actual conceptualism (performance)
which is the crux of the installation, where audience-artists participation is needed to complete
its form and meaning. Uploading a mere image on social media fails to reveal that the piece is
designed to allow spectators complete it with individualistic choice of markers of different colour
shades to colour in different sections with different marker strokes and shading techniques as
indicated in figure 2.

Fig. 2: Andrew Neyer and Andy J. Miller ‘Interactive art Colour Me 2019’
audience participation in completely the installation (Source: MoMA).

This example demonstrates that with social media, actual space is lacking thus performance
installations cannot be complete in their contextual ideation and production. Since social media
is incapable of providing that experience yet is quick to wow and connect globally through virtual
pictorialism, it truncates the creative process and makes a joke out of artistic display. This is why
McLogan avers that social media lacks what it takes to make a work of art complete, therefore,
“seeing something on social media is just an invitation to get the conversation started” (McLogan
2018, p.4). For McLogan, until objects are seen and experienced, they cannot be categorised as

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art in which case virtual exhibitions should only be looked upon as mere prelude that should lead
to actual gallery and museum visits to experience and take in artworks.

c). Devaluation of the Content and Authenticity of Art

The problem with viewing art on a screen is, you don’t see any surface. You can’t tell if
this is gloss or matte or are there any bumps. Colours look different and because the
colour is visible through electromagnetic waves, we all see everything in grey if there is
not enough light. Technology can ‘introduce’ art to a wider audience. Still, it can never
replace the atmosphere of actually being at a live event. That atmosphere is as much a
part of the experience as the actual performance. The argument is that social media is a
virtual experience and not a real one (Razzaq 2020, p.1).

Social media displays devalue and debases the content and authenticity of art and artworks. As
Razzaq points out in the extract above, it does not account for actual colour, scale or even the
tactile qualities of a piece when displayed digitally thus alters the perceptual impact it has on the
viewer. Take for example El Anatsui’s ‘In the World but Don’t Know the World 2019’. On social
media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Facetime, Pinterest, Behance etc., this piece
appears as an interesting installation of folded mat-like fabric forms draped on the wall with
captivating folds and colour punctuations revealing intriguing patterns resembling Ghana Kente
cloth (fig. 3).

Fig. 3: El Anatsui - In the World but Don’t Know the World 2019 (Source: MoMA).

What this display actually does is cheapen this installation by failing to reveal two key variables
central to understanding the conceptualism of this piece – size and materiality. The display of this
piece on social media without close surrounding relative forms makes it impossible to appreciate
the fact that this piece is actually a gigantic installation over 40 feet high and 60 feet wide (see
fig. 4). What this virtual exhibition also fails to reveal is that this installation is a complex

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interrogation of materiality to foster a postcolonial critique of hyper-consumerism, indiscriminate

waste disposal and lack of recycling culture in Africa. It also falls short in revealing the heightened
mastery and display of the methodology of assemblage for the recontextualization of discarded
bottle caps - the hallmark of Anatsui’s contributions to the contemporary artworld (fig. 5).

Fig. 4: Closeup revelation of the scale of Anatsui’s work (Source: MoMA).

Fig. 5: Closeup revelation of the intricate methodology of assemblage the hallmark of Anatsui’s art (Source: MoMA).

What this example using Anatsui’s work valorises is that social media display while popularising
art invariably devalues its authenticity and artifactuality in many ways by denying spectators the
opportunity of first-hand experience needed to appreciate the extent of an artist’s skill,
ingenuity, methodology and stylistic import. Also, this example demonstrates again that social
media’s focus on pictorial popularity reduces art to a mere aesthetic object embraced only for its
visual appeal without recourse to any underlying philosophical, cultural or ideological leaning. It

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suffices to submit that with virtual exhibitions, content and authenticity of art are sacrificed on
the altar of aesthetic appeal and instant popularity. This emphasis on aesthetics and pictorialism
is inimical to art development because artifactuality of art objects extend beyond mere intricately
enchanting formal and compositional configurations. A work of art is a product of cultural,
economic, indigenous, religious, political and social influences or interactions thus exist as visual
codification of the society or culture where it is created and the circumstances of that historic
timeframe. These concepts define the content and meaning as well as the form of what we
classify as art; thus, understanding art requires contextual reading – that is viewing artworks side-
by-side the factors that influenced their creation and the ideologies or philosophies the artists
intended to pass across to the viewers. Whilst artists may not be present at all times in galleries
and museums, artist statements and galleries’ concept notes help to convey the underlying
content and meaning of works of art in traditional gallery and museum displays to further extend
their meaning. Social media and visual exhibitions lack the capabilities to communicate deep
rooted information about art beyond their visual configurations thus reduce the value of such art
forms by masking the codified content and ideologies of the maker.

d. Debasing Art Curating and Influencing Gallery Representation

Besides the devaluation of art in the context of display, social media now curate exhibitions and
influence artistic production. As elucidated earlier, Frye 2014 exhibition tagged #SocialMedium
was curated by the public through social media. The museum only included works in their
collection with the highest number of likes and shares as part of their display. Tate Britain in 2007
used Flickr to crowdsource photographs for the exhibition ‘How We Are: Photographing Britain’,
a show which included images by famed British photographers such as William Henry Fox Talbot,
Lewis Carroll, and Julia Margaret Cameron, as well as postcards, family albums, and propaganda.
At the Brooklyn Museum, ‘Click!: A Crowd‐Curated Exhibition’, the public was handed the job of
ranking photographs for an in‐gallery display in 2008. These examples indicate how in recent
times social media has taken a center stage in art curating and authentication. What this points
to is a precarious situation were rather than having a specific aesthetic, conceptual or
philosophical point of view as the rational for curatorial decisions on which works are included in
an exhibition, most galleries and museums are resorting to public verdicts based on social media
validation through likes and retweets. There is a great concern with this approach because
viewers are often drawn to pictorialism and visually appealing forms with intriguing
configurations that can evoke an instant wow factor, thus, by authenticating art/artworks based
on such superficial concerns, it devalues the nature, notion and philosophy of art. This is why
Sharlow argues that many artists are coming to the realisation that social media “is posing a
threat to artists and constitute a danger from which there seems to be no escape because it kills
creativity” (Sharlow, 2019, p.4). Social media has become so powerful with its tweeter mops that
it is beginning to define the parameters of artifactuality hence reducing the value of art to mere

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number of likes, retweets, shares and pins. This is an attack on art and creativity which should be
carefully addressed and navigated.

Conclusion

Although social media platforms promote artists’ global visibility and the sales of works of art,
this paper reveals that it’s focus on pictorialism and aesthetics as a form of artistic validation is
problematic. Through discourse analysis findings in this research demonstrate that social media
adversely affect contemporary artistic production and appreciation by devaluing art, truncating
the creative act and commodifying artworks. Various theories were analysed on the subject
matter to arrive at this conclusion which is presented as an open discourse for researchers, artists
and designers in this technologically advanced and interconnected age. This paper, therefore,
recommends that the arts should re-evaluate the role of social media in art promotion to curb
the commercialisation and decimation of art and artworks through the problematic curating and
authentication of art based on trivial variables such as likes, shares, pins and retweets.

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