Art as a Social System (Meridian: Crossing Aesthetics)

The scope and breadth of Luhmann’s undertaking and analysis is truly astounding, and based on this “astonishment” alone, one might be tempted to call his writings in totality a work of art. “[T]o borrow a phrase from antiquity, the work of art is created for the sake of astonishment.” (p. 40) Luhmann would no doubt have objected to such a description, blurring as it does the boundaries of differentiated subsystems which are operatively closed, according to the theory, a condition which “might be described as autonomy[,]” meaning that “within its boundaries, autopoiesis functions unconditionally, the only alternative being that the system ceases to exist.” (p. 157) In this context, “an autopoietic system” is merely a “self-determining process” of communication. (p. 11) Luhmann goes on to note that a “system that partially relies on external elements or structures because it cannot operate without them—a computer, for example—is not an autopoietic system.” (p. 157)This appears to be one of the more problematic aspects of Luhmann’s theory, when he states in his conclusion that the “art system . . . remains dependent on its social environment, and such dependencies (of an economic nature, for example) may increase.” Luhmann attempts to mitigate (or ignore) this difficulty through the concept of “structural coupling[]” such as “between the nervous system and consciousness[.]” (p. 8) Such connections “between system and environment are presupposed.” (p. 50; citing Humberto R. Maturana and Francisco Varela, The Tree of Knowledge: The Biological Roots of Human Understanding (Boston, 1992), pp. 75ff, 181ff) Indeed, “artistic communication realizes specific forms of structural coupling between consciousness and society.” (p. 52) Here we see Luhmann’s assumption that communication is fundamentally separate from perception. “To be sure, communication can indicate perceptions, but what it indicates remains as operatively inaccessible to communication as does the entire physical world.” (p. 10)Luhmann touches on recent evidence that “the external world is the brain’s own construction, treated by consciousness as if it were a reality ‘out there.’” (p. 6) For Luhmann, in a kind of second act for the mind / body distinction, the “world . . . remains undetermined.” (p. 36) So far as sociology is concerned, the system remains largely undetermined as well. “An external (in this case sociological) description of the art system . . . says nothing about how the art system handles self-generated uncertainties and difficulties.” (p. 315) Then what exactly, does a sociological description of an art system do? The function of the sociological system appears to be a third party observation, that can see both sides of the distinction drawn by the subsystem. “Sociological interest in the notion of function . . . aims at the ‘other side’ of the distinction that art introduces into the world. The question might be rephrased as follows: How does reality appear when there is art?” (p.143)It may depend to some degree on differentiation, which seems to define “modern society.” (p. 133) Luhmann ponders along the lines that “if differentiation in its specifically modern form turns out to be not as beneficial as was previously assumed, then one needs to revise one’s judgment of modern society.” (p. 133) We are firmly in the grips of a neo-modernist here, as Luhmann wastes little time with the “ill-fated title ‘postmodernism[,]’” a topic for which he finds the “relevant literature . . . grown out of proportion[, and] reason enough for a communication system to end the discussion.” (p. 298; footnote 218)In Luhmann’s description of modern society “the orientation toward specific functions (or problems) of the social system catalyzes the formation of subsystems that dominate the face of society.” (pp. 133-34) For Luhmann, “society . . . manifests itself in the comparability of its subsystems.” (p. 134) By comparing different subsystems along general and abstract lines “such as system formation and system boundaries, function, medium and forms, operative closure, autopoiesis, first- and second-order observation, and coding and programming . . . a theory of society emerges that does not depend on discovering a unified meaning behind society—for example, by deriving societies from the nature of man, from a founding contract, or from an ultimate moral consensus.” (p. 134) Luhmann’s larger project “may be treated . . . as different forms of self-description available to the system of society.” (p. 134) “The self-description of a system is a paradoxical undertaking from its very beginning.” (p. 302) Indeed, paradox is central to Luhmann’s distinctions, and descriptions of all the subsystems of society: “art . . . law, science, politics, and so on[.]” (p. 134)For Luhmann then, sociology is a method by which society engages in “self-description.” (p. 134) He is, in a sense, attempting to describe a system of society which encompasses, as environment, all other subsystems. “[F]rom a sociological perspective[.]” systems must adapt to “the results of social evolution” in order to preserve “autopoietic” or self-generating “autonomy.” (p. 302)Thus, Luhmann would seem to attempt an examination of “the problematic relationship between art and society[,]” a problem that “remains unresolved[.]” (p. 302) Joseph Beuys called it something like “the fatal distance between the artistic will and social reality.” (please forgive, but the external citation escapes me at the present time) It is a problem exemplified by such as Duchamp and the readymade, and a problem which “did not present itself until the twentieth century” according to Luhmann. (p. 314) Prior to this, art developed such that eventually “[p]rofit motives became worthy of literature, and peasants became suitable for portraits.” (p. 145) Here, as in many places, Luhmann appears highly skilled at describing the evolution of the art system, yet he fails to offer a convincingly articulated point at which operative closure and autopoiesis begins, which seems perhaps a fatal flaw for a theory describing such processes as “unconditional[.]” (p. 157)Luhmann states that his description “remains external and has no control over . . . the art system[.]” Luhmann’s investigations lead him to “one question—a question that cannot be answered by sociology or by any other academic discipline, but only by art. . . . [the question] of how the distinction between art and nonart is to be controlled; how, in other words, the paradoxical unity of art and nonart can be dissolved within the art system itself.” (p. 314)For Luhmann, art has moved in a difficult direction for any system, a direction in which each communication becomes an attempt to thwart the system’s boundaries. “Art approaches a boundary where artistic information ceases to be information and becomes solely utterance [Mitteilung], or more accurately, where information is reduced to conveying to the audience that art wants to be nothing more than utterance.” (p. 298) Such efforts at self-negation, according to Luhmann, have led to a situation where art becomes nothing but utterance, or conveys solely information to that effect, such as a scream for the sake of screaming one might phrase it. (p. 298) This presents difficulties for any system of communication, when communication is defined by Luhmann as “the difference between information and utterance,” pp. 39 - 40 (emphasis in original)Hanging over the entire discussion of course, are those pesky “psychic systems,” or “humans” as you and I would refer to them. Luhmann does actually break down and discuss “psychic systems” quite a bit within the text currently under discussion, yet tellingly, the phrase itself is left out of the index. Luhmann (and most of his disciples it seems) would like to ignore such problematic areas of analysis, by moving the frame to the abstract level of “communication systems” or “social systems[.]” (p. 9) In discussing the perception of psychic systems, however, Luhmann notes that a “distinction must be presupposed when dealing with the psychic system’s participation in the communicative process—when, in other words, one of the conditions of possibility of society is at stake.” (p. 16; Luhmann cites himself here, notably)“Art cannot overcome the separation between psychic and social systems.” (p. 48) Yet the “irritation” remains; if a social system falls in the woods without any psychic system with which to structurally couple, does it utter any information? Many more learned scholars in the area of sociology might find such concerns a “trivial distinction,” similar to dismissals by internal observers of other system-specific paradoxes which Luhmann describes. Nonetheless to the non-sociologist (or non-systems theorist!), such concerns may appear valid. Certainly as Luhmann defines it, communication exists independently of such individuals or “psychic systems.” But is this just an impressive parlor trick, designed to fool us into submission while the modernists continue to operate the machinery of civilization from behind a curtain of ever increasing complexity?

It's heavy, but with a lot of sense. It's completely worth the slow reading + deep thinking it provokes. It jumps around eras and contexts, with careful reasoning. You need to slow down and remember history isn't just a sequence of news articles.

Sono pienamente soddisfatta per tempestività del servizio e per la successiva ottemperanza alle richieste relative agli adempimenti contabili. Farò certamente altri acquisti.