Until the 16th century, painting and sculpture were not considered arts but manual labor. None of the nine muses were devoted to these activities. In classical Greece, they were often performed by slaves. Even La Nascita di Venere no fue idea de Botticelli, was not Botticelli’s idea; he had to follow written instructions received from Ficino. It was precisely during the Renaissance that these activities began to acquire the social status of arts, and since then, those who practice them have risen in status to the point where some painters have been given the title “the divine.”
In the 21st century, there is growing recognition of the creation of new and more beautiful social relationships as an art form. When we enter a room, we may enjoy its beauty due to the paintings hanging on its walls, but we enjoy it even more if we have experienced beautiful relationships there that enrich our memory and our lives, rather than toxic ones.
Social artists are those who create new human relationships that are better and more beautiful than the previous ones. Creating beautiful new relationships is more challenging than creating beautiful new paintings; it requires at least as much artistry as painting. During the 20th century, some arts progressively became subordinated to the market, to the extent that Duchamp’s urinal is cited as one of the most important works of the century simply because it fetched a high price. The social status of certain artists is now often measured by the economic value of their works, which has little to do with the value attributed in their time to works by Goya or Van Gogh.
It is not money that is driving the recognition of the creation of new human relationships as social art. Social artists are also highly altruistic. They do not discredit or forbid “copies” of their works. On the contrary, they take pleasure in seeing their creations reinterpreted in the most diverse contexts around the world. None of the nine muses were devoted to social art, but Plato called Sappho the tenth muse, and she was undoubtedly the first known social artist. Perhaps she will soon become the muse of social artists.
Associate Professor at University of Granada