I was just watching the American TV series F.R.I.E.N.D.S for the umpteenth time. In one scene, the character of Phoebe says – “I’d give anything not to be appreciated in my own time!” That made me think. Why is an artist usually not appreciated in his/her own time?
First thing’s first. A lot of artists are appreciated in their own time. Example – all the famous musicians, painters, poets in their respective industries right now. But a posthumously celebrated artists makes for a better story and speaks more to our consciousness than the “mundane” stories of artists being famous in their lifetime.
For those few artists who aren’t appreciated in their time, there could be three main reasons, I reckon – .
1) Historical value
An artwork might have several types of values – physical value (use of expensive materials for example), artistic value (the emotional, moral, societal value) and historical value (being a time capsule by capturing an instant of time in history). Physical value is the least important when judging art. People don’t value a Picasso painting because he used expensive colors or a pricey frame. The artistic value is the core of any art. It’s about the feeling the art creates within us. And it is completely subjective. What one person may deem art of highest nature, might be discarded as rubbish by another person. It’s because of this subjective value that people play millions of dollars for one painting but not for the other that is quite similar.
The third type of value is historical – capturing a specific time in the history of humanity. This value can only be attached to an artwork only through passage of time. If we had two works of art, both of equal artistic value to me but one created 200 years ago and another one 2 years ago. Anyone would say that the older artwork is more valuable because it contains history within it. And that’s exactly why an artist may not be appreciated in her own time. Her artwork may be considered nice enough in her time or completely discarded but over time, her work invariably gains some historical value.
2) Hindsight
Every era has its own “acceptance boundaries” when it comes to ideas in art, science, or any other domain of human endeavor. Sameness is usually found boring. A little “uniqueness” is desired and rewarded but if you go beyond a certain threshold of being different, you are discarded for being “bizarre”. Most artists who gains any fame in their time find themselves in this Goldilocks zone of “different”. An artist who is wildly different risks being ignored and dying penniless and unappreciated. Since time is constantly flowing and human definitions of what is acceptable are constantly changing with it, at a certain time after the active period this artist, his/her work is “rediscovered”. Suddenly, that wild “different-ness” becomes the unique selling point of him/her. And there you have the hindsight bias – only after seeing an artwork of the past in new light, can we sometimes appreciate its unique edge or style, the same unique edge or style which was dismissed in the artist’s time for being weird or crazy.
3) Denied pleasure
It’s an established fact about human nature that we desire things that we can’t have much more than the things we are allowed or that are easily available. Be it food, romantic interests or works of art. So, once a artist is dead or retired and we know that we won’t be having any more of his/her art, the value for his/her existing work increases even though those works are exactly what they were prior to the retirement or death of the artist. So, even the artists who are appreciated in their own times, are appreciated more in times to come. And this relative increase in the value of their work seems to us like a newfound appreciation.
The value of art is not fixed to begin with. The beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder and the value of an artwork is determined by what people are willing to pay for it in a certain era of time.
Some artists are appreciated in their time but only in their time. Some are appreciated in their time well enough but discover a new fandom in another era. Some die unappreciated and are never rediscovered. And some die penniless and unknown only to find a posthumous stardom centuries later. We just can’t predict who will be valued when, and how much. What I can say for some certainty is that my own work, e.g. these short essays, will not draw much attention, if at all, posthumously or otherwise!