What Are the Limits of Opportunity in the Art Sphere?

What was your initial motivation to research students from various Czech art schools

Jiří Skála (JS): I have been interested in various aspects of the phenomenon of work and labor for a long time, and when you focus on such a topic long enough, you sooner or later encounter concepts such as ‘cultural capital’ and ‘social capital’… It’s just a part of it. In 2018, I was talking to Tereza Stejskalová about it, and she sent me a link to a research project from Britain in which they studied social mobility in the art sphere. Tereza mentioned that it would be interesting to try that here. Because she did not have time to work on it then, we started on the project with Johana Chylíková, who had experience with sociological research. I then asked Tereza for an introductory text where she would write about her own interest in the topic. The topic of researching the social background of art students also complemented very well with my interests after completing my doctorate studying systemic precarity in art (the outcome was published as Litanie prekariátu, AVU, 2020; AB)

Johana Chylíková (JCh): Jiří approached me directly at the beginning of 2019 with an offer to perform some quantitative research. He wanted me to design a quantitative research project analyzing the cultural, social, and economic capital of students enrolled at art universities. And due to the tight financial limit, we agreed that I would design the analysis, prepare the survey, gather the data online, and then provide the tables with basic statistics. It wasn’t supposed to be a research project yielding a peer-reviewed paper. I basically did the work of a full agency, but that would cost like five times more… (laughs)

JS: Then I started searching for schools and also approached those outside of Prague, but they were generally not very interested. They told me they didn’t want to collaborate, even though it would have only required them to send out a survey to their students. So, we ultimately surveyed at The Academy of Fine Arts in Prague and, after a little convincing, we were also able to do so at FAMU. Johana then came up with the idea that it would be good if we also included a vocational school for comparison – the students would get the same survey and this would show the differences between the ambitions and reality of people who study at art institutions of higher learning and those who find a different path for themselves.

JCh: We chose one private vocational school and found that there were students with higher economic capital than those studying at public universities. The benefit for the involved schools was that we sent them specific and interesting information about their students. But the downside of the research was the low number of returned surveys, as is often the case. That is, if you only get half or less of the surveys back, it does not allow you to draw general conclusions. And it would have also required more time to work with the data, which would have definitely been possible, were we not limited by a one-year grant from the Academy of Fine Arts. And time is money, so we finally opted to go by way of qualitative research. We applied for another grant from The Academy, and the result is this publication.

Are you aware of any other similar quantitative research project performed in Czechia?

JCh: Unfortunately not. In the case of researching social inequality and differences in education, most studies in Czechia adopt the quantitative method. A qualitative analysis of class inequality has only really been done by Kateřina Nedbálková, who focuses on manual workers, and perhaps Irena Reifová, who focuses on the depictions of class in reality shows. The research of class inequality in Czechia is mostly confined to so-called stratified research, which is essentially quantitative. And in the case of differences in education, the matter is more or less the same.

JS: We then agreed to perform the research by way of individual interviews.

In what way do you think qualitative research provides more information? Can we say that a qualitative interview with nine students better reflects the realities at the select schools?

JCh: It probably does not reflect the entire reality, but we made a point of choosing respondents in a way which would represent the various fields, various schools, diverse art media, and with a balanced ratio of genders, and Jiří also knows some of them, so we had a general sense from what social background they were coming from and mixed things up accordingly.

JS: And we ultimately managed to include in our results all art schools in Czechia. Considering that many schools offer separate studies of BA and MA degrees, our respondents ultimately had a lot of experience. We found out that the experiences of nine people provided enough material to write an entire book.

JCh:  I think that we could have maybe added two or three chapters, but we focused on topics which we had been encountering from the initial stages of the interviews. For example, the question of aspirations and motivation.

The category of “aspirations” is very interesting. Could you maybe elaborate a bit how you worked with it over the course of the interviews?

JCh: When we asked the respondents what social environment they come from and how they perceive their art studies, we very quickly encountered the question of motivations and direction. Of course, all artists wonder where and how they will make their living… And ambitions have to do with not only their economic background but also their cultural background, which also takes into account the overall support in their family. We found that family support, not only financial, but also moral – and especially trust – is immensely important.

The topic of aspirations and motivations is certainly very important also in the context of conversations about competitiveness, which are ongoing in contemporary Czech art…

JCh: We did not deal directly with the question of competitiveness, and it appeared on its own in just one case, but that was also perhaps on account of there not being enough time. One respondent spoke about the toxic environment of social networks. But the topic of aspirations generally appeared on its own when we were talking with them about the goals they had set for themselves…

JS: In the second round of interviews, we encountered the influence of social networks on motivation and work ethic and the like… That would probably make for a study of its own. I was greatly surprised by how important aspirations are. We found that although a person may come from a lower social background, they can succeed if they aspire to something, are motivated, ambitious…

JCh: It is interesting to note in this context that I have read a few international studies on the labor classes. Especially in the US and Britain, the labor class is the carrier of the idea of meritocracy. They believed that if they toiled away, they would make it. And one of the respondents we mention in the chapter on aspirations shows this pattern: I have an opportunity, my parents support me, so I must work 150% to take advantage of that opportunity.

Did you find out something surprising or unexpected as part of your study?

JCh: We found that at least a certain level of economic support from the family is imperative. It is almost impossible to study without it. But if there is at least some economic backing, then the moral support from the family and their trust in the student’s ability to be successful in the field of art play an essential role.

JS: The question of gender in relation to one’s own identity and labor background was also interesting –  how men and women work with it and how it relates to the individual art media.

JCh: One respondent described how she didn’t use makeup and did not dress well because she felt that a “too feminine” look may disqualify her from the art field she was studying.

We were intrigued by your finding that the category of gender is ultimately a stronger determinative motive than socio-economic status…

JCh: It’s because people realize their own gender almost 100%. People act towards us on the basis of (an assumed) gender, and we reflect that. But in Czechia, as a post-communist country, we pretend to a certain degree that class or socio-economic distinctions don’t exist in society. That is also the reason why we tend to make fun of people from the lower classes: “I’m not a welfare case…” The fact that the theme of class appears mostly on the level of humor and is otherwise virtually absent shows that it is mostly a repressed topic.

JS: I see petit-bourgeois morals in that: we shouldn’t talk about origins, all that matters is ambition and grit… we all work hard and whoever wants to get somewhere makes it.

This also points to the question of moral judgement, the evaluation of others’ status and competitiveness…

JS: That’s where social relationships are most visible. At one point, when we talked with a respondent about their perception of success, it manifested in a defensive formation. He cramped up and reacted by morally judging others.

JCh: It is a coping strategy for dealing with a certain trauma…

JS: Exactly, and its utilization also shows one’s social origins. That’s interesting to note.

Can we say this is specifically characteristic of the art sphere?

JCh: We don’t know; we performed the research only with artists. But it is true that other texts focusing on class that I have read recently also mention motivations and aspirations as something generally important.

One specific thing is that almost all respondents initially had to face their family’s resistance. Choosing to study at an art school is a decision supported almost exclusively by parents who themselves have some connection to art, are themselves artists, or work in a related field. Society assumes art to be a very precarious profession, both financially and socially.

JS: This also has to do with the fact that if a person from a lower social stratum wants to study art, they must accept that certain creative media are more “profitable” for them, typically painting. This allows social mobility from a lower class, provided at least minimal economic support and ambitions, as we’ve already mentioned. Although we can’t completely generalize, it has been shown that in some cases, the student switched their focus to painting to be able to continue studying art.

Socially determined mediality…

JCh: It was also obvious that people studying the commercially more lucrative fields were also very much aware of it and did not rely merely on their work but actively networked, working on developing social capital; they knew it was about business.

JS: At The Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, this is reflected in the emphasis placed on hard work and also in the fact that students – mostly those of sculpture but also painting studios – are provided with spaces to work right at the school where they go to work and study. This means that, on the one hand, we have post-studio practice, meaning work which does not have to take place in the studio and is a bit looser, and on the other hand, there are the studios with their studio-based work. This can lead to mutual misunderstandings about what art practice may mean.

Regarding communicating your research results or preparing to communicate them to the directorship of the interested schools, what might be one outcome that could be carried over into practice? Could it be related to providing more space for subjects which would generally focus more on the career that comes after graduation?

JS: This has been a topic of discussion for a long time, and I think no one really knows how to get there. It seems that this is more of a “craft,” so it requires a very individual approach, and no universal template can really be applied. Such a setting has to be carefully weighed. Maybe if there were one mandatory subject it could work, like Entrepreneurship 101 or something… But if it weren’t a mandatory subject, no one would take it.

Because it is too pragmatic an approach to artistic production?

JS: There was already one similar attempt at the Academy of Fine Arts, but students didn’t attend it because, during their studies, they are interested in other things. It was only later that they told me how much they would have benefited.

Is there anything else you found out from your research that might be applicable to practice? Like, for example, if the missing parental motivation might be supplemented by teachers?

JCh: We don’t know, as we didn’t focus on that, but I think that without the support of family, many people don’t make it to university at all, or there are not many that do, and most will likely not finish.

JS: It is also important to note that in our research, we selected respondents who knew a lot about studies and sort of knew what they wanted. That’s why we spoke with senior students in their last years of study. And when, as part of the initial research, I asked the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague to supply me with figures of departing students, I found out that most students who do not finish school leave the institution in the first two years. And that is mostly at their own request, not for any reason pertaining to unfulfilled study responsibilities. We did not know that beforehand. This brings up the question of what would happen if we reflected this fact in the research, as it would be interesting to also include those who left the school for various reasons, and in this way find out their situation pertaining to economic, cultural, or social capital.

And regarding implementation: It is obvious that we can change the school’s setting, but the graduates will have to grapple with the way the art world is set up after graduating anyway. One of my favorite British psychiatrists, David Small, says that we may be able to heal people, but we then release them into the same world that initially caused their problems, and we are back where we started… That’s why, according to him, psychotherapy does not work very well, as it is first necessary to change the social system. So it might be similar in the school context: it is a very competitive environment based on individual performance. Many problems start already at the schools themselves.

Would it be possible to perform the same research among the faculty and find out whether they also replicate a particular approach to art? Because people teaching at university are often fairly affluent…

JCh: I’m afraid that might not work because in the case of teachers, it is impossible to guarantee anonymity. But I think that there is no discrimination based on social origins among the faculty, but rather based on values. We had one respondent who got into an argument with one of her teachers due to her interest in feminism. It was not a conflict based on her gender, but rather her interest in gender topics.

JS: Social inequality can also be indirectly seen in the conflict of values, for example, during entrance interviews at which teachers may already see that they might not get along in the future – but we have no data regarding this.

Johana Chylíková is a sociologist. She works as an assistant professor in the Czech Social Science Data Archive at the Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences. She teaches sociology at the Philosophy Department of the Technical University of Liberec. She has published studies in the field of socio-scientific methodology in Czech and foreign expert journals and books, and she is currently involved in qualitative research of socio-economic inequality.

Jiří Skála is a Prague-based artist, writer, and university teacher. In his artistic practice, he focuses on the media of photography and performance. He has also been publishing essays and short stories. Most of his efforts deal with topics of the transformation of labor and leisure time in the context of Eastern Europe. He focuses on the overlaps between these two activities and the way they become a source of new forms of exploitation, dominance, and humiliation. In his artistic outcomes, he attempts to find adequate means of resistance and strong metaphoric imagery.

Johana Chylíková, Jiří Skála, Hranice příležitostí (AVU, 2023). 130 pages. 250 CZK.

Photo: Jiří Skála’s archive