Evolution of the territorial field of art in a post-socialist city. Distribution patterns of private contemporary art galleries in Krakow, Poland, between 1989 and 2019

Abstract

Private art galleries, due to their often short-lived nature stemming from the uncertainties inherent in the art world, constitute a good indicator of changes taking place within the urban space. The spatial patterns of their locations are the outcome of an interplay between the spatial choices of individual entities that respond to opportunities and constraints in different parts of the city. Such spatial patterns also reflect artistic hierarchies and oppositions within the field of visual arts, where artist-oriented and market-oriented art galleries represent different artistic communities (local, non-local) and generations (younger and aspiring, older and recognized). As a result, distinct art gallery clusters (market-oriented and artist-oriented) emerge and shape into spatial structures, which might be conceptualised as the territorial field of art. This concept is used here in a broad survey of the art gallery landscape of Krakow, a large city in southern Poland. This offers a unique opportunity to follow the development of an art gallery scene in a city widely associated with art and from the very moment when, in 1989, the newly introduced political and economic freedoms replaced the strict control of the communist regime removing barriers preventing the operation of commercial galleries and non-profit art spaces. The study involved building of a detailed database that enabled tracing the spatial choices (locations and relocations) of art galleries as far back as in the 1980s and then from 1989 to 2019. Along the detailed data review a qualitative analysis of reports in the press and on the internet provided an insight into the spatial contexts and motivations behind spatial decisions during different time periods. Four primary art gallery clusters were identified and their phases of emergence, growth and decline observed over the three decades were found to have been mutually interconnected, as well as linked with the broader functional changes developing in different parts of the inner city and with distinct artistic and spatial preferences of the successive generations of young artists and gallery owners representing them.