ABSTRACT
When we think of important artists in any fi eld, original, creative, quirky, larger than life personalities like Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980), Kurt Cobain (19671994), and Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890) come to mind. Our mental images of artists are created and sustained through media representations like the Hollywood-style “biopic.” Shakespeare, Basquiat, Mozart, Goya, Frida Kahlo, and more popular artists like the singer Diana Ross, the cartoonist R. Crumb, and the punk rocker Sid Vicious have all appeared as central characters in big
budget dramatizations of artists’ lives. This genre of fi lm tells us much about our society’s view of artists and what they do. While these fi lms vary in details, without exception they focus on the psyche and life events of the individual. Whether the artists are presented as disturbed geniuses, neurotic bohemians, or visionary outsiders, the emphasis is on the unique and special qualities of the art producer. The social and historical conditions that make it possible for the artist to produce the work that we admire so much are, at most, presented as a backdrop to the “real” star of the show.
