ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on some problems which cluster around the concept of a 'sociology of art'. It argues that sociology, or sociologists, should not involve themselves in critical judgements but maintain a position of aesthetic neutrality is in itself untenable, as it can be shown to be both theoretically unsound, and impossible to apply in an empirical investigation. The chapter presents a research project which looked at the production of art in Glasgow, as an example of an empirical piece of work which, implicitly, if not explicitly, depended upon the principle of aesthetic neutrality. It expands three premises of the sociological model. The premises are the formulation of general laws regarding the production of art, the necessity of aesthetic neutrality, and the objective facts are to be found in the social relations governing the production of art. The research which was carried out in Glasgow was entitled the 'Socioeconomic context of artistic creation'.
