ABSTRACT
The work of art has been compared to the opening of a window upon the world. Apart from its external limitations, the sociology of art also has internal limitations. Thus sociology fails to explain the connections between artistic quality and popularity; and to questions about the material conditions of the creation of works of art it gives answers that are not altogether satisfying. One of the most obvious shortcomings of the sociology of art, as of all genetic explanation of spiritual structures, derives from the endeavor to analyze into simple elements an object whose very nature consists in its complexity. The inadequacy, however, that we often find in the sociologist’s view of art is not simply the result of the method of research which sociology shares with psychology and art history. Sociology possesses no philosopher’s stone, does not work miracles or solve all problems.
