Art, Work and Art Work

This paper introduces a novel method for investigating the interfaces between art work and managerial work in the creative industries. The method, which we are calling dispraxis, seeks to transcend the traditional divisions between the academic world and the world of practice. This particular dispraxis is a structured, iterative dialogue between an academic, a manager, and an artist on the themes identified in the call for papers. In this dispraxis the following four themes were elicited. The first theme centred on the explosion of management discourse into the creative industries. The second theme explored the difference between the creative industries and 'normal' business and introduced the metaphor of chelation to describe the primary need to manage and protect safe spaces for creativity to happen. The third theme was money and this theme explored how art is valued and funded, especially in a postmodern world where the notion of authenticity and Taste have been problematised. The fourth theme discussed how art is routinely identified as the highest expression of human achievement and yet is largely ignored in commercial discourse. One explanation for this is to consider artistic work as part of the abject. The metaphor of origami is used to gather together the various themes explored in the dispraxis.