Academics and practitioners are working to understand the connections between artivism and entrepreneurial activity and behavior, seeing both as catalysts for social transformation. Callander argues that the processes for structuring and implementing socially engaged artwork rely on effectual entrepreneurial behavior and Hjorth underlines how both artivism and entrepreneurial behavior challenge the dominant models and conventional structures that govern the social realities of our world.
Artists today are often entrepreneurs in the practical sense that they form their own livelihoods to a greater extent than most. For example, van Gogh’s passion and entrepreneurial imagination led to groundbreaking work that changed the vision of modern art. Further, artivists proactively leverage contingencies and means to their advantage, and sometimes create improbable alliances, break laws, and employ “shock and awe” tactics to grab notice and wield influence. Picasso and Braque referred to their practices and expertise, transforming existing means into new effects, giving rise to the Cubist art movement. Like entrepreneurs who use this effectual reasoning, artivists embark on journeys of discovery, not knowing—or expecting—at the outset what the end results will be.
Questioning the neutrality of art and aesthetics upheld within classical art, artivists stand for raising awareness of the political nature of artistic creation, framing it as a praxis of power for bettering society from the bottom up…