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    Published : 2026-03-30
    Vol. 17 No. 1 (2026)

    Art as a Medium of Communication in the Social Sphere

    Małgorzata Sławek-Czochra

    https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4732-1341

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.18290/rkult26171.2

    Abstract

    The article addresses the issue of art as an autonomous medium of social communication. Despite the fundamental role of artistic practices in social life, communication enacted through art remained on the margins of reflection within communication and media studies throughout most of the twentieth century and into the early twenty-first century. Classical communication theories most often reduced art to the status of an aesthetic object or approached it only indirectly, as an element of visual culture or interpretive discourses. The aim of the article is to systematize the key concepts and to identify the theoretical foundations of an approach in which art is understood as a medium of social communication. The text proposes a coherent interpretive framework grounded in Niklas Luhmann’s theory of social systems and Siegfried J. Schmidt’s constructivist media theory, enabling the analysis of artistic practices as forms of communicating meanings, emotions, and values in the social sphere. A key element of the proposed approach is the distinction between communication through art and communication about art, which makes it possible to capture the specificity of the mediatization of artistic messages. The article serves as a point of reference for further empirical research on the functioning of art as a medium of communication in diverse social contexts.

    Keywords:

    artistic communication, systems theory, art in public space, social communication, artistic practices, mediatization of art



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    Sławek-Czochra, M. (2026). Art as a Medium of Communication in the Social Sphere. Roczniki Kulturoznawcze, 17(1), 23–45. https://doi.org/10.18290/rkult26171.2

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    Roczniki Kulturoznawcze · ISSN 2082-8578 | eISSN 2544-5219 | DOI: 10.18290/rkult

    © Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawła II

    Articles are licensed under a Creative Commons  Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)