The making of art: sculptors, artisans, and artists in the Apuan Alps
type: CreativeWork
description: This dissertation investigates the sculpture industry in the Apuan Alps and its relation to claims of artistic value. For centuries, this Italian district has specialized in extracting, marketing, and processing marble into luxury commodities. Ahead of many other parts of this economy (including design and architecture), art manufacturing has dominated local identity and commercial strategies. This thesis studies the Apuan industry in the context of transnational artmaking processes. It maintains that production reveals aspects of these economic activities that cannot be fully studied from the side of circulation alone. For example, while a sculpture’s making can be fundamental to our appreciation, we often rely on highly restricted information, sometimes misleading, in order to respond as spectators. In foregrounding production, this dissertation hopes not only to improve our understanding of sculpture-making itself but also to explain why it is often mystified. Its treatment of the topic refers to debates in the anthropology of art and those more traditionally engaged by scholars of economy and labour, such as technology, practical rationality, and alienation. Methodologically, the analysis combines in-person and remote fieldwork with a historical framework. As an international art centre since the Florentine Renaissance, the Apuan Alps present an ideal location for such inquiry. Around Carrara, Pietrasanta, and the rest of a local 20-kilometre-wide marble district, workshops host a diversity of carving activities. In the sculpture firms, artisans fabricate works for their clients, which may involve different degrees of automation and creative input. In private studios, amateurs and professionals share spaces to make art, for themselves and for others. The thesis’ approach to this intricate economic reality is structured around a central question: How can we understand art as industrial production? The response is both empirical and theoretical. In the Apuan Alps,…
abstract: This dissertation investigates the sculpture industry in the Apuan Alps and its relation to claims of artistic value. For centuries, this Italian district has specialized in extracting, marketing, and processing marble into luxury commodities. Ahead of many other parts of this economy (including design and architecture), art manufacturing has dominated local identity and commercial strategies. This thesis studies the Apuan industry in the context of transnational artmaking processes. It maintains that production reveals aspects of these economic activities that cannot be fully studied from the side of circulation alone. For example, while a sculpture’s making can be fundamental to our appreciation, we often rely on highly restricted information, sometimes misleading, in order to respond as spectators. In foregrounding production, this dissertation hopes not only to improve our understanding of sculpture-making itself but also to explain why it is often mystified. Its treatment of the topic refers to debates in the anthropology of art and those more traditionally engaged by scholars of economy and labour, such as technology, practical rationality, and alienation. Methodologically, the analysis combines in-person and remote fieldwork with a historical framework. As an international art centre since the Florentine Renaissance, the Apuan Alps present an ideal location for such inquiry. Around Carrara, Pietrasanta, and the rest of a local 20-kilometre-wide marble district, workshops host a diversity of carving activities. In the sculpture firms, artisans fabricate works for their clients, which may involve different degrees of automation and creative input. In private studios, amateurs and professionals share spaces to make art, for themselves and for others. The thesis’ approach to this intricate economic reality is structured around a central question: How can we understand art as industrial production? The response is both empirical and theoretical. In the Apuan Alps,…
author: Ruiz del Río, Javier
language: eng
keywords: Apuan Alps, art, industry, labour, sculpture
license: https://apollo8-f-pro.lib.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/c38b20f7-7f4e-4b12-942a-16343a2438b2/download
license: https://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
date published: 2023-09-19
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:24:18Z
provider: Cambridge University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Cambridge

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.17863/CAM.106364