Abstract

Contemporary art, characterized by the co-existence of heterogeneous practices in continuous proliferation, is one of the most difficult research objects. Although it has been addressed by various disciplines in fervent competition, no satisfactory theoretical consensus has been reached. The lack of commonly shared norms for asserting what contemporary art is and what is not has an impact on the activities undertaken by individuals or by collective structures within the social world. Consequently, the present paper aims at transcending the conventional discipline division of tasks by scrutinizing comparatively the aesthetical and sociological approaches to art in view of the articulation of a new methodological platform able to account for the complexity of contemporary art