The thinking of this paper starts from the value of previous contact. What is the value? Things have no value, and the value of things comes from human needs. Without human needs, there is no value. Therefore, value reflects people's needs. More vividly, value is a category that exists only for people under the control of the concept of "person". Because value depends on people, as far as things themselves are concerned, there is no fixed value. Value changes with people's need for it. When the value changes, the price of goods should also change. However, the traditional economic theory tells us that the price of goods does not necessarily reflect the value of goods, and the two are often in a state of separation and contradiction to some extent. Today, from the perspective of human needs, we reflect on this point of view and find that the value of goods in traditional economic theory can exist independently without human needs! ? We can't help asking, what is the value of goods? Is it only composed of useful materials and practical value? It should be clearly understood that the use value of commodities includes not only practical value, but also aesthetic, psychological, social and political functions. As symbolic existence, these functions, together with useful material existence, constitute the use value of goods, which is the need of the person in charge (there are many theoretical discussions in this field in contemporary times, and the most important one is Jean? Baudrillard's Theory of Symbol Communication and Illusion Simulation in Consumer Society (4). When we realize that the use value of goods includes both practical value and symbolic value (in Baudrillard's words), we will not tolerate the hasty practice of focusing only on practical value and ignoring symbolic value. Therefore, we say that the price and value of commodities are unified, and the price is a true reflection of the current reality of commodity value. Without price, the value of goods cannot be reflected.

It is precisely because of the diversity and complexity of the components that constitute the value of goods that we need to identify the value of goods dialectically and comprehensively. For example, we can't determine the value of a commodity by the amount of tangible material and capital labor invested in producing it. Why? Because the products produced may not be able to form a reciprocal relationship with people's needs in society (as far as painting is concerned, perhaps there is some symbolic obstacle in its intangible style or color artistic conception, which causes consumers' psychological rejection), people in society are reluctant to buy at the price set by the producers. If so, then the production of this commodity is invalid and this commodity is worthless. Thus, on the issue of commodity value, any unilateral price decision is invalid, and the real effect must be realized in specific purchase actions. It should also be specially reminded that a certain degree of deviation between commodity price and value will only occur in the case of commodity alienation, such as monopoly, which is contrary to the real free and equal exchange of commodities, and this situation is beyond the scope of theoretical discussion under normal circumstances.

Since the price and value of commodities are unified, that is to say, the circulating price of the market is a true reflection of the value of commodities, then the price of artistic works as commodities is a true reflection of their artistic value.

Artistic value, artistic value of works of art

There is a view that still exists among many humanistic intellectuals, that artistic production is a special spiritual production, which not only abides by the laws of general material production, but also has its cognitive value and aesthetic value, that is, it has its particularity of spiritual production, so it is impossible to simply apply the statement that the price of artistic works is a true reflection of artistic value, otherwise it will be impossible to explain why some artists' works have high artistic value in people's minds, although they do not have considerable market prices. This view is expressed in another way: commodity price not only can not reflect the artistic value of works of art, but also defile, stabilize and devalue the artistic value.

There seems to be some conceptual confusion to be clarified here. First of all, it should be declared that artistic value is different from that of artistic works. Artistic value occurs at the level of human life existence, which embodies the original function and significance of art to human life activities. In other words, it is a concept about the whole human life in a humanistic sense. People often say that art is priceless, that's what they mean. The artistic value of works of art is a kind of value judgment of works of art based on artistic value and criteria, which embodies the concrete way and significance of the excavation, construction and presentation of the origin of the above-mentioned people's life activities by works of art. The value of artistic activity itself is priceless, that is, the so-called art is priceless However, the artistic value of a work of art can indeed be valued, because the artistic value of a work of art, as the concrete presentation and specific significance of the origin of life, has never existed in isolation. In the relationship with the concrete presentation of artistic value of other works of art, their respective specific meanings can be compared and estimated with each other. Therefore, we only say that the artistic value is comparable, and it can be divided into high and low on the level of the artistic value relationship of different works of art.

Through such analysis, we know that the artistic value itself has nothing to do with the commodity value, but the artistic value of artistic works is related to the commodity value of artistic works. The artistic value of works of art is the value undertaker of its commodity value, which is why people appreciate and consume works of art precisely for its artistic value. Therefore, the commodity value of works of art reflects the degree to which works of art meet the needs of people in society by presenting the origin of life activities, that is, the degree to which the artistic value of works of art meets the needs of the present society. In the realistic relationship between the artistic value and commodity value of works of art and the needs of people in society, the commodity value of works of art is the embodiment of its artistic value. In fact, once a work of art enters the circulation field as a commodity, it has formed a new evaluation system to measure the artistic value of the work, which is why it is influenced by tradition and George. In his famous "convention theory", Dickie called it "the art world". There are five reasons for slamming the evaluation system. We will discuss this problem later.

Several misunderstandings about the value essence of works of art

To understand the value essence of works of art, we should at least pay attention to the following aspects: 1. The value of artistic works is measured by people's consumption demand rather than consumption results. By analyzing and understanding the difference between artistic value and artistic value of works of art, we know that art is priceless, but this does not mean that the value of works of art is also priceless.

However, there are always some people who insist that a painting has profoundly affected their life, so it cannot be valued. According to this logic, value has completely become anything subjective. This shows that it is not feasible to determine the value of artistic works according to the effect of acceptance and consumption. Two? The commodity value of works of art is different from that of works of art at a specific stage. Take novels as an example. In a certain period of time, the sales of a best-selling novel greatly exceeded Tolstoy's Anna? We can't draw any conclusions from Karenina's sales. Because a work of art not only has the commercial value of the sum of the specific forms of all periods or stages, but also has the local rather than the overall commercial value of a work of art in a specific period or stage, the two cannot be compared. Three? The value of a work of art is not inherent and unchangeable in the work itself, but changes with the times. Van Gogh's paintings are of great artistic value to people today, but none of his works were sold when he was alive. Why is this? Painting or painting is the work itself that Heidegger said from the beginning of creation. What's the problem? The problem is that although the artistic value contained in a work is owned by the work itself, it will change with the changes of the times and people and show different meanings. When Van Gogh was alive, his paintings were not part of the overall needs of society, so they had no realistic artistic value. Today's situation is completely different. They greatly meet the needs of modern people in art consumption, glow with great artistic value, and naturally obtain high commodity value. In more popular terms, this is: the value of a work of art will change with the change of history, because its sexual relationship with people is different in different historical stages; At the same time, its value in the sexual relationship with people in each historical stage is the embodiment of something inherent in itself. This means that the value of a work of art in the sexual relationship with people in a certain historical stage (such as contemporary) cannot be regarded as the inherent value in the sexual relationship with people in all historical stages. Otherwise, just as we used to regard the thoughts of Marxist classical writers in a specific historical period as a "universally applicable" dogma, we made the mistake of metaphysical thinking mode.

Artistic value evaluation and discourse right

The previous analysis shows that the commodity value of artistic works constitutes a true reflection of its artistic value, thus forming a new evaluation system, which has been criticized by the existing pre-existing evaluation system. This is an indisputable fact. In fact, in real life, we will find that the artistic value of works of art is not without standards, but with standards, which are formulated by experts and authorities who have the right to speak. In this way, the judgments made by experts and authorities of a certain class or individual may be objective or true, while the value presented by artistic works to a specific recipient may become something that can exist independently of the recipient, which belongs to the permanent inherent nature of artistic works, that is, the above-mentioned "universal value." What experts did sigman get? Bowman called it "the exclusive power of legislators", which is the product of profound and complicated historical and cultural origins. It can be said that the discussion of its historical existence and realistic situation is a very difficult and complicated project, and this paper can't go deep into it. But one thing is clear: the artistic value recognized by experts and authorities is often not responded by the general public. This is just like Marx's famous saying: "... the most beautiful music is meaningless to an ear without a sense of music, ..." 7 The difference between the works of art appreciated by experts and authorities and those enjoyed by the general public is not only the difference in artistic taste, but also the difference in artistic value. Because the public is always in the majority and the authority of experts is always in the minority, the so-called "elegance" and "vulgarity" view of the academic tyrants has been formed.

The elegance and vulgarity of works of art have undergone historical transformation.

What needs special explanation is that our analysis of the evaluation standard of the value of artistic works formulated by experts and authoritative organizations does not mean that we recognize the legitimacy of this evaluation standard, but testing the legitimacy of this standard requires the above-mentioned very complicated research work, which is far beyond the scope of this paper. In fact, because value belongs to people in the final analysis and is realized in people's acceptance of works of art, the value of works of art is closely related to the personnel structure of the recipients of works and their proportion in the whole society. Especially in contemporary society, art, as a universal commodity of society, is no longer faced with a few princes and nobles, but with the general public. Therefore, in a sense, the commodity value of works of art is mainly determined by the public's consumption interest, which also leads to the phenomenon of cultural fast food that works of art blindly cater to the public's interest and reduce its artistic value.

How to treat the opposition between elegance and vulgarity in works of art? In fact, from the perspective of historical development, the two are not monolithic, but change with the change of history. In the west, painting did not change from vulgar art of local people to elegant art until the Renaissance. With the improvement of people's cultural level, the elegant art that has been tested by history has been accepted by more people and has become a popular art with a wide coverage. The temporality and eternity of art always complement each other, and there is neither absolute temporality nor absolute eternity.

If the distinction between popular art and elegant art takes place under the background of traditional social form, the former mainly refers to popular folk art, while the latter mainly refers to aristocratic and religious art; Then, the distinction between popular art and elite art takes place in the context of contemporary society. The former is aimed at social groups with knowledge and certain assets mixed by various social occupations and social identities, while the latter is aimed at people who love the quintessence of national traditions and are keen on pioneering and experimental exploration. Whether it is popular or elegant, popular or elite, from the perspective of development, they are all changing with each other. The reason for the change is the change of people's needs in society.

We have been discussing the value essence of artistic works as commodities from beginning to end, because only in this way can we eliminate all kinds of details and illusions that entangle or cover the value essence and approach the core part of the value essence more effectively. I hope that the efforts of this paper can play its due role in revealing all the problems of art commercialization.