On the Difficult Bond Between Artist and Audience

Author: Tomás Barceló

Some artists become deeply irritated when I mention the need to connect with the audience. That reaction, I believe, reveals a wound and therefore a possible source of learning.

The comments I receive usually fall into three groups, sometimes overlapping. One directs attention toward the audience; another focuses on the artist; and the third places emphasis on the nature of art itself.

1. “The audience knows nothing”

This is the most visceral and resentful stance. The audience is accused of being ignorant, uncultured, incapable of understanding. I understand the reaction because I have felt it myself. It is a resentment born from a failed attempt at connection.

When you offer something of yourself and receive indifference, it hurts, and to protect ourselves we have two paths: blame ourselves or blame the audience. The first tells us “I didn’t make it,” and it hurts because it forces us to face our limitations and accept that we haven’t yet found a way to reach others. The second claims that “the audience is stupid,” functioning as an emotional analgesic: it protects our pride and allows us to move on without questioning ourselves… but only on the surface, because the discomfort remains.

Neither response resolves the essential issue: the frustration of a connection we longed for and did not achieve. The first option, at least, leaves room to try again, even if it means revising our approach; the second, however, leaves us stuck, because it depends on a change that others must make, not us.

2. “I make art for myself, not for others”

This position can be genuine or another form of refuge. There are artists who truly create inwardly: they live their art as an intimate, therapeutic experience, and they do so with complete peace. The sign that this is the case is precisely that peace: they feel no frustration if no one recognizes what they do, because they don’t need it. That is what happens to me with music, for example.

Art “for the inside” seeks to organize one’s inner life, while art “for the outside” is born from the desire to offer something to others. If lack of recognition produces resentment or sadness, we are likely facing a frustrated desire for connection. That pain is the proof that the art may not be as “for the inside” as claimed.

3. “Art that succeeds is pure marketing”

Here another form of resentment arises: the idea that those who manage to connect with the audience do so because they have betrayed art and turned it into merchandise. It’s true that one can attempt to manufacture art like just another product, but that almost never works. It is not advertising that creates a lasting bond with the audience, but the experience of something they perceive as authentic and valuable.

For me, sculpture is not a job but a vocation of loving dedication to which I want to devote my life, almost like a marriage or a small priesthood. That devotion is not about selling, but about trying to offer a bit of beauty in a world besieged by despair. And within that vocation, the audience is not a customer to be pleased: it is the people to whom this form of love is directed.

That is why, when I speak of “connecting with the audience,” I’m not referring to techniques or marketing strategies. I mean that a work needs to find someone. And when that happens, it is rarely due to tricks, but rather because, for some reason, what we do aligns with something others need, even if they cannot express it. That is why it is not about obeying the audience or adapting to their tastes. It is about listening to what symbolic space is empty in their lives and offering, from the deepest part of our authenticity, something that can illuminate it.

If you make art “for the outside,” if your intention is to participate in that symbolic conversation, then the audience matters to you. It is part of your responsibility. It affects you, hurts you, and brings you joy.

The symbolic conversation was born tens of thousands of years ago, when a tribe gathered at dusk around the fire and one of them asked for silence. That gesture—standing before others and claiming their attention—is the origin of what we now call art. That is why, when I speak of connecting with the audience, I think of that scene. After all, art is still this: standing by the fire and saying, “Listen to me for a moment: I have something to tell you.”