Taste as a social marker: Bourdieu and cultural capital
This article draws on my master's thesis: Verdier, D. (2024). How to serve the democratization of Art among citizens in the digital context of 2024? M.Sc. in Management of Social Innovation, HEC Montréal (supervisor: Rafael Ziegler).
Why do we like what we like? Pierre Bourdieu's answer is uncomfortable: our cultural preferences are not purely personal choices — they are shaped by social, economic and educational forces. Art, in this view, becomes a marker of belonging: a 'Louis Vuitton for walls'.
Three capitals that shape taste
In La Distinction (1979), Bourdieu distinguishes economic capital (money and materials), cultural capital (knowledge and education that let us understand and appreciate complex works), and social capital (networks that open doors). Access to art depends on all three — which is why inequality, not just price, keeps art exclusive.
Art as distinction — and isolation
Owning the right work can signal membership of a group. Schmutz et al. (2016) show how cultural capital forms as early as adolescence; Simmel (1903) linked taste to the tempo of the metropolis. But Bourdieu's marker has a shadow: consumer individualism can turn art into a status object and, online, into superficial display — accentuating isolation rather than meaning.
Breaking the reproduction of inequality
Adorno argued that art's autonomy — its power to resist and critique — is threatened when artists must professionalize inside a market. The way out is not to abolish the market but to lower its barriers: online access, fair representation of living artists, and co-creation let more people accumulate cultural capital and participate, instead of inheriting taste from an elite.
