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Thursday 6 February

Richard Orlinski: The Triumph of Marketing Over Art

Listen to me carefully, you bunch of snobs, marketing has finally devoured art. Richard Orlinski (born in 1966 in Paris) perfectly embodies this victory of capitalism over artistic creation. This former real estate agent turned “artist” in 2004 offers us the depressing spectacle of the total industrialization of art, transformed into a mere consumer product for a society hungry for superficial entertainment.

In this artistic masquerade, Orlinski plays the role of the perfect 21st-century entrepreneur, skillfully surfing the codes of pop culture in a way that would have made even Andy Warhol pale. But whereas Warhol used repetition and mechanical reproduction as a sharp critique of consumer society, Orlinski embraces the pure commercial logic without the slightest critical distance. His geometric, garishly colored animals, mass-produced like cars on an assembly line, embody the definitive triumph of commerce over art.

This approach directly echoes Theodor Adorno’s reflections on the culture industry. In his Dialectic of Enlightenment, the German philosopher already demonstrated how the standardization of art drains it of all critical substance, reducing it to mere entertainment. Orlinski takes this logic to its extreme: his sculptures are nothing more than glorified merchandise, endlessly replicated to fit all budgets, from a small Mickey at 45 euros to a monumental gorilla worth several million.

The artist proudly claims his intention to “democratize” art, but this supposed democratization is, in reality, nothing more than total submission to market laws. His Born Wild “concept”, registered as a commercial trademark at the INPI (France’s National Institute of Industrial Property), perfectly illustrates this deliberate confusion between artistic creation and marketing. His incessant collaborations with luxury brands and appearances on reality TV and radio programs complete the transformation of art into a mere extension of the advertising domain.

Walter Benjamin warned us in The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction: mechanical reproduction risked stripping art of its “aura”, that unique quality that gives it profound cultural value. Orlinski goes even further: he makes this loss of aura his business model. His sculptures, industrially reproduced, do not even attempt to maintain the illusion of any artistic authenticity. They fully embrace their status as commodities, like those Pac-Man figurines he mass-produces for the delight of “collectors” looking for financial investments.

Orlinski’s true achievement is not artistic but entrepreneurial. He has understood that in our society of the spectacle, to borrow Guy Debord’s concept, image takes precedence over substance. The artistic emptiness of his productions does not matter as long as the marketing packaging is flashy enough. His gleaming gorillas and chrome panthers are nothing more than luxurious avatars of a society that has definitively abandoned any artistic ambition in favor of pure entertainment.

This industrialization of art reaches its peak in his “studio”, which employs over 150 people. We are far from the traditional artist’s workshop—this is a genuine mass production factory, where artworks are manufactured like any other consumer goods. The artist’s hand has disappeared, replaced by standardized industrial processes that ensure perfectly calibrated production for the market.

Orlinski’s defenders may argue that he is merely following in the footsteps of Jeff Koons or Damien Hirst in the industrialization of art. But whereas these artists still engage in some critical reflection on the status of artwork in the age of total commodification, Orlinski merely reproduces the most worn-out codes of pop culture, without the slightest critical distance. His geometric animals are nothing more than three-dimensional logos, registered trademarks that come in derivative products like any cartoon character.

It is telling that his greatest commercial successes involve collaborations with Disney or luxury brands. Art is no longer anything more than a pretext for selling, a cultural packaging that helps sweeten the pill of pure commercial transactions. When Orlinski claims to be “breaking the codes” of contemporary art, he is, in reality, merely submitting to the far more restrictive codes of marketing and profitability.

This total submission to commercial imperatives results in an aesthetics of ease. His sculptures are designed to be immediately pleasing, requiring no effort of understanding, no confrontation with any form of artistic otherness. It is an art that prides itself on being “accessible”, but this accessibility is merely another name for a leveling down, a standardization that eliminates all rough edges, all true singularity.

The ultimate irony is that Orlinski presents himself as a rebel shaking up the conventions of the art world. In reality, he is the most accomplished representative of a system that has turned art into just another economic sector. His commercial success only confirms the total triumph of the market over art, the reduction of all creation to its mere market value.

The tragedy is that this triumph of marketing over art is not even perceived as problematic. On the contrary, it is celebrated as “democratization”, as if the ability to buy a plastic reproduction of a sculpture for a few dozen euros constituted cultural progress. This overlooks the fact that true art has never primarily been about being “accessible” or “popular”, but about confronting us with a singular vision of the world, pushing us out of our intellectual and aesthetic comfort zones.

The Orlinski system thus represents the logical outcome of a society that has abandoned any real artistic ambition in favor of pure commercial entertainment. His sculptures are nothing more than sophisticated decorative objects, social markers that allow their owners to showcase their supposed “good taste” and purchasing power. Art is dead, long live marketing!

In this world where art is nothing more than a branch of the entertainment industry, Orlinski is indeed a king. Not a king-artist, but a king-merchant who has understood that the appearance of art is more profitable than art itself. His creations will not be remembered in the history of art, but they will perfectly testify to our era—the era in which art has definitively surrendered to market forces.

This capitulation is all the more striking because it happens without the slightest resistance, without the slightest critical questioning. Orlinski’s animals, with their smooth surfaces and gaudy colors, are the perfect totems of a society that has abandoned all depth in favor of permanent spectacle. They tell us nothing about the world, confront us with no otherness, provoke no reflection. They merely exist, shiny and hollow, like the luxurious storefronts of a shopping mall.

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