Artnews, featured by Eleanor Heartney titled Ethical Collecting

A second case study provides a more posittive example of art collecting's influence on an emerging art scene. Cuba is unique in having a thriving international art market despite the powerful economic embargo imposed by the United States. Art, as "cultural material", is outside the embargo, and American collectors have become well versed in the legal loopholes that allow them to travel to Cuba. As a result, artists find themselves in an enviable position in this highly regulated, socialist country because they have unusual access to international markets, residencies, and patrons. And it is expected that economic reforms instituted by Raul Castro will soon make foreign travel and investment much easier.

Rachel Weingeist, a curatorial and cultural advisor, until recently directed and curated the 8th Floor, a private exhibition and event space affiliated with the Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation. In part, the 8th Floor (located literally on the 8th floor, above the Rubin's better-known museum of Tibetan art) serves to promote the Rubin's extensive collection of contemporary Cuban art, which now includes more than 850 pieces. The space is also involved in web- and video-related projects that help Cuban artists on the island develop an audience for their work elsewhere and expose them to larger currents in contemporary art via the Internet. This is in keeping with the Rubin Foundation's mission statement, which involves the promotion of art and the creation of exchange opportunities for artists from conflicted parts of the world.

Weingeist notes that in her five years with the space, she observed a ralaxation of official attitudes toward art. She says, "I get a strong sense that fears of government reaction are diminishing, and there seems to be much more flexibility in terms of imagery than ever". She speculates that international interest is part of this equation, pointing out, "Art is a huge attraction for tourists, which is the largest source of income for the island".

Even more transformative has been the effect of a robust art market on Cuban artist themselves. Thanks to the rise of an outside market for Cuban art (and Weingeist notes that there is very little significant art colecting inside the country), successful artists have become an economic elite in Cuba. She points to the 8th Floor's September exhibition of Stainless, a Cuban artist collective composed of Alejandro Pineiro bello, Jose Gabriel Capaz, and Roberlo fabelo Hung, as evidence of the growing artistic and physical freedom of artists. Cuban artists who emerged int he 1980s only gained attention when they managed to leave the country. However, the three young graduates of the San Alejandro Fine Arts Academy, who make up the collective, are instead, she maintains, "a product of the new, much more lenient Cuban cultural environment and have benefitted hugely from the financial, housing, and travel privileges the two generations of artists ahead of them have fought for, as well as the flush newish tourist economy and the abolition of exit papers for Cubans."

Such scenarios suggest how collecting has consequences that go beyond the individual collector's portfolio - or personal satisfaction - and ripple out into the worlds of artists and art communities. Asked about how he views the collectors' role, Milani says, "They need to understand that they are the feeders of art. Without them supporting local artists and localized art communities, the whole thing collapses." He concludes: "This is the existencial problem being brought about by the internationalization of the market through free-market globalization. Collectors can be encouraged by being brought into the narrative, by being part of the human ecology of art, not just its economy. My best collectors," Milani says, "are people who sit down with the artist for a meal because they care about the social implications of art."

he adds, "It has been argued by others that art is a civilizing force, and if you denude it of its primary social function you rob it of this power. With everything that is happening in the world today - the wars, the beheadings, the slide into mass surveillance, the inexhaustible marketing, and the tides of useless information we are confronted with every day - it seems to me art's social agency is crucial now more than at any other time in my life".

Eleanor Heartney is a New York-based art critic and author of numerous books about contemporary art.