Artists and Economic Competition. During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries social and economic forces were at work that eventually transformed the conditions in which artists worked and expressed themselves. The emergence of a consumer-oriented market economy coupled with industrialization created an increasingly pluralistic society with new sources of wealth and an accelerating division of labor. This society included new consumers (more and more of whom were women) with new tastes and money to invest in art, including books, musical concerts, paintings, and buildings. Among artists, most of whom were men, these new conditions brought about growing specialization, increased competition for consumers, and a greater freedom to create original or singular works of art. By the late eighteenth century, European cities—especially Rome, Paris, and London—suffered from a glut of artists, especially painters. Art schools...