Luhmann
“Luhmann sees social systems as comprised of communicative events – meaningful utterances – which form part of a recursive network of communicative operations. In other words, for an utterance to figure within a social system it has to give rise to further utterances, otherwise it no longer contributes to the system.” … “Within this schema, art forms one of many social systems, which include, in modern society, the economy, law, politics, love, science. While Luhmann is sensitive to the materiality of the artwork – indeed he explores the ways that art draws attention to processes of perception – it is its communicative function that makes art into a social system.”… “The social effect and meaning of the artwork is tied to its role as an ephemeral communicative event, and although it might continue to exist as a physical object, this is no guarantee that it will have any further communicative, and hence social, significance. If it continues to function within the art system, this is because of its capacity to continue to produce further communicative events. Thus the artwork, when first produced and exhibited, constitutes a particular type of communicative event. If its production prompts the production of further works then it has functioned within the recursive network of the art system. It may of course prompt further communications beyond its immediate impact.”