Deleuze’s Web: How Art Perpetuates Its Own Systems and Why That Matters

Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of the rhizome offers a perfect lens to understand contemporary art’s structure. Unlike trees with their hierarchical branches, rhizomes are underground root systems that spread horizontally, creating connection points anywhere and everywhere. Think of ginger or turmeric roots—they grow in unpredictable directions, any part can become a new starting point.

In “A Thousand Plateaus,” Deleuze and Guattari write: “any point of a rhizome can be connected to anything other, and must be.” This perfectly describes how the art world functions: a curator knows a gallery owner who studied with an artist who teaches at an academy where a critic gives lectures. There’s no clear hierarchy, just endless interconnections.

But here’s where it gets interesting: while appearing open and non-hierarchical, the art rhizome can become exclusionary. Those already inside the network continue strengthening connections while others struggle to find entry points. This might explain why we see the same names circulating through galleries, biennales, and art magazines.

Assemblages: More Than the Sum of Their Parts

Another crucial Deleuzian concept is the assemblage—a collection of heterogeneous elements that come together to form a functioning whole. In “A Thousand Plateaus,” Deleuze and Guattari describe assemblages as “multiplicities of multiplicities forming a single assemblage, operating in the same assemblage: packs in masses and masses in packs.”

Think about a major exhibition. It’s not just artworks on walls—it’s an assemblage of:

• Physical components (artwork, gallery space, lighting)
• Expressions (curatorial statements, press releases, reviews)
• Social relations (who gets invited to the opening)
• Economic factors (sponsorships, price points, collector relationships)

Each exhibition functions as an assemblage that reinforces the larger art assemblage. An artist like Damien Hirst doesn’t just sell shark tanks—he’s part of an assemblage involving galleries, auction houses, critics, collectors, and institutions that collectively determine what counts as “important art.”

Territorialization: How Art Builds and Breaks Boundaries

Deleuze discusses processes of territorialization (establishing boundaries), deterritorialization (breaking free from territories), and reterritorialization (establishing new territories).

The art world constantly performs these processes:

1. Territorialization: Establishing what counts as “serious art” through institutions, degrees, and critical frameworks
2. Deterritorialization: Revolutionary movements that challenge conventions (think Dada or Fluxus)
3. Reterritorialization: How those revolutionary movements eventually become institutionalized and academic

This dynamic relationship between systems is elegantly captured by Deleuze and Guattari when they discuss how books interact with the world:

The same applies to the book and the world: contrary to a deeply rooted belief, the book is not an image of the world. It forms a rhizome with the world, there is an aparallel evolution of the book and the world; the book assures the deterritorialization of the world, but the world effects a reterritorialization of the book, which in turn deterritorializes itself in the world (if it is capable, if it can).¹

We can apply this exact thinking to art and society. Art doesn’t simply reflect society—it forms a rhizome with it. They evolve together in parallel, deterritorializing and reterritorializing each other in an endless dance. A provocative exhibition might temporarily deterritorialize social norms, but those same norms often reterritorialize the exhibition through critical reception, market valuation, and institutional framing.

This explains why even the most shocking art eventually becomes acceptable. Duchamp’s urinal was scandalous in 1917; today it’s taught in Art History 101. The art system deterritorializes through shocking new works, then reterritorializes by absorbing them into the canon.

Breaking the Mesh: Is Democratization Possible?

So here’s the big question: If we’re already caught in this rhizomatic mesh, can we ever truly democratize art?

Deleuze would likely say complete escape is impossible—we’re always operating within assemblages. However, understanding these structures gives us power to create lines of flight (another Deleuzian term for creative escape routes).

Some potential approaches:

• Creating alternative assemblages outside institutional spaces
• Recognizing and questioning territorialization when it happens
• Supporting platforms that actively work to include those outside the established rhizome
• Understanding that “democratizing art” might itself be a form of reterritorialization

What Now?

Next time we walk into a gallery feeling like we don’t belong, we should remember: that feeling isn’t accidental. It’s produced by the assemblage that includes everything from the gallery’s architecture to the language in the exhibition text to the implicit dress code at the opening.

By recognizing these Deleuzian structures, we don’t necessarily escape them, but we gain more agency within them. And maybe that’s a start.

How does the art world look to you through a Deleuzian lens? We’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences navigating these rhizomes in the comments.

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Note: This post was inspired by Inger Mewburn’s thought-provoking article “I’m mad about everything” at The Thesis Whisperer, as well as our discussions with artist Vedran Ružić during preparations for his exhibition “Plesni Peristil” (Dancing Peristyle) held in February 2025 in Split, Croatia. The theoretical framework draws from materials studied while developing the exhibition concept.

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¹ Deleuze, G., Guattari, F. and Deleuze, G., A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, 12th print, (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007), p. 11.