What makes avant-garde avant-garde?

[Cyrus]

MalignD at aol.com wrote:

>Those days are over, except, perhaps, via 
>some unforeseeon commercial, eye-opening blockbuster, some artist co-opting 
>commerce.  Possible, but not likely.  
>

This may sound absolutist, but I try to live by it: An artist who 
co-opts commerce, in the sense that he creates using recipes which he 
knows will be successful (usually because others have already tried it 
and succeeded), is undermining and, finally, demeaning, his art.

Cyrus