Here's a bit of information I found in an arts site. Worth considering as so many of us go through a struggle to get viewed rightly.
Credit : absolutearts.com
12/19/2005: "Is there an ‘art mafia’?" by Andrew Wielawski

For artists trying to get their work shown, it often seems like there’s a group of ‘insiders’, whose work is always being shown, who always get invited to shows in other places, and who seem to have always been in the spotlight. If an artist comes to town anywhere without knowing anyone, they find that as much as they try, no one even wants to see what they’re doing. And perhaps they’ll be in a bar one day, and a newcomer from Los Angeles, that no one has ever heard of, suddenly has a show in the town’s museum. They’ve gone from zero to number one in an instant, leaving observers baffled as to how they did it. Frustrated, other artists conclude that there’s some kind of organized effort to promote certain people, and not others.

In traveling around the world, we might visit the largest contemporary museums and walk away with the same impression. Wherever we go, the same artists are always there, with very few new ones we don’t already know. It’s rare to find an artist in one museum and not in others as well. The same is true of public works. In Kansas City, or Madrid, or Berlin, they always seem to be made by the same people.
Has there been some kind of worldwide organized effort to promote artists like Jenny Holzer, Bill Viola, and Julian Schnabel? And to close the door on other artists who don’t have their foot in yet, no matter how good they are?
I think not. But art is, after all, primarily a business, and not the caring for a cultural treasure. Artworks only become cultural treasures after they have established a business track record.
If we carefully consider what objectives art professionals want to achieve, be they museum directors, critics, curators, gallerists, or backroom dealers, all have one priority ahead of any others in their individual strategies for personal success. It is, to make themselves ‘big time’ players in a game that has little or no pity for those hampered by sentimentality.
The perception is, if you associate yourself with greatness, some of will rub off on you. It’s easy to do, while, on the contrary, the discovery of new talent is both risky and difficult. A museum which needs to accumulate work will inevitably choose the work of well known artists because it makes their museum more important. That this hides a lack of ability to judge quality is of no importance. The people visiting the museum and looking at the work will be even less qualified, and therefore even more drawn to names they already know.
If you were charged with the responsibility of selecting works for acquisition by a museum, you would have to justify your choices to the museum’s board, which means to those who give you your paycheck. These people are less qualified than you are, because board members are generally not art professionals themselves, rather they are in elevated social positions and need you to explain, in terms simple enough for them to understand, why you made the choices you did. The easiest way to do this, the path of least resistance, is to say that the work is already in the collection of another museum. The board will tell you you’ve done a good job, and you will retain your position.
In other words, as long as you respect the criteria of a Bree Van de Kamp as to what behavior in your role is acceptable, and what isn’t, you’ll get by. And if a few Rexes die along the way, while you’re making the bed, or tempting the pharmacist, at least you’ll sleep soundly knowing you didn’t technically do anything wrong.
If it seems there is an art mafia, that is because we perceive ourselves to be passengers in a vehicle going down the road. We assume someone is driving it. In fact, that is very irresponsible on our part. We haven’t even looked to see who it might be.
One of the ways which enable museums to exhibit the work of new artists, is to get a group of curators together and agree to acquire the works of a certain artist for a group of museums all at once. Each one can then say that other museums are in the process of acquiring, or have acquired, the same works. Inevitably this is where the collector becomes involved.
A collector with a significant number of works by a certain artist, will work hard to get these to pop up in a number of big name museums, all at once. He will agree, therefore, to donate seven of his collection of fifty to seven museums, keep the curators safe, and create publicity, by doing it all at the same time. He’s left with forty three, and their value will triple or better in the twelve months to come. The curators haven’t risked their skins, and everyone walks away smiling. The public will never know things happened this way, as their impression will be that an emerging artist has suddenly been recognized. This situation exists because nature abhors a vacuum. If no one is driving the car, then whoever can gain by jumping into the driver’s seat, will.
Why is it that the critics always seem to have the same opinion, one that is almost always a positive, glorifying tribute to whomever they review, with one slight negative observation? This last is to make themselves appear strong, and the rest is because they’re too weak to do other than praise the work of an artist already in the spotlight of the international community. They either tag along with a group they believe is powerful, or they resist that group by themselves. Few critics are strong enough to do that. After all, nobody wants to swim upstream. The critic who applauds work that has already achieved star status has become a part of the debris cloud circling that star.
There is no organized ‘art mafia’. There are no ‘bosses’. But the art merchants, and the slews of stage door Johnnys that go with them, be they critics, curators, or local government officials handling cultural events, will always walk downhill on the path of least resistance. We’ve read, here on this site, about where we can go to see the art that the desperate housewives of the world think is the right thing to go see simply because it’s been so heavily promoted. The people who champion established artists have no power themselves, but serve to reinforce the power of the people running things by agreeing with their choices, and even falsely proclaiming to have been a part of the selection process. As with the museum director who falls in line with the flock to keep his job, such individuals allow themselves to become important only through the abdication of their individuality, by becoming foot soldiers who back the self serving choices the biggest, most serious collectors have made so as to increase the value of their collections.
What I have described is as natural as the arrival of rain in the Amazon. If a vacuum exists, it is soon filled. The opportunity to collect art, and then be able to increase its value through a museum is a relatively recent phenomenon. That Charles Saatchi was able to do this so easily with the Brooklyn Museum should tell us something. The best defense against art on steroids, is film and literature. If writers ridicule, and film makers expose, then real art has a chance. The public, that sea of humanity that affirms and legitimizes things they know nothing about, has to be made to laugh the same way Eddie Murphy made them laugh in that gallery scene in “Beverly Hills Cop”. The misplaced faith the public has in self proclaimed professionals has to be revealed for what it is; the epitome of ignorance.
If you’re a buyer buying for investment, stick to known names, the more well known, the better. You will have a veritable army of people working for you to increase your acquisitions’ value, most without a direct financial interest in the works themselves. If you are buying because you are struck by a piece, buy without fear of criticism, trusting in your own judgment. You’re the one who will have to live with your choice. You won’t have the security of the approval of your peers, but you can be happy in the knowledge that almost all of them don’t really know anything about art anyway, besides what they’ve read. And the observant among us know why what they’ve read was written, and why the status the writer was seeking to achieve was of primary importance, and the content secondary.
Nature provides opportunities for every beast in the jungle, including you and me. To be able to seize the moment when it comes your way, you have to know what makes the machinery hum, how it works, and why. You need to be as knowledgeable as possible to see not just what happens, but the naturalness of its happening. You also have to know which animal you are. A rabbit can’t play a tiger’s game, but in the love shack, he has a lot more fun.
Nature also provides risk, to allow the best examples of a species to prosper, while the weaker ones are swept away. Be strong. Accept the game you’re in, the cards you have been dealt, and play them like a pro.