The Imagery of Chess, St. Louis

What's the connection between sociology and art? The Wikipedia page Sociology of art is little more than a stub that says, 'Studying the sociology of art throughout history is the study of the social history of art, how various societies contributed to the appearance of certain artists' and 'This article needs attention from an expert in Sociology.'

The phrase I've highlighted appears to be an independent topic, but only redirects to Wikipedia's History of art, a subject large enough for a college degree. The 'Sociology of art' page also points to Art in Cyberspace — Sociology of Art (sociosite.net), a huge page that starts,

The creation of works of art, their distribution and their effect on people are processes which can observed all through history. They represent a universal phenomenon of human society in action. As such they are open to sociological examination and imagination. They are the object of a sociology of art.

The connection between chess and art, while also too broad to be easily digested, can be reduced to bite-size chunks. Here's one.

Living St. Louis | The Imagery of Chess: St. Louis Artists (4:35) • 'A diverse group of St. Louis artists and musicians interpreted the game of chess for the exhibit, "The Imagery of Chess: St. Louis Artists" at the World Chess Hall of Fame.'

World Chess Hall of Fame chief curator Shannon Bailey explains,

It was inspired by the Imagery of Chess that took place in 1944 in New York City. It was arranged by three art enthusiasts and artists, Julien Levy, who owned the Julien Levy Gallery where the exhibition took place, Marcel Duchamp, who's one of the most important artists of the 20th and 21st centuries and was an avid chess player, and Max Ernst, a very famous artist.

For more about the exhibit, see World Chess Hall Of Fame Chief Curator Shannon Bailey On New Exhibition (alivemag.com; February 2017). I once wrote about a previous exhibition with the same name, Elsewhere on the Web : The Imagery of Chess Revisited (archive.org -> chess.about.com; January 2006).

Chess and art have their closest relationship in the 32 pieces of wood, glass, or just about any other material used to make chess sets. The Imagery of Chess Revisited, one of the current exhibits at the Noguchi Museum, Long Island City (Queens), New York, is the latest look by the art world at that relationship.

The artist featured in the video, Martin Brief, mentions Yoko Ono's white chess set. I covered it in another post, Chess Sightseeing (March 2014).