[adam]

It seems to me that applying rules about when it is valid to look beyond the piece of art to the artist is limiting. There are pieces of art that, for me, are best approached, or engaged with, with minimal consideration of what the artist intended and what was going on in their lives, and there are pieces where a lot of the value comes from the artist.

Henry Darger's work is interesting on its own, but I find looking at his art with a biographical portrait in mind is much more engaging. R Kelly's Trapped in the Closet, by contrast, I find barely interesting at all without taking into account the mind that created it (directly, in fact, through the commentary track he has created to go with it). I haven't listened to Wesley Willis much, but I imagine his work is more interesting in what it reveals of the artist than my immediate reaction to it.

However, there are plenty of pieces for which I feel no need to search past the existence of the individual piece itself. The flexibility in approach seems to me to be crucial.