How do artists influence, inspire and affect change in the world?

Question

Im doing a unit in Art on how artist influence change in the world, change their styles of art based on world influence, or how they changed as a person through art. Basically anything about 'change'. Does anyone know anything about artists that did this such as Picasso, Salvador Dali, Rauschenburg, Hockney, Escher, Anish Kapoor etc.?
Also, do you have a better example(s) of an artist creating 'change' or being changed?

Answer 1

If you take an artist like Dali, you can look at his effects on the art world starting with Dadaism and the ensuing Surrealist movement which grew out of Dadaism. His works and his contemporaries' works were influenced by the Marxist dialectic as well, which impacted on what they produced. Dali was influenced at an earlier stage by the horrors or WWI which was one of the primary concerns of Dadaism. Picasso and his most famous Cubist work, Guernica, were also influenced by the horrors of war.