Art's Influence or Influence on Art?

In response to Sarah’s question, “Will the representation of the unhealthy environment through art cause a drastic turnaround for the way humans treat the environment now?”
I think that in this case our treatment of the environment is influencing art more than art is influencing our treatment of the environment. For proof of this change in mentality, look no further than the push for alternate energy (even if it is being ignored by the major automobile companies who contribute only miniscule portions of their budget towards its development) or the creation of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth (even if it is an over-exaggeration). The Badlands exhibit exists because people’s attitudes and treatment of the environment is starting to change, and this change is being captured in art. However, art cannot always be defined as a reflection of the time period it was created in (on page 10 of the introduction for Wartenberg, this theory is mentioned in regard to Hegelian thought). In some instances, art does cause a drastic turnaround in the values of a culture. One example is the Beat Generation, which created very drastic turnaround in the thoughts and values of American culture. To summarize, I do not think the representation of the unhealthy environment in art will cause a drastic turnaround for how humans treat the environment; rather, I think the environment is being portrayed as unhealthy because humans are beginning to change their mentality towards the environment.
QUESTION: Was Freud drawing upon Hegelian thought when he said “We must not imagine that the various products of this impulse towards phantasy, castles in the air or day dreams, are stereotyped or unchangeable. On the contrary, they fit themselves into the changing impressions of life, alter with the vicissitudes of life; every deep new impression gives them what might be called a ‘date stamp’” (Wartenberg 113).

Art as a Means to Attain Status

According to Dickie, status in the artworld is presented “in a way analogous to the way in which a person is certified as qualified for office, or two persons acquire the status of common-law marriage within a legal system, or a person acquires the status of wise man within a community” (Wartenberg 224). If this is true, then we may have been presented with the function of art.
In all of these examples, the status is conferred after certain actions are considered; a person is considered qualified for office if they have been properly educated and experienced; two people acquire the status of common-law marriage if they undergo the proper paperwork; a person is considered a wise man if he exhibits sufficient wisdom. In the artworld, the action which merits status is the production of art. So, according to this theory, art functions as a means to attain status in the artworld. Could this be its only function?