Between Contemporary Art and Cultural Analysis Artistic research is an alternative way of producing different kinds of knowledge, inside or outside of the Academy. This is accomplished either by producing investigative artworks or by writing a doctoral dissertation about your own work. For cultural researchers the artistic methods utilized in these processes are both familiar and challenging. Ordinary ethnography is mixed with more unpredictable experiments. This article presents several contemporary artworks, such as sculptures, films, dances, installations and performances that explore various aspects of reality. One question asks what is to be learnt from these works. Another question is what an open exchange between artists and academic researchers could attain. Especially four methodological devices are pointed out as interesting subjects for discussion. The first one is that a lot of artists are living experimentally; they make use of themselves both as actors and as research objects. Second, contemporary artworks are approaching the theme of materiality in very tangible ways. Third, much of contemporary art is emotional – even when it is called conceptual – when it comes to the creation, the forms of presentation, and the influence on the spectator. When the artists systematically implement wild whims they exploit their spontaneity professionally. Finally, many artists have the gift to find and show surprising meanings in ordinary life. How do they accomplish that?