Things I Care About (And Why): The Arts

“The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and architecture, all make the point as clear as possible: The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden. If you don't want paradise, you are not human; and if you are not human, you don't have a soul.”

Thomas Moore

It’s tough to convince people to care about art. A perception persists that art doesn’t matter; that it is irrelevant in the real world, where real problems and real daily concerns consume our time and energy. We spend most of our time working or sleeping, and at the end of the day most would consider stopping to consider something as seemingly trivial as a painting on a wall or a poem written decades ago a waste.

I disagree.

There are a number of forces at work that are responsible for the decline of the arts. The educational system, due to limited funds and the prioritization of science and math, neglects to emphasize the important role art has played in our history and plays in our everyday lives. This technological emphasis, though well meaning in its efforts to give students a chance to compete in an advancing society, also fails to give students an opportunity to explore different ways of thinking and to express themselves in alternate ways.

Blame can also be placed on modern media. Television and film, which have the potential to be powerful art forms, often reduce themselves to hedonistic sense titillaters (you like that word?). These two mediums reach a greater audience than any other, and therefore are capable of communicating powerful messages. More often then not, however, they fall short. I’ll get to film another day. It is one of my passions, but there is too much to cover in this post (let’s say I’m just as excited about its potential as I am disappointed by its failures).

Let’s take a moment to look at what art could be. Language is limited. I often find myself frustrated by the insufficiency of words to express certain concepts, such as the awe-inspiring nature of God, the life-changing power of love, the vastness of the universe. Even right there, words fell flat.

But art communicates on a level deeper than mere words. It can communicate thoughts, ideas or emotions that would be impossible to put words to, but can only be expressed through the visceral, unspoken experience of viewing a piece of art and understanding through it a piece of humanity.

A powerful example of this is Picasso’s Guernica. Depicting the Nazi bombing of Guernica, Spain during the Spanish Civil War, Guernica captures the suffering, brutality, chaos, death, and helplessness of war without saying a word. Someone who has experienced war could tell us that war is horrific, but the woman, distorted in agony, weeping over the young child in her arms on the left of the mural says just that and so much more.

Art such as this binds us in communal experience. We were not in Guernica on that fateful day, and we can’t claim to physically understand what those people went through. But if we can put ourselves inside of the painting, if we can allow ourselves to become lost in the images and allow ourselves to emotionally, instinctually, and intellectually react, we can share in that experience. By doing so, I believe, we pay our respects to the victims.

Through Guernica, Picasso is bound to the victims as well as whoever views the work, and likewise the viewer is bound to the artist, those that suffered, and to all others that have viewed. This connectedness is not limited by time or geography, by age, vocation, sex, race, or language. Art provides us with a unique opportunity to share in the experiences of the world. I’d say that’s an opportunity worth utilizing.

Thanks for reading.