On my journey into art, I’ve learned to use it to help flourish and address the suffering that plagued my life for so long. I never looked much at art before, but I had an idea for many years to try my hand at it. A few years ago, I put aside my indecision and took a leap by making my first art. Since then, I’ve kept an interest in art and aesthetics with me. Years before that, I started writing.
Over the years, I have wondered why art matters and why to me; here are three reasons why?
Mental health
One lesson is art can help address our mental health. Facing our inner turmoil, and giving it form, is a way to help us explore difficult feelings.
Typically stifle our inner turmoil or get caught up in our feelings. Our obsession with happiness, trying to eliminate the negative, can backfire and make us more unhappy.
We can only find contentment when we accept the complexity of our emotions, life and who we are. Life is about nuance and subtleness; you diminish yourself if you try to truncate it. Life becomes a little greyer, colourless, and you will feel less incomplete and disconnected. You can’t have light without dark, and the appreciation of art and the making of it can help us deal with all parts of ourselves, especially those we find difficult.
In observing art and making it, we don’t push anything down or away; let all the ideas, feelings and thoughts arise. Such a practice can help us reconnect to all the part that makes us up.
It doesn’t have to be coherent or even a clear image. But it is you being aware of what’s on. That awareness can be enough to feel better, but it’s also the first step to dealing with unpleasant or pleasant emotions.
ADD MY ABSTRACT fear art HERE
Like waves, art lets emotion roll in and roll out of you.
Communication, Expression
Art is important because it’s a way for me to express myself, my ideas, my insights, and my feelings. By connecting people, art helps unite and be part of a community. It makes art like a campfire that people gather around.
For me, who has often felt lonely in my life, such connections matter to me far more than I appreciate. By consuming art but also making and sharing my own, I get an opportunity to connect with others, converse and interact, and I feel more myself when doing that.
Our identity is defined by the roles we play in the world. To discover who we are, look at how we relate to others. After digging inwards, look outwards; art is one way of doing that.
Appearances do matter
Despite naysayers, appearances do matter, but only up to a point. The importance of the aesthetic dimension to life matters because we are affected by appearances.
Appearances matter because they are clues to what lies underneath or elsewhere. How things look can convey ideas, feelings, values, and principles. That’s why studying art, how it does it in works what it does, is an academic field.
Studying art and aesthetic can help us craft ideas and messages that are more effective. Think of marketing as a field dedicated to working out ways to communicate ideas more effectively.
Art through history has been the same endeavour; imagery, word and music convey ideas and emotions to an audience.
Because of this, everyone should study art, formalising or informally. Learning how appearances can affect us means we can know how we respond to a message.
It’s a way to understand ourselves and our connection to the world around us.
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Art and aesthetics matter to me because they help me understand myself. I have learned what’s important through art and writing. Also, I learn something about how to craft better art and find better ways to reach out and connect to others.
Art has become a path for me to be myself, an outlet for expression, a connection to others, a way to influence the world, and a practice I can enjoy for its own sake.
It all brings me connection and meaning to my life.