Creation. Self-expression. Passion.
If you asked me to come up with three reasons for making art, in about 30 seconds, that’s probably what I’d say. But the longer I ponder this question, the more convoluted its answer seems to become.
Yes, it’s true, we make art to express ourselves. It’s a way to let out the complex emotions that we can’t always put into words. However, to say that is all that art is would be a rather grotesque understatement.
Whether it’s acrylic-covered canvases on the walls of galleries or the flowers scribbled in the margins of math notebooks; art is everywhere. We create and consume art every single day. It’s just a matter of finding it. And art itself takes on so very many forms, that sometimes we forget that the creations before us are even art at all. We forget the humanity behind it all.
But that doesn’t answer my question.
Why?
What is the meaning of all of this? Why does it matter? Why even ask?
We ask because art is not an extra. Not a cherry on top of a cake. It is a living, breathing, integral part of what makes us human.
It gives us brief respite from the banality of our agonising reality. It is at one and the same time an escape, and an opportunity to face who we really are.
To make art is to claim ownership over something. It is to stand in the brilliant and sometimes blinding light of your truth. Exposed, but not without armour.
Art is answering a question, even though not everyone will like your answer. It is baring your soul and risking getting it bruised. It is the trying and the struggling and the failing. Art is a siren call to those who seek something more. To construct a world they’d like to live in, rather than just inherit the one that was dropped in their lap.
We make art to build ourselves a home in a world that provides no shelter. To fill the gaping abyss in which resides our pain. We bleed, and laugh, and cry, and we make art. We make art because we’re human.
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