The Art Gallery of South Australia does something like this, they arrange the rooms by concept, lust, death etc. It's very effective and it's free to enter if your in that neck of the woods
I love how the layout for the proposed art museum is organized into "anger" "despair" "confusion" "loneliness" and "anxiety". That pretty much sums up the totality of experiences in life.
I go to museums about once a week. I've been doing so for about one year now and I absolutely love it. My favorites are modern art museums. My city has about 3-5 venues that mostly exhibit modern art. When I go to a museum I spend a lot of time looking at every piece and write extensive notes about them. I often end up spending about four to five hours at a time. If you come to Helsinki, I'll hint you the best places.
the problem with categorizing by feeling though is of course that said feelings are subjective and the same work obviously could make various people feel differently
If this happens then the artist has failed at doing his job. If you can't make people feel or think how you want them to feel or think then you're obviously bad at what you are doing. If your art can be interpreted in all sorts of ways and has no underlying theme or universal message that people can recognize and agree upon then you don't even know what you are doing. If your audience is confused then your art has failed to do its job. Whether its poetry, film, music, sculpture or painting it doesn't matter because these rules WILL apply.
+Kazuya Mishima but then how would you explain the emotion of a Rothko or a Pollock. The type of art style they created under evokes very different interpretations based on the person doing the viewing.
+Kazuya Mishima if that's your definition then what's the underlying message of the Mona Lisa? what's the underlying message of van Gogh's sunflowers? oftentimes the viewer, not the artist attaches meaning. I think that a lot of people both in and out of the artistic community would dispute the presence of rules or even states of failure, definitely the modernists
daffodilZephyr That means either not everyone was meant as an audience or that the artist has failed at his job. I don't see any conflict with what I have said. Just because you choose to believe that it is otherwise still art does not mean it must be true. Otherwise you have to admit one of two things. Either that peoples beliefs are fundamentally always true which I shouldn't have to explain why this Idea is ludicrous or that no one knows what art actually is because we attach it to arbitrary objects in which case I might argue that art as a whole does not exist or that we might as well call EVERYTHING art. It sure as hell isn't the mere concept of attaching emptions or meaning to things because people are by nature able to attach meaning, value and emotion to everything.
*Concept*: An art museum for love only. The artwork is presented using the stages of love. For example, art resembling two people (or more, if you will) meeting could be at the entrance. The rule of the museum is to come with someone you love (a partner, a family member, a friend etc.). One goes into the museum before the other and walks to the point (to the art piece) that they think best resembles their relationship with the person waiting. After, the second person does the same thing. At the end, their stopping points are revealed. It'll help people who, perhaps, aren't so good at communicating with each other. Or for the people who want to know their loved ones frank feelings and not something the other person said simply to make them believe they are on the same page. That's if you want a challenge, but imho people should also be invited to visit on their own or simply - not take part in the challenge.
The way you described this type of museum wouldn't be a a museum on Love. It would be a museum on relationships. A museum on love could verily start with yourself. People also place value on loving objects or ideas. And peoples ideas on what love means can be very different. The context of the Museum would have to be very broad otherwise you would have to define what love is and that may be alienating. Your idea would be great in starting conversations for those willing to explore themselves. I could even see how people could actually go and meet people based off piece(s) of art in which they're interested. It may be indicative of personality and create better relationships than say meeting at a bar.
I personally have a bit of a problem with a lot of modern art. A lot of it just looks like the artist has put hardly any thought, skill or effort into making the artwork and just ended up fooling around a little and do something like spraypaint a canvas purple or something equally pointless. I can't help but feel a bit insulted buying a ticket to a museum and then being confronted by seemingly lazy and uninspired art. Classical artworks can be so beautifully detailed and tell stories with meaningful symbolism but I find it difficult to find anything like that in most modern art.
b leria I get that it doesn't need to have a defined meaning, but if you're going to claim it has any value I feel like you should at least put effort into it. And we shouldn't accept pointless effortless art as being good enough to be put in a museum
I suspect that a lot of skill was learned by necessary. What takes a painter years my phone can do in seconds. While random blobs may have a meaning, but if it needs explaining it's shit.
+Elise Weusthuis I think you are definitely right to feel a bit insulted especialy when considered that the majority of art and institutions nowdays (like muesums) are payed by the taxes so art should definitely go further to make "the money worth it". People are unaware how many have misserable jobs for their earnings to be spent on someone pointing out mundane facts with random objects, and even when in prestige private collections we can again ask the question who actually payed for it? While there is good contemporary art dealing with such and simmilar questions most of it sadly works as a puzzle, where you will have the "concept" maybe even written aside to understand the puzzle and feel good about solving it. You can see more about that on the documentary Why Beauty Matters by Roger Scruton, it raises an excellent point about it even though the conclusions are quite wrong.
While I would mainly agree with you that many pieces of modern art seem absolutely desolate in terms of meaning, I think I also have gotten hold of another thought on the subject. I went to a modern art museum some months ago with one of my more contemporary art-appreciating friends, who let me know of some of the workings of newer art-forms. She told me something along the lines that, concerning I believe Warhol's pictures of Madonna, it worked as a sort of statement about society; that you did not have to have a "deeper meaning" to be "successful", but in our time and day you can simply have a celebrity in the frame, and it will sell. I think we should all remember that perception is individual, and that the great challenge of perception isn't universal; some other person would without effort experience a kind of resonance, even though the very same piece triggers nothing in you. Therefore I think that, even though I can tend to agree, we should be wary of our chauvinist tendencies, which we all posses, to define what is right and true; We should be wary, as even though one might have an education, an exquisite perception or any such, we are always perceiving the world through our own eyes - and those are not identical to those of others. Finally, I would propose that anything, really, which somehow resonates with a person on a level or another would be a form of art, as art can provoke just those hardly verbalisable experiences - it doesn't have to be intellectual as such, it can simply be an emotion of a feeling of vitality, as Daniel Stern might put it.
You you need a course on art history and "modern" art to understand the contemporary art that you wrongly call "modern art." Trust me I was ignorant like you once. Knew nothing about art. Art is a visual language. Not understanding art doesn't indicate a lack of intelect, it indicates a lack of visual vocabulory. Every painter makes references in his painting to other paintings. Just like jokes. And the reason you dont understand them is not because you are stupid or because "art is subjective" which it really isn't, btw, but because you just cannot relate things to other things and get in on the jokes and references.
One of my opinions about the subject of what is art is that it reflects the current state of the world, for example back in the early BC eras, the first cavemen would often paint on their cave walls either for decoration or for memory, that was the simplest of times and the art reflected that, nothing more nothing less,, a couple hundred years ago art was nothing but realism as at that age time seemed to move slower and there was a "strict set of rules to society" hence there not being any freedom of expression and there was no way you would dare oppose it as you would be labeled as insane and committing blasphemy. Whereas today art has become extremely subjective and "abstract", confused you could say, which reflects society today with all the commotion going on about this and that and being "politically correct" and such that art has yet again reflected that.
I like to think that there are three kinds of art: decoration, illustration , and expression. Currently we value most highly expression, but that's not always been the case. Medieval art was all about illustration, and prehistory and many native cultures highly valued decoration. (I worked for years as a sign painter, illustrating other people's products and ideas, so personally I'm quite impressed by a very good illustration...)
Sorry, no, I disagree. While your previous video was a superb analysis of modern self-portraiture techniques (The Dick Pic - not to be confused with The Diptych ;) ) this one seems short-sighted. Art is not defined by its utility. What qualifies a work of art is not its therapeutic value. This may be one of Art's motivations, but is not and should not be considered its sole nor privileged purpose. One criticism of the public art institution is in the curation of major exhibitions emphasizing The Spectacle beyond the academic value of the show. On the other end, there is often criticism that works or exhibits are opaque, obtuse, and difficult for the public to understand. An understanding of any given work or show may require additional research beyond that which the gallery spoon-feeds its audience - and that's okay! Art exists to incite and to disturb - not solely to soothe or bolster the ego. I'll give you credit. You do express the art-value of works which challenge authority and provide cultural critique. It must be remembered that these will seldom appear in the institution during their time due to the fundamental conservativism of The Institution, but The institution is unable to present works which threaten its own funding or existence. This space can reflect on social movements, but the real change happens in street-side gutters. Artmaking is a form of thought. This is the best explanation I have yet to encounter. An art-ifact, then, is a kind of thought-crystal (bear with me), an idea made tangible with the power to provoke thought in others. Not necessarily the same thought, but a breeding pool of ideas. I feel the phrase "art for art's sake" is frequently misinterpreted as meaning something vain or that art is a self-contained value system which has no bearing on things outside of itself. This is incorrect. Art for art's sake is analogous to the scientific method, which is to say that whether or not it is created with some greater purpose in mind, artmaking advances the narrative of its own accord. Art produced "for art's sake" is akin to the presentation of a hypothesis and an attempt to prove the notion one way or the other. Its concerns are often technical and advancements in this field of art lend themselves to other genres, contributing to a Technology of Expression which helps us to articulate notions (ideas or emotions) more clearly in subsequent works. A note on chronology: Works are often exhibited in this manner for easy comparison. This helps us to draw conclusions about what life was like at a certain point of time, or conversely, knowing what life was like at a certain time informs our interpretation of a given work. Being able to see what other artists of the day were doing further shows us what the individual may have been grappling with in their creative practice, what the dominant modes were, and how they sought to reinforce or diverge from the status quo. For an interesting look at art from a thematic, rather than a chronological perspective, I recommend "Art and Today" by Eleanor Heartney from Phaidon press. Edit: the art is therapy site I think reinforces some of my criticisms - notably, the interpretation of The Lace Maker as "a nice person" - largely irrelevant to the context of what is being depicted: a woman doing handicrafts for a little extra cash.
I agree with all your statements. I would add up to your definition of art what Milton Glaser said: "...It is the most powerful instrument for survival...The reason is that art at its fullest capacity makes us attentive " Reading your third paragraph, one can also argue that the museum is an institution that validates the cultural selection made by a small elite or ruling class, their codes of ethics, moral principles as well as their political and religious beliefs. For that reason contemporary critical works of art that challenge authority and question social truisms will never be displayed in those spaces during their time.. The street is the museum of the right now
I am glad I genuinely enjoy art to the degree where I travel the world in order to visit these museums (as well as architecture). I prefer to visit museums alone as worrying about anything outside of my personal experience detracts from the reason I contemplate art/architecture. It's in a sense the same reason I travel around the world to ski various mountains. There is something in seeking the beautiful and sublime for the brief moment that is a timeless reflection that you will carry with you for the rest of your existence.
+snorkeLious I understand where you are coming from but sometimes its the old, the past, the artifacts that help us reflection and bring us back in where we once was or came from. Say, you grew up poor in a small shack with your family but later became very successful and now your living large and worldly. An image of your past could humble you and bring you back to a in-touch state of mind. Being humble and in-touch is the spirt of God.
I'm not at all an art museum person, but I really like this idea and if museums were like this, I might actually want to go. To go to a museum and take in the emotional themes.
A lot of people say that watching television is a waste of time, but I get from television what this video described of art museums. A well written, well-directed shows with great actors widens my perspective as I appreciate the beautiful cinematography.
YOU'VE JUST STOLEN MY HEART AGAIN. I was ranting about this for about an hour last night, then voila! Your video comes out today. 💓💓💓 This is so in line with my most cherished values in life. Thank you for putting this out in to the world. I believe that everyone should live their lives creativity, from the inside out. 💓
This is certainly a good use of art, but should not be the exclusive "use" of art or its only form of display. Art is also profoundly effective at showing us the feelings of others whose experience is not our own and making us see the world in new and different ways. Art should not only help us psychologically but also at times rock our foundations to become more expansive thinkers and people.
I think School of Life's ideal map of a museum being split into the emotions art elicits is very effective. Lately I've been mapping my own music collections more into what it elicits from me, which has helped me break down the delineations of music genres and made listening so much more meaningful
I think that Art museums should be for healing, but not only for healing. Museums, and I think art in general, is just a place to be evocative, and while taste may lend oneself to look out for feelings that art that will compensate for what is lacking in one's life, art can also be provocative and go against the grain of one's taste and of several others. Provocation is useful not because it is therapeutic, but because it alerts us to something within ourselves and maybe felt by society as a whole.Though I understand this may sound therapeutic, it's therapeutic in the sense that you gain in self-knowledge, not that you relax, calm yourself, or lessen the load of your life. Some art does do this, but not all art. It's like the difference between a feel-good Hollywood movie and a depressing European art-house film. One is compensatory, the other you grow in knowledge and wisdom I would argue. Anyway that's what I think anyway, SoL.
Actually the founder of this channel Alain de Botton and another great thinker John Armstrong had already done this in the famous Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. And from what I've heard, the people loved it, and the art critics hated it! So there you have the best indication that it was the right thing to do! I love reading anthologies of short stories around a theme, and this way of organizing paintings reminds me of them. Let's say you read a book of short stories from different writers about Insomnia, or about Anxiety. Of course you can also choose a more cheerful subject. There is even an anthology of " Birthday Stories" from world literature...There are anthologies about everything! There you'll have the chance to go deeper into that subject with the help of one story after another, seeing it from the eyes of different people. And after each one of those stories you can stop and look back at yourself in the light of what you have just learnt or felt.You will also have the possibility to discover several writers in one book. Writers whom you may feel like a soul mate or at least as " good company" in the future. I am sure the advantages of looking at those paintings so "well organized" must be the same. Maria Popova said something very wise on an interview I heard the other day: "Organizing is a form of design. It is the architecture of thought. It is about creating a framework for what matters an why. " By the way, if you liked the website " Art as Therapy", you really should get the wonderful book with the same name too!
As I walked through the Louvre what this video is talking about came profoundly on me, that the art is revealing certain inner aspects of artists, societies, humanity. I had a rush of ambition to write a book that would take the reader on a journey through themselves by passing through the galleries. I've set the goal of finishing it by 2018. :)
I think art can often envoke many different emotions and what I feel about one piece can be viewed completely different by someone else. That is what is beautiful about art, it is open to interpretation.
The São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP) the collection is displayed in tempered crystal sheets leaned on concrete blocks bases. Its very different from other museums and it feels amazing to be there.
I think the more important problem isn't just the concept of a new approach to curating and exhibiting for the masses, but lies very deeply in the quality of the museum's educational programmes. It is true that sometimes we go to a show and walk out feeling yay/nay, and I have felt that way myself when I look at contemporary art. That is not to say that I am uninformed, not exposed to art education and simply ignorant of its history and functions -- I studied Fine Art in college and always keeping up with news in the art world/industry. In all societies of the world, not everyone has that luxury of an art education and yes, it is true to say that not everyone will want to study it and connect to it. But in order to achieve this therapeutic, healing experience, curating is only the first few steps. Educational programmes are the main factors that can create any visitor's interaction and connection with art, and the reason for this lacking is probably due to the tight budgeting for coming up with programs and limited resources. The quality of both educators and art educators working closely together (i separate them because they really are two different specialisations) are also probably limited and confined to curatorial objectives. A good museum experience can be said to be subjected to the viewer but it is largely in the way it is communicated via educational programs. That, is the gap that needs to be addressed and needs to be taken seriously in order to heal, to soothe and to provide therapy for all viewers.
Part of the process of art appreciation is discovering one's own value attributions. To arrive upon works that have been prescriptively categorized by some superstructure precludes much of the romance.
"The business of art lies just in this, - to make that understood and felt which, in the form of an argument, might be incomprehensible and inaccessible.” To anybody interested in exploring this idea further, I highly recommend reading Leo Tolstoy's, "What is Art?", from which the above quote is taken - I feel it contains many insights, or at the very least, thought-provoking statements, on this matter.
If anyone happens to be in Zagreb, go to the Museum of Broken Relationships. I went this summer whilst interrailing and I had to buy the book, such a great museum!!
the reason why art is organised chronologically is to show from the art what previous cultures valued and believed as other tools such as writing in those times where not as common so images would be better used to represent history, morals, religion traditions etc. this idea could easily fit in with what you describe as it would divide the art by topic and then time of creation.
Interesting idea, but one of the best things about art museums as they are is how one can walk through and experience a full spectrum of emotions. For example, one might find not only that the art alleviates the pain or distress they were aware of, but also that their journey through the museum had brought to light internal issues that had been previously unnoticed.
Brilliant. There are artists who display their works on smaller galleries. Some focus on the themes you mentioned and the shows are an expierence. Wish museums did it too..
this is very true, when i go to a modern art museum i often really don't get some of the pieces even when i read the text next to it. A museum of calm or of friendship would be awesome
Great idea! No matter how art is curated and hung it adds purpose, so why not try a therapeutic hanging - I would go. I personally like randomness to get the element of surprise in there. I find that the pinball effect on my emotions at a great art exhibit primes my mind for openness which is usually a great start for any constructive thinking. If you can visit Wanås open air art Park in Sweden near Copenhagen/Denmark, it is highly recommended. Take a walk through Beauty, Bizarre, Angst, Horror, Cheerfulness, Hope and the whole gang. Walking and searching in the open adds space and excitement. Wanås is masterfully and bravely curated.
Art is food for the mind, and the eyes are the tongue that taste it. Where the eyes of one inclines, another's might flit. And where ever ones eyes should find to sit, bear in mind, you are what you eat.
Alain your wonderful analytical mind provides so much insight into many varied topics but I think that this video has highlighted your Achilles heel. Art is not for such direct and obvious purposes. There isn't a singular, clearly defined meaning or purpose behind all of Art. Art is simply something that someone creates and wants to show others. Duchamp popped his name on a toilet and wants you to look at it. A lot of people hate it. I love it. Different art works will appeal to different people for different reasons. I love art galleries and sometime find healing from art. Sometimes I don't, it can rub salt into wounds. Sometimes I am purely interested in the history or technique. Sometimes I engage with art to stir myself up of to get pissed off about something. Sometimes I just want to look at something different and not know why. I think that wanting all art galleries to have a clear purpose would result in watered down uninspired art and possibly other negative consequences.
A significant problem I see with the proposed layouts for art museums is that it imposes a definition on a piece. Many artists, both out of vogue appeal and, in some cases, a genuine belief would claim that their art can't be categorized under definitions such as 'Grief' or 'Anger'. We've already seen so many modern works vehemently run from definitions of genre. Personally I think a chronological layout is a good one. In an expansive library it allows the viewer to take in a progression of how art changes over the years. This is one of an art galleries greatest feats. Sure you can see a slideshow of works laid out in chronological order but seeing something like the progression or digression of an artist like Munch as you move from gallery to gallery is a unique feeling. In this context the mere act of being in a museum becomes a medium in and of itself in which the the curator becomes an artist himself.
Hi, Brilliant! I used to feel so much wonder when in different the museums I visited as a child. I remember trying to get that same feeling back later on in life but there were always other considerations coupled with the visits,cultural appropriateness, appropriation,colonization, wether or not works were actually "Art". But your idea on displaying art in an emotional narrative is a revelation of what I have been searching for all this time!:) I can now go forward with my own ideas of curation for the soul and bringing art back into life and not just a static observation. Thanks.
I go to modern art museum during their free museum days to give each piece a new less pretentious title, since a lot of those piece are named by number or date I take it as an invitation by the artist to do so. It's quite entertaining, and it jogs the memory of my history of art class at the same time.
Modern artist Stuart Davis similarly classified his favorite artists by "psychological content" in his journals: Fantasy- Miro, Sensuousness- Matisse, Invention- Picasso, Serenity- Seurat, Objectivity- Cezanne.
Interesting concept, dividing according to emotion. Although I would love to see that it would of course be difficult, the reason we divide by age is we can divide into distinct objective classes. If were were to divide by troubles there would be overlap - things such as loneliness and despair would often be hard to separate.
Dividing art into movements and periods is often very arbitrary. Every way of dividing art is. The one suggested in the video however seems to me, if not "objective", more meaningful.
Personally, I prefer Art Galleries to represent the world around them rather than the emotional turmoil of one's soul. Simply because I find different mediums of art, like music to portray emotions better. I find it hard to depict just one emotion from a particular piece because the message a piece is trying to portray will always be received differently. "One picture holds a thousands words" if you will. That being said, what I can interpret from a piece verses what another person interprets from the same piece will be completely different regardless, therefore I can understand the demand for art that can connect to people in the best way possible - through our emotions. ~Just felt like tossing in my 2 cents. Have a wonderful day! ^^
If art museums are art cathedrals, pehaps we should also have small cosy consolatory parish churches... where one could pop in for a quick peek, and organise tea and communal events...
Royal Academy of Art`s 250th Summer Exhibition 2018 addressed this, curated `art made now` and chose a number of sub-topics in its 14 galleries such as `fun` (serious business I say!) and `politics` (not so serious business). It can be viewed until 19th August in London Royal Academy Arts.
I'm not entirely sure I agree. I know my local museum (The High Museum of Art) mostly groups its works by medium and region, though I think the "Modern Art" section is in its own space because the city's [petit- and otherwise] bourgeoisie is a lot more conservative in tastes than that of other cities. Organizing by history can have its advantages in that you can judge the comparative skill of one artist with that of their contemporaries, and also see the evolution of stylistic choices. Organizing by emotion is wholly subjective, though.
The interesting thing about art is that it means different things to each person For me, an aspiring story teller and game developer, modern art is a way of thinking. Modern art is the mentality that everything is beautiful. It can be perceived as beautiful to one person, so it is possible for it to be by anyone else. Modern art pushes the boundaries of what can be perceived as beauty That being said, i do not believe that money should not be involved. Money is ruining the face of art.
I can only partially agree with this. Your idea has value, but I think the chronological order is valuable for the insight we get on how the people of the past lived, far better than by just reading about them. On your video on capitalism, you talked about the Dutch painters of the 16th century representing craftswomen at work, and explained that this subject was treated more often than in Italy at the same time, because Flanders was protestant. Similarly, it's interesting to compare Warhol's work, or Pollock's work to the social and economical context surrounding their creation. Maybe we could do a bit of both? Some museums in my country have chronological permanent collections, with thematic temporary exhibitions.
Don't tell me something like that doesn't exist already. There are several museums for sexuality and various aspects thereof. There are museums for modern presentation formats. Why not one specifically for hentai? Collections do exist enough. Just one is needed that is public.
Interesting thought, by reading the following comments down here, I may actually have "learned" more on the subject of art than ever before. Strange things do happen.
I used to skip freshman year at murray bergtraum high school (nyc) and would go to the varying museums and botanical gardens to gain symbiance with our collective genetic potential.
While utterly instructive and really well-crafted, the content the School of Life produces seems to always come down to the same: art, literature, and philosophy are very often reduced to self-help mechanisms for us to cope with the hardships of life in modern, Western, relatively privileged societies. Many of the artists, writers, and philosophers you have dealt with in your videos would be outraged at the notion that their works be regarded merely as therapeutic devices for the human psyche. That being said, you're doing a great job popularizing certain concepts and intellectual debates which, more often than not, don't make it past the walls of academia. Keep up the good work!
1:13 didn't think I'd ever see the Roppongi hills spider in a youtube video :D I've witnessed it while drunken in the middle of the night alone in Tokyo, brings me back haha
What an awesome idea. I had never thought about it like this. Thank you for introducing me. Your website "art as therapy" is also stupendous. Congratulations!
I like going to the museum just for the sake of going and learning, and if I think something's silly or doesn't make sense I'm definitely going to mention it. You see some really weird things sometimes!
The Holocaust Museum in Auschwitz and Robben Island Museum in South Africa serves the purpose of art stated above. One of my friends went there. He told that it was unimaginable for him and the others around him that humans could do such cruelty to fellow human beings. There were no flash lights, no selfies, no smiling pics and nothing. The visitors were really sober may be introspecting how could have the poor souls who were trapped and killed in here felt, how pointless is violence and how lucky they were not to go through this harrowing experience...... He told when everybody came out .....many of them were crying, some were sobbing and some were grim....... and most of them were silent................ Silence was so deafening!!! I ve also read about the museum in south africa where mandella was imprisoned..... The writer was taken their by an african taxi driver..... the latter insisted the former to visit it.... When he came out and sat inside the taxi and asked the driver ....how do you people endure this pain and what should be done to the perpetrators the driver replied : I choose to forgive them!! They both sat their inside the car facing each other without talking anything...............pure silence. And they both started crying hugging each other !!! It makes us empathise!!! Makes us more human!! Provides the Healing touch which we desperately want!! I too am sobbing !!
Very interesting perspective! Would you not feel that with such segregation would leave some pieces of art unseen? Seldom would someone visit museum of envy, hate, anger by choice or curiosity as art tend to have powerful impact. :)
One great example of a space already doing something like this is the Museum of Broken Relationships (I believe there are two branches, one in Los Angeles)
as much as i would like to believe in art's therapeutic impact, i feel that visual arts have failed in comparison to music and storytelling when it comes to really reaching out to people and healing them.
Alain, recently the highly regarded former Metropolitan Museum of Art director, Philippe de Montebello, coauthored a book about art that a book reviewer said strangely excluded mentioning the benefit of viewing art. I think you have enough influence that maybe you could get Philippe to respond to your video or just to say what he believes is the benefit to viewing art.
So, well, while it might comes off strange, I suggest to stroll around the TATE modern Museum in London for at least two exhibitions. I was there last weeks, and while I can't give a completely neutral view on it, since I'm someone genuinely interested in mordern and contemporary art, I think everyone will be entertain. Maybe even understand for yourself what the meaning of all of it is. You know, it's fine if you look at some work, giggling with your friend about it, but art can really be therapeutic, if you let it be. Almost like opening yourself to the therapist, Relaxing on the Couch and just SENSE. Art cannot and doesnt Need to be profound, if the beholder, the spectator doesnt view it as such. Opening yourself completely, letting all the bias fall is a way to let art do it's Thing for yourself. Thanks for reading.
i definitely agree that art is therapeutic as i became an artsist due 2 a lack of my brother in my life. i thought that if i drew something so realistically that it one day it might come 2 life, replacing my brother with an imaginary friend
We view art for the purpose of self reflection. Period. (What does that say about those who would promote Picasso?) Museums are a medium for culturing the rich the way TV cultures the rest of us. The problem is, they show only ugly, confusing reflections. The professional artist makes art for money. Period. I should know because I've commissioned scores. Genuine art is created as a way of sharing a message - even if only with yourself, even if you don't know what that message is, and responsible art accurately reflects only the very best and most beautiful aspects of our world. Only then may viewing it be considered therapeutic. Thanks for sharing such great work!
This would be ideal for art today. What art is lacking is perhaps an objective view again of the world, a common agreement with the liberties it has. Just like the renaissance, there were amazing works of art and society worked towards it. We are understanding much less of what art is and what it represents in modern society....
What about teach? That's the whole point of "The treachery of Images" is to teach how distant a painting is from an actual object. IMO art is there to teach lessons, more than it is there to heal as you say. It is a way to avoid repeating the same mistakes and living 100 years in solitude
I think you've brought up an interesting point. Nobody knows the artist's purpose unless they share it, so it would be in rather poor taste to assign a specific psychological function to their works rather than letting the works speak for themselves. The benefit of a cathedral is that you know what it's fittings were meant for!
Well, the artists motivation is to create a work of art with a very specific and certain intention of communicating something. At the other side however there are different levels of understanding and interpretations of the work and the artist. If one sees the prehistoric images in Altamira Spain, one can understand the scenes. Although most of the contextual information is lost, we still can see those animals and those hunters running in the prairies, we can see their tools. That is the nature of the work of art. Time has stripped all the interpretations and contextual information off the work, the work and the artists intention remained intact. The nature of the human however is to fill in the blanks, it is what we call speculation but speculation or interpretation does not change the work of art or the intention of the artist
I don't think most artists have made studies on how to heal and elevate mankind. They usually do what they do because they are driven to do it, and enjoy the rewards of developing their skills and beholding their creation. I'm sure many of them would find objection to being pigeonholed into somewhat restrictive categories. It's a novel idea, but I can't see me automatically turning to a museum curator when I need calm, solace and inspiration.
"the purpose of art is therapeutic.. art helps us to cope with our inability to focus on what's beautiful in life" ok.. I once went to that famous museum in Paris.. and went to the room that contained that famous Mona Lisa.. and i noticed hundreds of people trying their hardest to take a photo of that thing.. some using selfie sticks.. others extending their arms in any way possible to take a pic that would most likely contain dozens of hands covering up the famous painting.. meanwhile not a single person noticing me taking photos of them.. I also noticed that in this same room.. on the adjacent walls.. there hangs dozens of other masterpieces.. that no one seems to notice at all.. perhaps art's lofty goal SHOULD be to offer therapy.. but.. empirically.. on a large scale.. it in fact emphatically does not.. so as mentioned in this video.. perhaps if one organizes the art.. for example a section devoted to fear.. maybe someone suffering from social anxiety would one day go and looks at the famous screaming man painting but then cannot help to notice the hundreds of others taking photos of the same painting.. well.. maybe we can organize the famous paintings on one side of the museum and the other emotions on the other side.. i'm sure everyone would love to escape the pressures of modernity by traveling down an art section entitled.. memory lane.. hm.. anyway.. if it turned out that 95% of visitors just see the famous section and neglect everything else.. would this empirical observation change our ideas about how art or art museums function? art cannot help us notice what's beautiful in life until we rethink the role of art even before we step into a museum.. which comes first.. appreciation of beauty or appreciation of art in its ability to help us appreciate beauty? it seems more likely that someone would learn to appreciate life first before appreciating art.. after all.. there are countless ways someone can learn to appreciate beauty in life.. so it seems more likely that once someone appreciates beauty in life.. THEN they may be curious to go to an art museum.. rather than the reversal.. and so in this way.. we would expect that art museums simply "preach to the choir": those who already appreciate beauty will be more likely to get more out of the art experience than those who are still learning how to appreciate beauty.. just because we started out saying "art helps us" does not mean we can then conclude that "art museums help us" because perhaps.. yes.. art can help us.. in the sense that.. creating our own art can help us.. but clearly that was not what was implied based on the rest of the video.. what was suggested by the title of the video and the information contained within was that "art museums helps us" .. but they certainly have not done this on the large scale.. but perhaps the novelty of rearranging the art of a museum would capture the public's imagination and compel them by curiosity to go.. and over time.. people's perception of art and its role would improve.. all because of a simple rearranging.. well then.. when is this new museum opening up? :D
Long story made short (and slightly off topic): My father was a psychiatric nurse. My father once did a little experiment with his boss who claimed that you can tell someone's mental state from their art work. He gave the patients canvas and oil paints. However he didn't give them any white paint. His boss looked at the pictures and, going on how heavy and dark the pictures where, made completely the wrong assessment of the patients.
***** In general I agree. I went a lot more when I was younger, but that was also when I didn't value my skill as much and I was desperately looking for a mentor and some sort of guidance to being a good artist. FYI, found out I didn't need either.
That's interesting. I find as a musician that I don't go to the performances of others so much for guidance, but more to observe and react to the way that others are doing the things that I am also doing in my own way...or to try and feel what they are trying to communicate. Of course I can appreciate that this might be vastly different in a medium that isn't live performance.
There is a huge difference between seeing a picture of a painting and actually seeing it with your own eyes. I remember the first time I saw a Van Gogh "live", and I finally understood why he was so well respected. His art is so vibrant, it's almost three dimensional. I don't understand how you can be an artist and not enjoy the art of others.
