Art is a highly diverse range of human activities engaged in creating visual, auditory, or performed artefacts that express the author's imaginative or technical skill and are intended to be appreciated for their beauty or emotional power. Art is a way to express an opinion or a feeling or create a different view of the world, whether the work of other people inspires it or is entirely new. It holds meaning for both the artist and the beholder. It is more than something that invokes emotion; it can carry a message or a viewpoint or champion a cause. Thus, it can be used for various purposes.
Art can be both personal and political.
Art can be a very personal outpouring of the soul, a journey of learning more about oneself. Artist Ebtisam al-Saffar said, "An artist's responsibility is to stay true to his/her vision and develop skill in the medium; it isn't how others see it. As long as you are creating it from your heart and soul and willing to discover your journey and experience through art, it is fine." An example of art rising from personal experience is the set of portraits called 'The Sick Child' by Edvard Munch, which were meant to represent his sister, who died of tuberculosis. Even more famous is 'The Scream', which he painted after he sensed a scream passing through nature. It is accepted to represent the universal anxiety of humanity. Anyone who has gone through a traumatic experience will link that painting to their personal lives and relate to it.
A fundamental purpose common to most art forms is the underlying intention to appeal to, and connect with, human emotion. Janáček's Second String Quartet was written to reflect the love that he had for Kamila Stösslová. It was not a present for her, but an expression of his feelings for her. Producing art has a good impact on personal growth. Creating artwork can be a way to express emotions that cannot be expressed in words, and it can be a relief to do so. Studies have even shown that art therapy affects people who are suffering from depression.
Art can have a political dimension to it too. Politics is simply the ways and means by which we organize our social lives together. Art embodies or reflects it, only sometimes directly engaging in issue-oriented subjects. A strong relationship between the arts and politics, particularly between various kinds of art and power, occurs throughout history. As they respond to contemporary events and politics, the arts take on political and social dimensions, becoming themselves a focus of controversy and even a force of political and social change. In the mid-1930s, during an urgent rush of creativity, Picasso painted a dramatic mural-sized protest over the bombing of Guernica in the plain black and white tones of a newspaper. Black Arts Movement was part of a broader social movement Black Power, while Feminist art came as a logical outcome of the feminist movements of the 20th century.
Street art is now a new stage for protesting political injustices and economic and sexual inequalities. For example, Fintan Magee's mural in Stavanger, Norway, reflects the consequences of a cut in oil prices on the local economy and working class. Czech sculptor David Černý's Entropa, a sculpture commissioned to mark the Czech presidency of the European Union Council during the first semester of 2009, illustrates how art can come into conflict with politics. In the 1960s, the songs of Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, and others protested further racism, war, and the military-industrial complex. As seen from avant-gardes to the feminist movement, art in itself is a powerful political tool and can express opinions on politics and change people's attitudes on specific issues.
Illustration by Adarsh Jay
Art reaches a high level of creativity when it has personal values embedded in it, along with a political flavour. Artist Fleury's sculpture series "Ela 75k" (2000) confirms her interest in shopping and luxury goods while also commenting on the social values embedded in capitalist culture. David Smith's ground-breaking sculpture, "Hudson River Landscape", portrays the surroundings of his home at Bolton Landing in a manner that accepts and expands on the artistic and political conventions of the time.
Those who agree with the phrase "the personal is political" may find it difficult to distinguish between art that is personal and art that is political. They believe that personal problems are political problems. In the decades after the 1960s, artists focused on the political relationship between the individual and the community. At the intersection between the personal and the political, artists such as Ed Ruscha, Robert Indiana, Ray Johnson, Buster Cleveland and Annabel Daou—have made some of their most influential works.
Great art has, through time, been made in many guises. It has been made as protest and propaganda, made to disturb and to soothe, made to question and express. Art is something that can blend the personal and the political, two seemingly unrelated things, into one masterpiece and satisfy our desire for beauty.
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