Why Art is Important
There’s a chance that you’ve found yourself in a museum, gawking at a painting you think you could have created at age five. Perhaps you’ve sat through two hours of a bloated Hollywood blockbuster and wondered aloud, to no one in particular, how the funds were ever collected to hobble the monstrosity together. Maybe someone you know and love has mentioned an interest in pursuing a career in the arts, and you’ve blurted out “But... why?”. On the surface, it’s easy to see how art and music can seem like complete wastes of time. There are no tangible benefits to make up for the time and money that goes into the average piece of art, since all that time could have just as easily been spent at a desk in return for a guaranteed hourly wage. Human inventions like the wheel, the light bulb, and the loofa serve practical purposes, unlike any found-object sculpture that you can pay to visit in the Museum of Modern Art. This line of thinking may explain why the United States spends less than 9% of what Germany does on funding for the arts (Gummow). Art can seem a useless pastime to many, even to the artists themselves sometimes, but it is integral to not only the human experience, but to human survival.
Many of art’s benefits are of a personal nature, such as escapism. The bright, colorful scenes in certain landscapes, or magical worlds illustrated by books, film and TV allow patrons a temporary break from the drudgery of their everyday lives. Some may scoff at the absurd nature of fantasy stories or childish video games, but these forms of art, among many others, represent very real respite for those of us in dark places. Why obsess over contemporary political disasters, or the existential dread that is the constant side dish accompanying the human mind? Those things are so far out of our control, and we could just as easily be cheering for the success of our favorite fictional boy wizard. In addition to escape, a work of art can allow us a private, personal sense of kinship with the artist. Knowing that whoever wrote our favorite song was once in an almost identical state of mind can alleviate a great deal of our loneliness and alienation. We may never meet another human being who will openly admit to certain feelings, but after seeing or hearing them expressed in art, we know we are not the only ones to experience them. Alternatively, art can serve as a spiritual counterweight. None of us are entirely balanced, and art allows us to explore what it is that may be missing from our lives. Perhaps the character arc of a film’s protagonist teaches him a valuable lesson that we hadn’t considered holds relevance to our own lives. On the flipside, however, feeling a deep connection with an anti-hero, such as Walter White, can shed light on flaws in our own worldview (Guardian Culture).
In societal terms, the effects of this personal relationship with art can be seen at a much larger scale. “Sometimes a whole society falls in love with a certain style in art,” explains philosopher Alain de Botton, “because it's trying to rebalance itself: like France in the late 18th century that wanted David as a corrective to its decadence, or Britain in the 19th century that looked to the pre-Raphaelites to counter the effects of brutal industrialisation” (Guardian Culture). Art can serve as a social barometer that indicates what a society feels it’s lacking. Sometimes this effect occurs rather directly, and an artistic movement arises for the explicit purpose of reminding us all of the important aspects of ourselves the current mainstream mindset has left out. Artistic movements, such as Dadaism, can remind us of how silly our current focuses are. During the First World War, Dadaism arose from a disillusioned disgust with the horrific nature of reality. Dada works of art tended to be nonsensical, ranging from chaotic collages to surreal sculptures and beyond. The movement wasn’t united by a particular visual style, but rather an anarchical uprising against the idea that art needs to be a pleasant distraction from real life (MoMA).
Projecting forward into the future of human progress, a common fear tends to be that of automation. Since the human brain is essentially a biological machine, it seems reasonable to assume that computer programs could someday replace us in any and all fields. According to NPR, systematic, impersonal jobs are much more likely to be automated (such as a 99% chance in the case of telemarketing) than the abstract, personal occupations, like that of preschool teachers, at 0.7%, or animators, at 1.5% (NPR). However, given enough time and technological progress, even those professions could go the way of the dodo. “Creativity may feel like magic,” says CGP Grey, in his video essay Humans Need Not Apply, “but it isn't. The brain is a complicated machine -- perhaps the most complicated machine in the whole universe -- but that hasn't stopped us from trying to simulate it… But even if we assume the human mind is magically creative -- it's not, but just for the sake of argument -- artistic creativity isn't what the majority of jobs depend on. The number of writers and poets and directors and actors and artists who actually make a living doing their work is a tiny, tiny portion of the labor force. And given that these are professions that are dependent on popularity they will always be a small part of the population. There is no such thing as a poem and painting based economy” (CGP Grey).
Even with all the personal and societal benefits considered, there remains the question of whether the existence of art can be explained from an evolutionary standpoint. In his scientific journal from 2000, Geoffrey Miller argues that, rather than being a cultural invention (like delicious food or pornography) that stimulates “our tastes in evolutionarily novel ways”, art acts as an indicator of a potential mate’s intelligence and mental health. Officially, there’s yet to be a scientific consensus on this evolutionary view of art, but, Miller argues, there has never been scientific consensus on the evolutionary purpose of “humor, story-telling… ornate language, imaginative ideologies, religion, [or] morality” either, and yet these remain vital aspects of human interaction. “This [lack of consensus] has been one of the greatest obstacles...” says Miller, “to building any load bearing bridges between the natural sciences, the social sciences and the humanities” (Miller).
The challenges in defending art’s purpose don’t stop there, though. Despite the countless societal and cultural arguments for the necessity of art, economic points remain the most readily available counter arguments. Music and art may improve our lives, but when justifying the two endeavors through the lens of responsible budgeting, art isn’t quite enough of a must-have for educational institutions. The history of the arts is chock full of part-time artists, as well as enthusiasts and hobbyists who maintained alternative day jobs, for the simple reason that making a full-time living as an artist is a very rare achievement. As Elizabeth Day of the Guardian puts it:
Almost a third of visual and applied artists earn less than £5,000 a year from their creative work, according to a survey conducted last year by Artists' Interaction and Representation (AIR); 57% of the 1,457 respondents said that less than a quarter of their total income was generated by their art practices and only 16% of them paid into a private pension fund, raising questions about how professional artists will support themselves once they reach retirement age (Day).
Throughout human history, the power of artistic expression is clear. Art gives us a private, personal way to deal with the world, be it through reflection, escapism or personal growth. Entire societies are able to communicate their history through art, as well as using it to address their collective concerns. While it may not be the safest economic investment, the continued production and consumption of art has survived most of human history, and is likely to serve a purpose long into the coming chapters of our story.
Works Cited
Blute, Marion. "The Mating Mind: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature .
By Geoffrey Miller. New York: Anchor Books. $27.50. Vii 503 P; Index. ISBN: 0–385–49516–1. 2000." The Quarterly Review of Biology 78.1 (2003): 129-30. Web.
Day, Elizabeth. "Can You Make Any Kind of Living as an Artist?" The Guardian. N.p., 28 July
- Web. 15 Nov. 2016.
Jodie Gummow / AlterNet. "Culturally Impoverished: US NEA Spends 1/40th of What Germany
Doles Out for Arts Per Capita." Alternet. N.p., 5 Feb. 2014. Web. 06 Dec. 2016.
Humans Need Not Apply. Perf. CGP Grey. CGP Grey, 13 Aug. 2014. Web. 15 Nov. 2016.
“MoMA Learning.” MoMA | Dada, www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/themes/dada.
What Is Art For? Alain De Botton's Animated Guide | Art and Design. Perf. Alain De Botton.
Oct 24, 2014. Guardian Culture, 24 Oct. 2014. Web. 13 Nov. 2016.
"Will Your Job Be Done By A Machine?" NPR. NPR, 21 May 2015. Web. 20 Nov. 2016.