“Art flies around truth, but with the definite intention of not getting burnt. Its capacity lies in finding in the dark void a place where the beam of light can be intensely caught, without this having been perceptible before.” These words by Franz Kafka sum up why people lose themselves in art. The reason for people’s love for art has been a mystery to many. Making art isn’t a necessity. People create art simply because they enjoy doing so. It provides consolation, hope, a feeling of tranquillity, and an imaginary shoulder for them to lean on. Art is what it means to be human, flawed yet perfect.
Building bridges between different people and making it possible for them to say things they cannot in any other way is art’s biggest feat. Expressing the deep emotions of one’s self through the lush strokes of a paintbrush, the interweaving sentences of a book, the melody of a song, the graceful turns of a dance, or the dialogues of a drama or the pixels of a photo is art. It allows us to revisit our best moments and the worst ones. The happy memories come back to bring a smile on our faces while sharing the moments of our lives that gave us grief and pain can through art to share with others gives us consolation that others are suffering with us. This helps us to face the pain and move on from the grief. Art becomes a tool that releases us from our sadness and provides catharsis in situations where we have been unnecessarily brave for too long. It tells us the truth that we are inherently flawed creatures with troubling desires, unwanted grief, vulnerabilities, and obsessions. We find ourselves in a community of people across the widest ranges of time and space through art. We see the dead authors, poets, dancers, singers, and painters unfold the deepest truth about ourselves to become a part of our lives with living friends.
Our love for art gives us the accumulated wisdom of the greatest voices of all ages. Apart from consolation, it gives us hope and helps us see the hopeful ending of a dark tunnel. Songs about longing, films about happy families with cheerful scenes, poems about meadows in spring, paintings of smiling children in pastoral landscapes bring us happiness and teach us to be happy. Loving art brings upon with us a heap of emotions, ranging from sadness to anger to joy to hope, and at last, it brings peace to our souls. Artists try to control the chaotic world by recreating and reliving moments of their lives through art.
Creating and enjoying art is thus therapeutic. Telling stories rejuvenates the souls of artists. The curiosity and the hunger for more stories to make an artist’s soul. Without it, he would become a broken man. Attempting to make art cures the wounded soul of every person. So as Kurt Vonnegut urges, “Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possibly can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.”
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