There are several ways to read art: technical; historical; political; shock-value; and therapeutic. In the therapeutic reading, art is “not good or bad per se, but good or bad for us to the extent that it compensates for our flaws”.
Art can help us become better versions of ourselves. Seven psychological frailties inform seven functions for art.
1. Remembering. Both writing and art are central responses to forgetting. When we call a piece of art successful, what we mean is that it reminds us of something we easily forget.
2. Hope. Pretty pictures or idealised images or buildings, though they now have a bad reputation (unrealistic! false expectations! unable to handle the brutalities of existence!), do have an important place, for we long for what we don’t have, or for what we need.
3. Sorrow. Art teaches us to be better at suffering. It takes what is “base and unimpressive” in our lives and makes art of it. Art also brings us into relationship with our own insignificance, offering “more regular encounters with the sublime”.
4. Rebalancing. Art can give back to us the parts of ourselves which are missing. We are all missing different things, so the art we pursue will be different. A beautiful work is one with attributes we are missing, and an ugly work one with attributes we have in abundance. We create objects outside of ourselves to recover what we have lost.
5. Self-Understanding. Sometimes we aren’t able to explain who we are in words. Art and other objects can assist in this, as their qualities can reflect our understanding of who we are. They can reflect our own qualities to us, and to others. This is why we hang art and place objet d’art in our homes.
6. Growth. In art we can encounter things we don’t like, or we fear, or which don’t interest us at all. In art also we can encounter the other. If we take a moment to reflect on why we are reacting against it, we can not only learn more about ourselves, we are better equipped to be open to the other.
7. Appreciation. Familiarity with our lives, its objects, and people in it, desensitises us to their value. Art can take as its focus the ordinariness of life, and in doing so resensitise us to its value.
Art should be arranged in museums and galleries to speak to “the troubled areas of existence”.
Love. Art teaches us to be good lovers by showing us to pay attention to detail, and of the value of patience, that is, doing without excitement. It teaches us the importance of sensual pleasure, and to be curious, and of the necessity of resilience, and of not jumping to conclusions. It shows us how to attain perspective on life’s misfortunes, and that it’s okay to be attracted to physical beauty. Art recovers the good and beautiful from the routine, and teaches us that we should not expect all to go smoothly (picture boats on rough water).
Nature. Art reminds us to remember the importance of nature to us, what we like in particular about nature. It reminds us of the nature we don’t have around us, and to live in unity with the climate, and in accordance with nature, which includes death and dying, a good reminder for the young. Art can help us picture time, suffering and decay. It helps us appreciate the beauty of industrial nature, and changes how we experience the world.
Money. We need to be aware of both the pros and cons of capitalism. One of the cons is that people pay for the wrong things. Spending money well – that is tastefully – is a skill. It is okay to seek out an educator of taste, but, once educated, you’ll probably be less satisfied with some parts of life (such as architecture). Having money isn’t a terrible thing, and is important to be able to eat and live well, but love, respect, and honour are also important. Pursue money not for its own sake (acknowledging this is an argument from privilege). We are often looking for meaningful work, and we can learn from what we admire or envy. What is it in particular we admire? Can we make something uniquely our own from the creations of others we admire? It can take time to build the life we want, and to develop the personality required for complex positions. A realistic set of expectations is necessary, and art can help us realise that our struggles and sorrows, banal though they might seem, are dignified. All jobs are banal sometimes from the inside. Life is not somewhere else. The life you have here is art. Or something like that.
Politics. Art often takes the side of the marginalised, but has also been used as a tool of the politically powerful. It can raise consciousness around social issues, and generate change through guilt. Good political art doesn’t just point out the problem, it moves the collective in a better direction. Political art can highlight what there is to be proud of in a community, or what a country is embarrassed of. Everyday objects are where a culture’s spirit is to be found. There is a case for censorship, to prohibit the ugliness of design, architecture, and advertising, for “[w]e cannot claim both that art will elevate us and that ugliness will leave us unaffected”. It isn’t enough to admire art – we must put its lessons into action.
For Alain de Botton’s Rijksmuseum presentation on art as therapy, follow this link. For his webpage, go here.