Art – a spiritual food for your mind.
Note from the author: the word spiritual in this article is nonreligious and mainly serves to explain and emphasize the internal character of art’s effect on the mind.
Imagine a new house you are about to move into, with no furniture, only the walls, the windows, and the doors. When you step into that space, you will start creating your own cozy masterpiece called home. It will take time, lots of effort, and probably some professional assistance decorating it. Leaving that space blank will keep it as a house, an adult-sized box with multiple holes in the walls that let the light inside. Practical, but not fun! Decorating it turns it into a home, a place to live, dream, and create.
Life without art is like a house, practical but not fun! The paintings, the architecture, sculptures, interior, and landscape design, calligraphy, literature, cinema, music, ballet, theatre, graphic and fashion design, photography, printmaking, and decorative art. All that adds coziness to life. The history of human civilization would not be so rich and complete without those art forms. As your body needs food to function well and stay healthy, so does your mind, though a different one – a spiritual – with art being part of it.
It’s known that we receive 80 percent of the information with eyes. After it enters our brains, it helps to form our belief system, thoughts, and emotional reactions that govern our life for a certain period. Comparing that to the fact that it takes several dozen milliseconds for information from the eyes to reach the brain, which many researchers have proved, we should pay more attention to the quality of that information.
Once the food is in your body, you can physically feel the results of a digesting process. With art, you experience a different outcome. After looking at art (painting, sculpture, architecture), there is no immediate physical response from a body but rather a delayed and emotional (or spiritual) one. If you stay open-minded and allow art to access your brains through the eyes (visually), it will provide your mind with spiritual food. And it’s a non-visible, internal process that is felt intuitively. And with time, it results in a better quality of thoughts and perception of life.
Art is a beautiful way of visual communication that can nourish a human mind. Looking at art makes us feel, reveals our emotions, and helps us see things beyond our daily routine. That makes art an essential ingredient of life that can positively impact your future.
How do you define classical art?
The classical art definition in Wikipedia sounds like this: “Art is a diverse range or a product of a human activity that involves creative and imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, and conceptual ideas.” On the other hand, Britannica offers the following definition: “Art – a visual object or experience consciously created through an expression of skill and imagination.”
The word “art” takes its origin from the Latin word “Ars,” which is translated as “skill” or “craft.” It was first noticed in 13th-century manuscripts but has been used in different other forms since the founding of Rome in 753 BC.
I see art as an illusion made real, a creative collaboration between an artist’s imagination, experience, and vision. Where experience represents the past, imagination and a vision foresee the future by staying in the present. Art is subjective; it’s a fantasy made real using specific objective instruments invented by humans.
Let me name just a few of the most prominent artists of all time:
Painters: Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, JMW Turner, Frida Kahlo, Vincent Van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Paul Cézanne, Jackson Pollock, Claude Monet, Georges Seura, Tamara de Lempicka, Georgia O’Keeffe.
Famous architectures: Antoni Gaudí, Frank Lloyd Wright, Mies Van der Rohe, Philip Johnson, Eero Saarinen, Richard Rogers, Frank Gehry, Norman Foster, Renzo Piano, Santiago Calatrava, Zaha Hadid, Oscar Niemeyer, Rem Koolhas, Jeanne Gang.
Sculptors: Michelangelo, Donatello, Gianlorenzo Bernini, Auguste Rodin, Constantin Brancusi, Alberto Giacometti, Henry Moore, Sol LeWitt, Louise Bourgeois.
Can you make classical art?
Yes, anyone can make art, and the absence of a professional artist’s status shouldn’t stop you from doing it. When you feel that you need to make art, either paint, sew a dress, make a pot, write a story or poem, or something else from a long list of art activities, just do it. Making art as a hobby or part of art therapy is available to everyone. You can start engaging in art by buying necessary supplies, watching videos for beginners, or joining art or photography classes. Trust yourself and your intrinsic calling to do it. Focus on the experience, and the result will show you the next step.
Can you make classical art? The answer depends on how you understand the meaning of classical art. If you use the word classical to refer to a period of history dating back to Ancient Greece and Rome, then the answer is no. But if you use the word “classical” to describe a harmonious and balanced style of a piece of art, then the answer is yes. Classical art or “classicism” refers to the imitation of the art of classical antiquity (1000 BC – 450 CE). So, you can make art in a classical style, but it will require years of learning classical technics and practicing because it’s a practice that makes the master.
Can art exist in solitude?
Art starts blooming when the artist shares it with the world. It’s important because art is spiritual food for a human’s mind, and by sharing it, an artist allows it to flow in the vast fields of human life. And as a beautiful flower that makes everyone stop for a moment to admire it, your art can make someone inhale beauty and exhale love. In other words, your art can enhance someone’s life and brighten their day.
Art is a gift from its creator to the world.
It can be created in solitude, but to continue existing needs to be shared.
An artist must be brave enough to create a piece of art first and then share it with the world, which is diverse and filled in with millions of paintings, books, sculptures, songs, and dresses. So, create for the mere fact of creating and sharing your vision with the world without expectations, and you will be surprised by the result
Who is your favorite artist? Share in a comment section; I would love to hear from you.
