The Uses of Art

 

Art…

• Reminds us we are going to die
• Keeps us interested in living
• Breaks us open
• Gives hope
• Devastates
• Terrifies
• Delights
• Comforts the afflicted
• Can help us to shut the fuck up for a blesséd moment
• Afflicts the comfortable
• Makes us human*
• Magnifies the greater glory of God^†
• Joins the long conversation
• Engenders reasonless gratitude
• Offers the means to become other people
• Demonstrates unprovable truth.

 

I have been noodling on this list for years, mostly because I like to have reasons handy when I teach playwriting. (An investigation of the uses of playwriting would open a whole other can of worms.)  I have arranged these in a loose, ostensibly amusing order of my own choosing. I would be truly delighted to hear suggestions for additions, adjustments and deletions.

Over the last century or so we have tended to shy away from objectivity in the arts and have emphatically discarded any objective means of defining exactly what art is. “It can’t be done,” we shrug; or we toss down the glib gauntlet, “Art is whatever I say it is”, knowing full well that if that were true, then art would be, by extension, whatever anyone says it is, and by further extension, simply everything. And when something is “everything”, it achieves equivalence to “nothing.” Or perhaps even less than that.

So I would like to suggest that art might only be objectively defined in the context of its utility. Or in plainer words, in order to know what art is, we have to talk about—and maybe can only talk about— what art does.

I understand I have no special standing to proffer such a list. I quit college after my sophomore year. My plays are only rarely and mostly marginally produced. I am an administrative coordinator at a biotech company, a husband, a father and a person. That last post is the only one I believe entitles me to talk about art; but I stand fiercely by that standing, because, after all, if art is not for persons, then for whom is it?

My plan over the next few months, or—let’s be honest—years, is to write a short essay about every one of the uses I listed above, and maybe even some I have not yet thought of— maybe some that you suggest. Please be warned, however, that my track record for delivering on promised essays is spotty at best. 

Happy Holidays.

2010

 

*Not always a good thing.

^†Even if there isn’t One.

 

5/28/14 To see my more recent essay, "The Misuses of Art", please click here.

 

 

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Comments

[Bill Salyers]

... puts you in touch with like-minded people who might have sex with you.

[Paul Mullin]

Sex with like-minded people?!?

What are you? A puritan?

[Lyam White]

I like this list. I would add something about art's relationship to axioms--that it challenges standing axioms (sometimes confirming them in the process) and establishes new ones. I mean, if it were my list, which it's not. I'll be quiet now.

[Paul Mullin]

I am with you in spirit, Lyam. My only problem is that I had to look up "axiom" to be sure I knew what it meant, and I am trying to keep this list as clean and clear and accessible as possible. Could it be that what you're might fall under one of these:

# Devastates

# Magnifies the greater glory of God†

# Joins the long conversation

# Demonstrates unprovable truth.

If not, I'd love it if you'd consider writing something that fleshes out your argument. I'd happily post it here.

[Lyam White]

Hmmm . . . Seems to me that devastation would be a side effect, rather than the act; I don't see how challenging or establishing axioms would magnify the glory of God unless one challenges the glory of God and fails.

I suppose that challenging or establishing axioms could be said to "join in the long conversation," while establishing them, by definition, "demonstrates unprovable truth."

If we say that establishing axioms is well within the demonstration of unprovable truth, might we say that challenging axioms amounts to "demonstrating the poverty of common sense?"

[Jeni Falldine]

"Art joins the long conversation" is my favorite. That is so well worded. I am constantly amazed at the vast array of unique human creations...it is a very long conversation indeed. :)

[Paul Mullin]

I had to add this comment, six years later, from a note Keri Healey put on Facebook today:

"...perhaps the best thing art can do for me is untidy things in my brain once in a while, unpack what I thought was neatly packed away, and force me navigate the storms I'd rather avoid."