Every human has their own beautiful and unique experience walking through life. We see highs – weddings, birthdays, new love, good food and good friends; but we also see lows. We attend funerals, we fall out of love, we get sick, and we get injured. Sometimes we feel too much, sometimes too little, sometimes joy, sometimes pain, sometimes nothing at all.
Regardless of the variance in our experiences, should we choose to seek it out, we all have art available to us as a means of communication. Art allows humans to free our pain, joy, amusement, anger, and love from our minds and physical beings. Whether we are consuming and connecting with it, or creating and expressing, art is absolutely intertwined with our everyday lives. Visual art is displayed in nearly every aspect of media; not just museums. Graphic design is a rising field that allows for connection on new platforms in the digital age. Film allows for stories that would otherwise remain silent to be told with multiple forms of media simultaneously; while music, traditionally lacking a visual aspect, transcends all societal barriers to reach anyone who should choose to look for it. The most beautiful fact of all is that they can all intertwine seamlessly and never the same way twice, the projects as unique as the people who create them.
I believe that art heals on both ends of it’s consumption. For the creator, it can be a cathartic release of emotion, or an intellectual concept that fascinates them. For the consumer, while occasionally providing pure intellectual stimulation, it’s often a point of connection, a feeling of company and companionship, even if alone. While the trope of the tortured artist is, in my opinion, unnecessary and overused, the fact rings true that beauty and purpose can and do emerge from significant suffering, and that art, particularly multimedia projects, allow for that beauty and purpose to reach audiences who resonate with it.
I firmly believe that art saves lives, and provides purpose where a purpose may not otherwise be easy to identify. Creating gives direction to pain, and consuming brings comfort that physical beings cannot provide. Creativity, on all parts of the spectrum, absolutely heals.
Sabina Catherine 