The Beauty in Art and Perspective
I don’t believe we can ever predict how our work will impact others, will be interpreted. Every experience of the work is purely personal. No one will experience it the same way, since we have all had an array of different experiences shaping our lives. For me, that’s what makes art so special.
I think this also means there are certain areas where as makers we must negate control – not of the work we make, but of the way it will be interpreted. Your vision for a work will never be the exact vision perceived by the rest of the world.
Art has the special quality of transcending time. When it seems most resonant may emerge years after it was created. Or its resonance comes in waves based on how people try to make sense of it in relation to their current situation; politically, environmentally, locally, individually.
I have felt this very much in the current pandemic – I have watched work created years previously which suddenly feels so connected to this moment. It has a means of expressing many of the feelings erupting within me, in a way I cannot describe with words. Yet the creator, at the time of making this work, had no relation to this current situation, no awareness it would occur. It had not happened, and the work was formed from an entirely different source. But in the light of this specific time, it may mean more to many now than ever before. Although the work remains the same, the way we perceive its connotations has shifted. And I find that beautiful.