"Good art is honest"

This is the first two paragraphs from an assignment I recently wrote asking me to visit Britain's two most famous art galleries, the National Gallery (paintings pre-1900) and Tate Modern (contemporary art post-1900)and explain which I thought came closer to my sense of the purpose that art should play in people's lives. I enjoyed this assignment quite a bit, particularly as it afforded an opportunity to define my perception of art.

Thankfully, one of the few qualities about art on which everyone agrees is that it is incredibly subjective. This was important to keep in mind as I roamed the galleries of Tate Modern, pondering a personal definition of art. Somewhere betwixt and between canned feces and Russian propaganda magazine covers, I realized that I believe art is a created tangible object appreciated by someone. This can include nature, if one believes that it is created by God, or animal creations such as beaver dams and spider webs. This definition lets the viewer deal with the questions of aesthetics, as in the old maxim, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." My definition also requires an appreciator; an object is not art if it is not appreciated in some way.

What about the role that art should play? One of my favorite professors once told me that good art is honest, which I find to be a commentary on the ideal function of art as well as a standard for what makes art "good." On this subject, I asked one of my closest friends for her personal definition of art, which turned out to be proactive: “Any creation a person makes to send a message to the world.” My idea of art’s role lies between these two thoughts: Art is a medium for bringing truth into people’s lives and for lifting and stirring people’s inherent self-focus. Truth is more important than beauty, but the two often come hand in hand. Moreover, something traditionally thought ugly can be perceived as beautiful when it is true, such as a portrait of an old woman. Art reminds us as human beings that there is more to the world than ourselves and makes us examine our closely guarded notions of how the world is or should be.