The Artist is Alive and So Are You

         We often find ourselves appreciation art, whether it be a song or a painting, and wanting what lies beneath.  We want more; we want significance.  For most of us, most of the time, who are experiencing art, is experiencing an interaction between the art themselves.  It follows that any significance is exclusive to the observer and, more importantly, unique to the observer.  The art stays the same and we change, you change.  The art is not the experience; your interaction with the art is the experience.  Any significance is individual and irrelevant to another’s experience and therefore unusual in deciphering meaning, specifically that which is meaningful to you.

            Keep in mind that the artist in question deciphers meaning in her work in the same way that you might.  A notable difference being that the artist’s experience with the work encompasses the creation processes and the creation, whereas on observer will usually only experience the finished work of art.  Whatever meaning the artist finds in her own work is not necessarily synonymous with the artist’s inspiration for crating their art.  It seems to me that many observers of art get caught up on what the artist’s inspiration was as if it was the artwork’s ‘true meaning.’  But there is no true meaning; you, and everyone, give meaning to the art.  If you’re bent on discovering the ‘artist’s intent’, than I would say that you’ve missed the point.  The point was for you to connect with the art in a personal way.  You must look inward for meaning because where you and the art meet is entail determined by where you are.  Your interpretation of art says more about you than it says about the art itself.  So what does it say about you when your interpretation focuses on the art’s meaning to someone else?