Sunday, March 6, 2011

Why is Art Important?

Last night the Graffiti Art Gallery in Oil City held an artist reception for the current show listed below.

REFLECTIONS
(Photographs of Nature and Architecture)
by
MARK PANZA
Sufana Chowdhury
Eleanor ter Horst & the
National Transit Studio Artists
MARCH 1-APRIL 8, FRIDAYS AND SATURDAYS 11 - 7

If you missed the reception, don't miss the show! We are so fortunate to have a growing arts movement in our region! It's not only breathing new life into our economy, but more importantly opening hearts and minds to new possibilities.
Art - no matter if it is music, performing art, photography, painting, installations... - can provide a glimpse of someone elses vision of the world. It can open our minds to see our own world in a broader context. It can inspire us to express ourselves in new and interesting ways.
Learning to appreciate a wide variety of expressions helps us to learn to communicate better, to seek broader solutions, to think "outside the box." I believe art appreciation and encouraging artistic expression is the most important investment we can make to lead to a better community.
Why? Because it leads to invention. One must imagine something is possible before that possibility will ever be pursued.
Why? Because it forces us to see. We have to acknowledge that a problem exists before we can be motivated to solve it.
Why? Because we often overlook beauty and sometimes need to have someone put a spotlight on it to remind us that it is all around us.
Why? Because if we are to understand one another, we need first to learn that our point of view is not the only point of view.
Art can be shocking. It can be enlightening. It can be comforting. We need it all. We need to encourage expression. Encourage communication. Encourage understanding. If we can learn to do that in ways that may take us out of our comfort zone, in positive appreciation of varied perspective, we build better community.
I applaud the efforts of the Art Revitalization Movement in Oil City! And I am excited about the positive impact Art is having on the region at large.

2 comments:

  1. The very idea of creating an Arts Revitalization Movement was thinking "Outside the Box". It is not the traditional approach to economic development in Venango County. I too applaud the efforts of the Arts Revitalization committee because from a business perspective this is an overwhelming success!

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  2. Art can be an exchange or introduction of and to new ideas or old ones, through visual means, no words needed. Some arts ARE words. Some words are art. Presenting an uninterested soul to art sometimes is the way to introduce art and knowledge to that soul, who might become at once enlightened in several ways. and ...might just become the next artist.

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