Feb 5, 2010 11:03:48 PM cite

Art is one of the most beautiful way of expresion. When I see a picture I can feel and understand the feelings that the painter wanted to pass (but that is something that we learn with years of seeing museums) so I think that of course it can be a social tool and not only. With art, we can maybe show to anothers countries that we are all equals, because all of us do art, see art, and somentimes have the same interpretation of the same pictures. With this peace of paper we can transform the mankind because we can show ours feelings or thoughts. Like in "Guernica" from Picasso, we can see the suffer of this people, and we can identify with all the suffer around the worl, because every country have is bad moment (what shouldn´t happened).

by Jane

Jan 6, 2010 8:56:46 PM cite

Rene Magritte's painting, Son of Man, had this influence on me recently. It is the image of a man in a bowler hat with an apple obscuring the face. Commenting on his meaning, he said, "Everything we see hides another thing, we always want to see what is hidden by what we see. There is an interest in that which is hidden and which the visible does not show us. This interest can take the form of a quite intense feeling; a sort of conflict, one might say, between the visible that is hidden and the visible that is present." This has helped me to appreciate the reality of what I know and feel deeply about inside myself although I may not always be able to provide concrete visible proof of it. It has also helped me to try to peer beyond what may seem an obvious solution in problem-solving. Our world is very complex and truths are not always easily visible to the observer. It warns against over-simplification in all aspects of life.

by April

Jan 6, 2010 7:30:31 AM cite

I must agree with Thai Sean that art is a tool that presents the symbols and images of mythology, but modern people have lost the ability to recognize this. There is an account of a nativity scene from the second century that shows the child surrounded by the ox, the ass, and the Magi. It is noted that in the second century no-one would fail to recognise that it represented the cult of Set and Osiris reconciled in the Christ Child, along with the religion of Mithra, concedeing their power to the Christ. Most people today would just see it as a quaint scene in a stable. Please don't accuse me of any special wisdom or knowledge, as I only discovered this in the last year. The point is that people today do not recognize the mythological symbols and do not understand the meaning in myth or art.

by thedoc

Jan 6, 2010 4:41:33 AM cite

A purpose of Art is being a tool of mythology, using simbology and psychological archetypes. Art makes a inner connection to the viewer that relates them to the world of mythology as a subliminal image that connects them to something of this world. Possibly it could but the problem lies with the viewer few people can appreciate this nature of art let alone perceive it so I doubt it, but I side with doc…

by Thai sean

Jan 5, 2010 10:46:40 PM cite

Yes.

by thedoc