What does art do?

Me as a child drawing...

My first experience of recognizing art came from my father. My father would sit and draw comic book characters exactly as they looked from the comics. He had been doing it since he was a child. I was hooked and amazed. Throughout my younger years I was drawing constantly, even getting in trouble in class for not paying attention to the subject because I was drawing. In high school the only classes I enjoyed going to were my art classes and my religion studies class on Wednesdays (The teacher would play ambient music and let us take a meditative nap). In junior college I took every art class I could. When it came time to transfer the adviser assumed I was an art major, but I never even considered it as a way to make money.
I transferred as an art major with no idea how to make a career out of something called art. All my classes taught me skill, creativity, but not real world application. As I studied art more and more while also creating it, I became engulfed in the idea that Art was important. It's real world application was just what the artist wanted to make of it. I also began noticing that art was everywhere around me. I took the opposite approach to what constitutes artwork. Instead of classifying what made art I developed the idea "What doesn't make art?", because to me Art is a creative process involved in many aspects of life.
Yet, there seemed to be a problem with the perception of art. It seemed to me that art in a non-artists eyes was deemed not so important. The modern fine arts styles were labeled as too personal, weird, shocking, too be understood by someone who did not have a doctorate in art history. This did not match my perception of what art is about. Art to me should be for everybody done by anybody. Art can take many forms but I understood only a person like me could like all forms. Still, I believe there is so many styles available that it would be hard to find someone who didn't like anything. Yet art is not just for viewing analyzing and visually pleasing. In the book "World Art: an Illustrated History" a set of art roles are set down.

aggrandizing oneself or others
arranging disordered or dissimilar things
associating one thing with another thing
communicating
complementing education and training
contrasting familiarity and surprise for aesthetic excitement
creating codes
creating illusions
documenting things and events
educating the illiterate

employing the thoroughly known characteristics of one thing as metaphors of the less well known characteristics of another to shed light on the latter by comparison

enlivening a dull existence with change and variety
entertaining
executing a premeditated purpose
exhibiting technical skill
flattering patrons
giving form to therapy
heightening experience
illustrating ideas and narratives
indulging in fantasy
indulging in sensuousness
reconciling differing ideologies
passing on folklore or family histories
passing the time
providing a means of personal expression
providing an opportunity for self-examination
persuading
propagandizing
providing testimony
redefining reality
redefining art itself




 
 Andy Warhol "Campbell's soup can"

This blog is a continuation of my personal artistic journey of bringing art to those who wouldn't necessarily be interested in it.  I will investigate how the school budget cuts are affecting art education. I will research how people outside of the art world perceive art. I will be inspecting the barrier created between highbrow and Lowbrow art, while also researching how the divide came to be. I will be looking for art and artists that have broken into the mainstream while creating fine art. My ultimate goal will be to make the art world more accessible to everyone beyond the hardcore lovers of art. I want to make art as enjoyable and important to the readers of this blog as it is to me. I hope to make the journey an enjoyable one!