Art & Honesty

The painting above is by Hilo Chen.

At some point, I realized I enjoyed art because it was often more honest than the status quo.

I enjoyed art because even when it was fantasy, it often spoke to something more true than popular conceptions conveyed.

Art, even when it is hyperbole, can reach toward feelings that are sincere.

Artwork by Frank Miller:

Art cares about things that supposedly “appropriate” people shouldn’t care about.

Art stares at the things many of us are taught to turn away from:

Artwork by Fenton Bailey:

If you’ve never studied the World War II and Korean War photographs of Margaret Bourke-White, then I encourage you to study them.  They are honest.  They study what most people shun.  She photographed what many people considered to be grotesque and obscene.  She photographed a German mother standing over her two children she killed, before she commited suicide.  She photographed hundreds of graphic pictures of the German WW II concentration camps.  In the Korean War, she photographed a picture of a South Korean soldier proudly holding up the severed head of his enemy.  Her work is timeless and important.  I choose not to show the violence here, but I choose to honor and promote her honest artworks.

Portrait of Margaret Bourke-White:

Artworks by Egon Schiele:

Artwork by Mirabilia:

Artworks by Egon Schiele:

Egon Schiele died at the young age of 28.

I believe I was strongly drawn to art because it is important, if not essential, for learning how to live a healthy life.  Art teaches us things that are not taught commonly in most schools or textbooks.  Art often takes the lead in educating us about taboo topics most other education sources avoid or censor.

Someday, someone is likely going to lay their sexual cards on your table.

The better you understand sexuality in the arts, the better you’ll likely know more ways how to play or how to fold the expected and unexpected cards you are dealt.

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On a side note:  Congratulations to The Washington Post for winning 6 of the 14 2008 Pulitzer Prizes awarded for journalism.

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© All rights reserved by the respective artists.

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