How Art Has The Potential To Change The World

Good art enters the soul, appeals to the heart, and makes new ideas plausible.

I don’t remember the exact time and place I first heard the statement above, but I do remember my first experience with the transforming power of art.

When I was in my 20’s, shortly after the Iraq invasion of 2003, I spent a day at The Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, enjoying the art and a day alone with my wife.

Rounding a corner down one of the hallways, Kim and I stood in front of a large Middle-Eastern quilt stretching almost the entire length of the wall. It was big. It was colorful. It was captivating. And it was half-covered black with oil.

*Photo Credit: g.sighele, Creative Commons

Upon closer inspection, each of the squares on the quilt represented cultural centers and places of interest in Iraq. Some of the images were recognizable, but many were blacked out completely. The oil splatters symbolized one of the great tragedies of war: the destruction and abrupt halt of cultural advancement and art (nobody builds libraries when your country is being invaded). The fact that oil was used to represent the war signified clearly the author’s opinion about the war.

My wife and I stood speechless in front of the powerful imagery.

In that brief moment, my personal views on the war began to change. Or at very least, in that moment, I opened my mind for the first to an argument against the war I had never considered before.

Art entered my soul, appealed to my heart, and made new ideas plausible. Art changed me.

Art has a unique ability to impact our emotions and change our worldview. It is indeed very powerful. And because of that, it is important to always weigh its impact on our soul and our worldview through a personal connection with God.

In college, I studied Film Appreciation.

Or more accurately, I should say I enrolled in a Film Appreciation course to score an easy A. The class was wonderful, one of the highlights of my college career—the fact that I got to watch movies in school sitting next to my future wife was an added bonus.

During the class, my professor said something unforgettable.

It was simply this, “Every story is told with an agenda.”(tweet this)

Sometimes, the motivation of an artist is nothing more than to provide beauty, joy, or laughter into our lives. Other times, the art is specifically created to move my emotion, appeal to my heart, make new ideas plausible, and shift my worldview to align with the artist.

For this reason, we must treat it with great respect.

Poetry and story and music and dance and paint can widen my horizons. It can introduce a view I hadn’t considered and steer the course of my life in new directions. Make no mistake: I think this is valuable. Art has opened up the eyes of the world to great injustice and inconsistencies throughout history. And as an artist, I hope my words will have that same positive influence on others.

But within the beauty and world of art, there is also danger.

Not every artist, storyteller, and filmmaker has God’s agenda in mind—or even our best in mind. And given the power of art to change us from the inside-out, our filters must become even more important.

Truth must always be weighed against the eternal truth of a living God. As we seek to live a life fully committed to Him, it is important for us to keep God as the ultimate source of Truth in our lives.

Art is wonderful. Art is powerful. But all lasting truth begins and ends in God alone.

How Art Has The Potential To Change The World is a post from: Storyline Blog