It is sometimes claimed that art must send some form of message to the viewer. Should the message always be “beautiful”?
As they say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Art does not have to be beautiful to be appreciated. To me, art is conveying a message, insight, or story to the viewer/listener. This message can be beauty, but it can also be ugly. It can shock the viewer or bring them to tears. Sometimes the message is simple; look what I made.
My photographs do not convey a message, at least intentionally. However, other photographers (and other artists as well) create work with a message in mind. This could be to draw attention to a cause the artist is passionate about to something personal the creator is telling us. Humanitarian photographer David duChemin comes to mind.
When I create a photograph, it is with the intent of letting others see how I view the subject. This is giving you an insight into my way of seeing. I believe a large number of photographers would share this idea.
Some artists use their medium to tell a story. This can be accomplished by multiple works showing a process to a single photograph, painting, or drawing depicting something that has happened. It can be based on reality, but not necessarily. Depression era photographer Dorothea Lange is a good example of this.
Most art through the ages have shown beauty in its various forms and shapes. Paintings of landscapes, photographs of the night sky, and drawings of people all show beauty. Beauty is a constant in art, but not the only one. This, I believe, answers the question about the message always being beautiful.
To answer the question another way, we can ask, why should the message be beautiful? As I stated earlier, the message can be ugly. Not necessarily in the literal sense, although I think some art is ugly. The term ugly could mean what the art is conveying, as in the horrors of war. Guernica by Pablo Picasso comes to mind. Just bear in mind, ugliness, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
With this, I leave you with a quote by art critic Clement Greenberg. “All profoundly original art looks ugly at first.”
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