Why Bother with the Arts?

music-lesson
Böttcher, The Music Lesson (1860)

There are compelling reasons to learn about the arts, and we discuss a lot of them at the Circle of Scholars.

I was listening to Andrew Pudewa, as I often do, and latched onto something he said:

You can’t get something out of a brain that isn’t in there to begin with.

This is similar to what people like to say about computers: garbage in, garbage out. You can’t expect a computer to refine your data. If you feed in junk data, the computer will churn out junk results.

Now, what’s true about computers isn’t necessarily true for humans, but in this case I think it is. The arts are an immensely rich source of good data. Figuring out how to perceive and analyze a painting, a theatrical monologue, or a piece by Brahms puts “something” real into the brain—a lot of something!

The arts fill our brains with challenging ideas, our hearts with emotion, and our souls with depth and beauty. Wouldn’t it be nice if more of that were being churned out by our culture?

And it’s not hard to do this. Kids (or you, for that matter) don’t have to play an instrument, dance, act, or paint to be part of this richness. Nor do you have to be talented, super smart, or financially privileged to do this. You just have to take the first step of wanting to learn.

Let’s fill minds with the challenge and beauty found in the arts. It’s a grand journey.