6. Why Beauty Matters
Up until the turn of the 20th century, everyone just assumed that the purpose of art was to create something beautiful. There were notions that great art should aspire to philosophical truths, to be honest and to educate, and that mere decorative crafts were lesser arts. Then the 20th century began, and with it, two world wars, genocides, and new, conflicting socio-economic forces, namely communism and anarchy, took the forefront of all intellectual thought, throughout the world.
As a result, beauty took a side-line. It became passé. Great thinkers and philosophers became engrossed in existential questions related to mankind and our future. Were we truly good or evil? Moral or immoral? Altruistic or selfish? Redeemable? Salvageable? Or doomed to destroy ourselves? Was it best to leave people to their own devices or to shepherd them through institutional entities, to make them more ethical and productive? Should people be reliant on the state or self-reliant? These are questions we still wrestle with today and our art reflects this, as it should.
But, in this quest for self-knowledge and contemplation, several myths arose regarding beauty that still haunt us today, not just in galleries and museums, but in our everyday lives, especially right here in America. And, having lived outside the US for a number of years, I can attest to the veracity and effects of these legitimate complaints.
Not that there wasn't reason to look beyond beauty. Theodor Adorno wrote, "To write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric." And it's true, after any great horror or tragedy, you can't simply act as if it never happened, and keep composing love lyrics or painting spring flowers. And, it's certainly true that, "Those who don't learn from history are destined to repeat it." But, it's equally true that after some time has passed, you have to go back to composing love lyrics and painting flowers and dog portraits, and sunny hills, and fashioning wire jewelry, because we need it to survive. Life can't be simply about punishment, there has to be something aspirational to give us hope and bring joy to our lives. People need and deserve this, and in fact, can't live without it. Having said that, let's review some myths.
Myth #1 Beauty Is a Contest
No, it is not. One can make contests out of beauty, just as one can make contests from anything, but it's a silly enterprise––the kind of spectacle that we see on TV again and again because it makes a splash and sells products. The purpose and role of beauty in our lives is to give us joy and satisfaction. Whether it's the smile of a favorite pet, the look of a perfect dress, or a beautiful arrangement at the dinner table, it needn't be pricey, nor elegant. It just needs to feel right––to give us a sense of home, a place we can love. And, so long as you have that feeling, who cares if there's some greater beauty elsewhere in the world? A prettier set of dinner plates? A nicer wristwatch? A fancier car? A lovelier house? Who cares? There always is and always will be, and we know this. But, so long as you love your own little place in the world, and you feel loved, that's all that matters and all that should matter on the subject of beauty.
Furthermore, the notion of contesting beauty is detrimental in that it raises the notion that one sort of beauty can always outshine another, when in fact, it's the variety of beautiful forms that makes the topic so exciting. Imagine, for a moment, if the world came to a consensus on the prettiest flower, and from then on, it would be the only flower in every garden in the world.
All the rest could be plucked and cast into the trash. What a terrible mistake that would be! How boring! So, beauty should be about celebrating diversity, not pushing everything and everyone into one little box, regardless of how it fits. And, it's unfortunate how often our society does this, creating unreal standards and proportions of beauty. This short video shows how photographers manipulate photos to create this unreal standard:
Imagine if we treated anything else this way: photos of flowers, animals, houses, the ocean, a sunset. So, why do we do it to ourselves?
Myth #2 Beauty is Shallow, Superficial - It's Only Skin Deep
This is another popular misconception. The reality is this––beauty is not shallow, people are shallow, and shallow people develop shallow attitudes about beauty. And, because there are so many of them, the influence they hold is inordinate to its value. I once saw a news article on Dr. Stephen R. Marquardt, a plastic surgeon who designed a template, his "Golden Decagon" (based on the golden ratio), for measuring the beauty of a woman's face:
To fit Dr. Marquardt's definition of beauty, her face needs to fit into this pattern, which is a composite of various "beauties" throughout history, from around the world. Dr. Marquardt states, "Even a face that is considered somewhat plain will have a significant correlation with the mask. The difference between a plain face and a beautiful face is just a matter of a few millimeters in different areas—nothing as extraordinarily drastic as one might expect."
Now, I will give Dr. Marquardt credit for his work as a surgeon, where he helped many patients suffering from severe birth defects and physical facial traumas. He helped women who were born with no chin, or who had fallen into the rotor of a motorboat, and so he was faced with the terrifying challenge of helping these women look normal again. So, this mask was crucial to his job, and I thank him for that.
But, I'm sure he would agree in saying, this is not the template for a beautiful woman, merely a beautiful face, and a woman is much more than a pretty face. Not only is variety pleasing, as much in a face as with flowers, buildings, trees, animals, etc. But, people are much more than their exterior appearance. The character Villanelle in Killing Eve has a lovely face, and enjoys killing people––anyone and everyone, for no reason, just to watch them die. So, to rate a person's beauty is to rate their actions. Does this person make the world a better place? Do they bring joy to others? Are they reliable and dependable? Are they patient and resilient? These questions are far more accurate and pertinent in ascertaining beauty than Dr. Marquardt's template will ever be. And, we know this, intuitively, when we see a great portrait, we see the person's beauty, regardless of age or wrinkles or a funny nose:
Comedian Tom Papa explains it in his book You're Doing Great! And Other Reasons to Stay Alive, "Whenever you look at yourself in the mirror and you are horrified with how ugly you are, just remember that you’re not alone We are all funny-looking. Every single, misshapen, twisted, warped, crooked, spectacularly irregular one of us. . . . Even the people we see on the covers of magazines, who seem to have a perfect face, are funny-looking. Not at the newsstand all airbrushed and smiley, but at home with the makeup off, they look just like you and me; like monkeys trying their best to evolve. . . . So embrace your flaws. All of you. The girl with the ski-slope nose. The man with the pineapple head and beady eyes. And you with the fish lips. Own it. Enjoy it. You’re beautiful."
So then, what is beauty? Well, as I discuss in this lesson (Defining Beauty), it is a quality reflected in people and things that show positive, virtuous qualities, such as wisdom, skill, craft, and most important of all, love. Everything that we find beautiful in the world, everything we cherish, protect, and respect is a labor of love. All the endangered animals that we keep roaming free in nature preserves, we do it out of love. All the museums and libraries where we store knowledge and artifacts are a labor of love. Every time you exercise, it's a labor of love, to keep yourself healthy.
It's too bad more people don't see it this way, because when you see beauty as only the exterior, not the interior or soul of a person, place, or thing, then the pursuit of beauty fades to mere vanity - a quest for the perfect clothing and cosmetics, perhaps a few bouts of plastic surgery. But, nothing more.
Why Beauty Matters: What it Provides
To live in a world without beauty then, is to live in a world unloved, uncared for, and far too many people live in such a world. Author James Kunstler addresses this in a great TED Talk:
Mr. Kunstler explains the differences between American architecture and urban design versus that of other nations and cultures, and how this divide hurts the character of American towns and homes. He explains two major problems:
1. The majority of buildings we make in the US are ugly. Not our greatest buildings, like churches and museums, but the everyday buildings we take for granted, like Walmart, the cookie-cutter homes we live in, etc. Too much of our everyday life is centered on buildings where beauty and design were an afterthought.
2. There's little to no planning for a greater architectural environment between structures and landowners, from one place to the next. There's no synthesis. As Mr. Kunstler says in his talk, "You can't see the ____ from the _____ because of the curvature of the Earth."
America, as a relatively young nation, was developed and planned, to a great extent, after the invention of the automobile. America also felt pressure to expand and cover great lengths of land quickly, before any other colonial power could take it. The resulting differences from American to European towns is startling. I spent 15 years living in a modest town in Slovakia, named Spišská Nová Ves, a town with about 40,000 residents. It takes me about 35 minutes to walk from one end of town to the other. Compare this to my parents who live in Hot Springs, Arkansas, which also has about 40,000 residents. It takes me 35 minutes to drive from one end of town to the other. And, while Hot Springs has a downtown area, it uses only a tiny portion of the town's overall area. Most residents don't go there. They do their shopping in malls and supermarkets (and now those are all failing as people shop online). There's nothing practical to bring them downtown. Instead it's filled with touristy places like a mafia museum, a row of old, closed bath houses, souvenir stores - each on the precipice of bankruptcy. In fact, before our hometown "hero" Bill Clinton became president in 1992, almost all of downtown Hot Springs was boarded up - I remember it as a child. Now that the major shopping areas are failing, there's a faint post-apocalyptic air to the whole town, like the end has already come.
Consider the difference this makes on one's psyche. In Slovakia, every time I went outside I would see people I knew, friends and neighbors. We would stop and chit-chat. It wasn't so isolating. To get to the center of town (filled with restaurants and outdoor cafes, and parks and people) I would usually see 5-10 friends or students, someone I could wave to. In America it's different. Everyone drives, which is stressful, because when you drive every other car becomes an adversary and potential threat. You go out to the store, you drive home, and you might not talk to a single person. And because we grow up in it, we think it's normal, when it doesn't have to be. Not everywhere is like this in the US. I really enjoy the suburb I live in now, and I appreciate getting to meet and talk with my new neighbors. And I love that I have real nature around my neighborhood, not just "nature bandaids". But, the second I drive out of my little oasis there are the same strip malls and parking lots here as anywhere else in the country. There's no town center, even. No main street. Nothing to give my town a real sense of character or identity.
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