Is my/your art relevant? I have come across this question a fair number of times. I think there is a general consensus that art is relevant to in the human context, but often the question is raised as an issue in an artist application for inclusion in a show, sometimes it is an individual artist trying to find an answer. And here is what I have arrived at while pondering that question for myself.
I know that I make my art as a response to, commentary on, reflection of what is happening in my life, what I see around me, how I react to it. I know also that I am influenced in all this by my very personal cultural, familial, experiential history, and what I express in my art is inextricably tied to all that. So for me, of course my art is relevant, and I have accepted that because my art is highly personal, its relevance may not be easily recognized by a public who does not share a my experiences. I find that just as my personal background influences the production of my art, so the viewers’ experiences, self-perception and identification influence whether and how my art speaks to them, and if they find any relevance in it for themselves.
I am not intent on specifying what exactly I am trying to express with my piece of art, there are layers of meaning and often multiple ideas involved at the core of a piece. This will always be relevant to me, but I don’t feel it overrides the importance of the viewers’ interpretation of the piece, and how it speaks to them. Some of the best conversations I have had with people have been those, when a viewer was able to tell me how a piece of mine related to their experience, and what they saw in it, which at times came as a totally unexpected and validating surprise to me, and created a connection with a stranger, fleeting as it may have been.
“Relevance” is often used in a commercialized sense, finding what is trendy and trending, gauging how to best respond to that in the interest of maximization of profit. It is certainly one way to measure “success”, but in my view it will leave you always chasing after something, and maybe lead to losing your Self in the process.
