The impact of "the concept" and art as therapy

While discussing everyone's weekly projects, we brought up the unspoken truth that the perceived amount of effort has an impact on how we feel about it, highlighted by the green door project. This began a discussion as to why this is the case (which was never fully answered) and what impact the artist's concept for his/her work has on its reception.

The effort thing is entirely cultural. The US, for better or worse, was based largely on Puritanical beliefs, and by God did the Puritans value a hard day's work. We are conditioned to expect to be "repaid" in equal measure for the amount of effort put into our work, so when we understand that someone put more work into a project than we thought initially, the Pavlovian response is to drool and then appreciate the creation more.

Much like the effort topic, the importance of "the concept" matters entirely on the quality of the final product. If you did not successfully execute on the concept, then it doesn't matter how cool it was or how much effort you put into it. The only works that are aided by knowing the concept or the effort put into are products that are "good enough" where the concept can be appreciated on some level without being told. An OK work is made better by knowing that the person hand-crafted it versus clicking two filters in Photoshop and calling it a day.

Something I wanted to talk about beyond what was discussed in class was the idea of Art as Therapy. I thought it was interesting that Sharayah used her project as a means to force herself to do something she doesn't enjoy. Looking back, my project was therapeutic as it forced me to notice things about myself and share them. I was kind of surprised that no one asked me why I was so unclear as to who I am really am. Of course, hypothetical hindsight is better than 20/20 and I'm somewhat appreciative for that as I'm not sure what I would have said in response.