Why do we study humanities?

Having learned more about the myths and stories of Western civilization, I am
understanding more how study of the humanities (art, history, and literature) can
be used to help people better understand and communicate with one another. It is
obvious that the study of humanities is not just a college course, but it is an ongoing
process and practice in life.

The humanities can first be used to understand the past which has created the
present. The culture which we have was shaped by the past. Facts, findings, and
literature of even thousands of years ago have influenced our world today. Knowing
this past can allow people to understand our present; knowing how we came to this
present helps us to communicate about it and the future.

The study of the humanities can also be used to realize differing interpretations of
life and history. Studying facts of the past helps to understand literature of the past.
Art reflects the cultures of the past, and shows how we achieved what we have
today. For example, the Song of Roland was very biased about the Saracens
(Muslims). If one only studied literature, they would have a totally skewed
interpretation of who the Muslims were. By studying history though, we know that
the battle in this literature wasn't even against Muslims. Also by studying history
and religion we can see how Islam developed and what it really is. This is just one
example of how the comprehensive study of the humanities can be used to
understand the world, and to communicate fairly and intelligently with others in the
world.

The humanities are not just part of the college's curriculum. The study of the
humanities teaches one how to study and look at how the past developed and how it
has impacted today's world. The humanities allow people of different cultures to
communicate and understand their sometimes common pasts but present
differences. The humanities show how different disciplines affect and complement
one another. Finally, the study of the humanities shows that this study is ongoing
and continual, constantly evolving and shaping.

Art history might seem like a relatively straightforward concept: “art” and
“history” are subjects most of us first studied in elementary school. In
practice, however, the idea of “the history of art” raises complex
questions. What exactly do we mean by art, and what kind of history (or
histories) should we explore? Let’s consider each term further.

Peter Paul Rubens, three paintings from the 24-picture cycle Rubens
painted for the Medici Gallery in the Luxembourg Palace, Paris (today in
the Musée du Louvre, Paris), 1621-25, oil on canvas. From left to right:
The Presentation of the Portrait of Marie de’ Medici, The Wedding by
Proxy of Marie de’ Medici to King Henry IV, Arrival (or Disembarkation)
 of Marie de Medici at Marseilles (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA
2.0)
Peter Paul Rubens, three paintings from the 24-picture cycle Rubens painted for the Medici Gallery in the
Luxembourg Palace, Paris (today in the Musée du Louvre, Paris), 1621-25, oil on canvas. From left to right: The
Presentation of the Portrait of Marie de’ Medici, The Wedding by Proxy of Marie de’ Medici to King Henry IV,
Arrival (or Disembarkation) of Marie de Medici at Marseilles (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Art versus artifact

The word “art” is derived from the Latin ars, which originally meant
“skill” or “craft.” These meanings are still primary in other English words
derived from ars, such as “artifact” (a thing made by human skill) and
“artisan” (a person skilled at making things). The meanings of “art” and
“artist,” however, are not so straightforward. We understand art as
involving more than just skilled craftsmanship. What exactly distinguishes
a work of art from an artifact, or an artist from an artisan?

When asked this question, students typically come up with several ideas.
One is beauty. Much art is visually striking, and in the 18th, 19th and early
20th centuries, the analysis of aesthetic qualities was indeed central in art
history. During this time, art that imitated ancient Greek and Roman art
(the art of classical antiquity), was considered to embody a timeless
perfection. Art historians focused on the so-called fine arts—painting,
sculpture, and architecture—analyzing the virtues of their forms. Over the
past century and a half, however, both art and art history have evolved
radically.

Left: Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, The Spring, begun 1820, oil on

canvas, 800 x 1630 cm (Musée d’Orsay, Paris); right: Lucian Freud,
Standing by the Rags, 1988-89, oil on canvas, 168.9 x 138.4 cm (Tate
Britain, London)
Left: Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, The Spring, begun 1820, oil on canvas, 800 x 1630 cm (Musée d’Orsay,
Paris); right: Lucian Freud, Standing by the Rags, 1988-89, oil on canvas, 168.9 x 138.4 cm (Tate Britain, London)

Artists turned away from the classical tradition, embracing new media and
aesthetic ideals, and art historians shifted their focus from the analysis of
art’s formal beauty to interpretation of its cultural meaning. Today we
understand beauty as subjective—a cultural construct that varies across
time and space. While most art continues to be primarily visual, and visual
analysis is still a fundamental tool used by art historians, beauty itself is no
longer considered an essential attribute of art.

A second common answer to the question of what distinguishes art

emphasizes originality, creativity, and imagination. This reflects a modern
understanding of art as a manifestation of the ingenuity of the artist. This
idea, however, originated five hundred years ago in Renaissance Europe,
and is not directly applicable to many of the works studied by art
historians. For example, in the case of ancient Egyptian art or Byzantine
icons, the preservation of tradition was more valued than innovation.
While the idea of ingenuity is certainly important in the history of art, it is
not a universal attribute of the works studied by art historians.

All this might lead one to conclude that definitions of art, like those of
beauty, are subjective and unstable. One solution to this dilemma is to
propose that art is distinguished primarily by its visual agency, that is, by
its ability to captivate viewers. Artifacts may be interesting, but art, I
suggest, has the potential to move us—emotionally, intellectually, or
otherwise. It may do this through its visual characteristics (scale,
composition, color, etc.), expression of ideas, craftsmanship, ingenuity,
rarity, or some combination of these or other qualities. How art engages
varies, but in some manner, art takes us beyond the everyday and ordinary
experience. The greatest examples attest to the extremes of human
ambition, skill, imagination, perception, and feeling. As such, art prompts
us to reflect on fundamental aspects of what it is to be human. Any
artifact, as a product of human skill, might provide insight into the human
condition. But art, in moving beyond the commonplace, has the potential
to do so in more profound ways. Art, then, is perhaps best understood as a
special class of artifact, exceptional in its ability to make us think and feel
through visual experience.
 Coatlicue, c. 1500, Mexica (Aztec), found on the SE edge of the Plaza
Mayor/Zocalo in Mexico City, basalt, 257 cm high (National Museum of
Anthropology, Mexico City) (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Coatlicue, c. 1500, Mexica (Aztec), found on the SE edge of the Plaza Mayor/Zocalo in Mexico City, basalt, 257 cm
high (National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City) (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
History: Making Sense of the Past
Like definitions of art and beauty, ideas about history have changed over
time. It might seem that writing history should be straightforward—it’s all
based on facts, isn’t it? In theory, yes, but the evidence surviving from the
past is vast, fragmentary, and messy. Historians must make decisions
about what to include and exclude, how to organize the material, and what
to say about it. In doing so, they create narratives that explain the past in
ways that make sense in the present. Inevitably, as the present changes,
these narratives are updated, rewritten, or discarded altogether and
replaced with new ones. All history, then, is subjective—as much a
product of the time and place it was written as of the evidence from the
past that it interprets.

The discipline of art history developed in Europe during the colonial

period (roughly the 15th to the mid-20th century). Early art historians
emphasized the European tradition, celebrating its Greek and Roman
origins and the ideals of academic art. By the mid-20th century, a standard
narrative for “Western art” was established that traced its development
from the prehistoric, ancient, and medieval Mediterranean to modern
Europe and the United States. Art from the rest of the world, labeled “non-
Western art,” was typically treated only marginally and from a colonialist
perspective.

The immense sociocultural changes that took place in the 20th century led
art historians to amend these narratives. Accounts of Western art that once
featured only white males were revised to include artists of color and
women. The traditional focus on painting, sculpture, and architecture was
expanded to include so-called minor arts such as ceramics and textiles and
contemporary media such as video and performance art. Interest in non-
Western art increased, accelerating dramatically in recent years.
Queen Mother Pendant Mask (Iyoba), 16th century, Edo peoples, Court of
Benin, Nigeria, ivory, iron, copper, 23.8 x 12.7 x 8.3 cm (The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-
NC-SA 2.0)
Queen Mother Pendant Mask (Iyoba), 16th century, Edo peoples, Court of Benin, Nigeria, ivory, iron, copper, 23.8 x
12.7 x 8.3 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Today, the biggest social development facing art history is globalism. As

our world becomes increasingly interconnected, familiarity with different
cultures and facility with diversity are essential. Art history, as the story of
exceptional artifacts from a broad range of cultures, has a role to play in
developing these skills. Now art historians ponder and debate how to
reconcile the discipline’s European intellectual origins and its problematic
colonialist legacy with contemporary multiculturalism and how to write
art history in a global era.

Smarthistory’s videos and articles reflect this history of art history. Since
the site was originally created to support a course in Western art and
history, the content initially focused on the most celebrated works of the
Western canon. With the key periods and civilizations of this tradition
now well-represented and a growing number of scholars contributing, the
range of objects and topics has increased in recent years. Most
importantly, substantial coverage of world traditions outside the West has
been added. As the site continues to expand, the works and perspectives
presented will evolve instep with contemporary trends in art history. In
fact, as innovators in the use of digital media and the internet to create,
disseminate, and interrogate art historical knowledge, Smarthistory and its
users have the potential to help shape the future of the discipline.
ART APPRECIATION
This course is an exploration of visual art forms and their cultural
connections for the student with little experience in the visual arts. It
includes a brief study of art history and in depth studies of the
elements, media, and methods used in creative processes and
thought. In this course, students will learn how to develop a five-step
system for understanding visual art in all forms based on:
1. Description: Explaining a work of art from an objective point of
view, its physical attributes, and formal construction.
2. Analysis: A detailed look at a work of art that combines physical
attributes with subjective statements based on the viewer’s
reaction to the work.
3. Context: Any historical, religious, or environmental information
that surrounds a particular work of art and which helps to
understand the work’s meaning.
4. Meaning: A statement of the work’s content. A message or
narrative expressed by the subject matter.
5. Judgment: A critical point of view about a work of art concerning
its aesthetic or cultural value.
After completing this course, students will be able to interpret works
of art based on this five-step system of analysis; explain the
processes involved in artistic production, themes, and the political,
social, cultural, and aesthetic issues that artists examine in their work;
and explain the role and effect of the visual arts in societies, history,
and other world cultures.
COURSE LEVEL OBJECTIVES

 Interpret examples of visual art using a five step critical process:description,

analysis, context, meaning and judgment.
 Identify and describe the elements and principles of art.
 Utilize analytical skills to connect formal attributes of art with their meaning and
expression.
 Explain in writing the role and effect of the visual arts in societies, history, and
other world cultures.
 Articulate in writing the themes and issues that artists examine in their work.
 Identify the processes and materials involved in art production.
 Utilize information to locate, evaluate, effectively use and communicate information
about visual art in its various forms.
 Communicate effectively with others to understand and appreciate the variety of
responses art provokes.

COURSE DESIGNER
 Faculty at Cascadia Community College
Christopher Gildow received his MFA from Tufts University and the
School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Now a full time tenure track faculty member at Cascadia Community
College, his previous work experience includes the University of
Washington, Bothell and community colleges throughout the region,
including Everett, Skagit Valley and North Seattle.
Chris is active in curriculum development, including a Gates
Foundation / Washington State Grant to create an Open Course
Library digital textbook for the "Introduction to Art" course. He
received the Excellence in Teaching Award in 2012 from the National
Society of Leadership and Success.
His studio work includes painting, printmaking, photography and
sculpture.
Why do people make Art? People around the world make art to: • seek personal enjoyment and satisfaction. • express
personal thoughts and feelings • communicate with others. • create a more favorable environment. • make others see
more clearly. • provide us with new visual experiences. • record a time, place, person, or object. • commemorate
important people or events. • reinforce cultural ties and traditions. • seek to affect social change. • tell stories. • heal
the sick. • adorn themselves. • explain the unknown. • worship. • create an illusion or magic. • predict the future or
remember the past. • earn a livelihood. • do something no one else can (or has yet done). • amuse themselves (or make
us laugh). • make the ordinary extraordinary. • increase our global understanding. Try This: Display examples of art from
various cultures and time periods in the classroom. Ask students to speculate on the possible reasons why the art was
made.
Why Do Humans Make
Art?
Humans are the only species that make art. Where
did this come from?
Posted Sep 05, 2017

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One area of the human experience that seems not to have

parallels out in nature is the arts. It is difficult to conceive of a
pigeon Picasso or a baboon Botticelli. Indeed, only a few
animal species have even the faintest hints of the beginning
of culture. Without culture, there really can’t be art, as we
know it, because art cannot exist separate from culture. Art
reflects culture, transmits culture, shapes culture, and
comments on culture. There is just no way that animals can
possibly experience art as we do.

And there is the rub. Of course they don’t experience art as

we do because they don’t experience anything as we do.
And we don’t experience anything as another animal does
either. But if we really think about what art is and how it first
began in humans, we might indeed see budding artists
among our animal friends.

Source: noonexy/Pixabay

Art is about beauty

If we divorce art from its cultural implications, we can agree

that art is very often all to do with the expression of beauty.
Throughout history, much artwork was made for no other
explicit purpose than the production of beauty. Artwork is to
be beheld and admired. It is breathtaking and can even
make us emotional. It is this beauty that I draw the first
connection between nature and art. Nature and art are both
beautiful, no matter how you define beauty. They both can
dazzle us and hold us breathless. They can inspire us and
make us feel connected to something. They both can strike
an emotional nerve that leaves an impact on us that is not
soon forgotten. Perhaps this connection between art and
emotion reveals something about the origin of art.

First, let’s consider a specific subset of the beauty we find in

the natural world: beautiful animals. From the unmatched
colors of a tropical macaw, to the flowing mane of an African
lion, to the striking features of a mandarinfish, animals are
beautiful. But never was the saying, “beauty is in the eye of
the holder” more true than in the animal world. The bright
and flashy colors that we see in many animals have evolved
to be conspicuous, to help the animal “stick out.” The most
spectacularly beautiful animals are so decorated in order to
get the attraction, respect, or fear of other animals. In all
cases, the utility of the beauty is found in the reaction it gets
from the observer. Can’t the exact same thing be said of
human art?
Source: ToastyKen/WikiCommons

Although it’s not all about sex, much of animal beauty is

indeed about impressing potential mates. To date, scientists
have found no other reason that peacocks have those
beautiful and intricate tails except that peahens seem to dig
them. These tails are not a small decorative adornment,
either. The peacock tail is more than 60% of its body length.
When they try to walk, let alone fly, with those obnoxious
monstrosities, it is a pitiful sight indeed.

Nevertheless, peahens are deeply attracted to this tail, and

peafowl are not the only species with a strategy like this.
Beginning in the simplest of invertebrates, colorful and
striking ornamentation has been used to attract mates. I
could give a long list of beautifully colored animals whose
intricate visual patterns are designed for no other purpose
than attraction of a mate, but I don’t think it’s necessary.

Art and beauty evoke an emotional response

This beauty-as-sexy phenomenon has a deep biological
parallel with human art because it is the connection of a
visual stimulus with an inner emotional state. In the case of
an attractive animal, the external physical beauty is
transformed into a desire, a behavioral impulse in the brain of
the observer. When peahens behold a beautiful peacock,
they are “moved” by it, in the sense that it affects their
current mental state. We know this because it affects their
behavior and we assume that behaviors spring from mental
states. This is exactly what the fine arts are all about in
humans: they employ a visual stimulus to affect the mental
or emotional state of the viewers.

Source: Maurizio Pesce/WikiCommons

Art induces recall of past events or emotions

Admittedly, art and beauty in humans is more than just sex

appeal. The effectiveness of art depends on some basic
assumptions about the knowledge and experience that is
common between the artist and the audience. Andy Warhol’s
Campbell’s Soup Cans will probably have very little impact
on the bushmen of eastern Africa. Art capitalizes on specific
stored memories and associations in the brain of the
observer. Here, we have the second clue to the origin of art
in humans: visual recall of past events and emotions.

ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER ADVERTISEMENT

As human brains became more sophisticated over the last

million years, we became capable of storing extensive
details as memories, a skill that came in handy as our
behaviors became more detailed. The hunting and gathering
way of life common to all of the various hominid species
required extensive visual memory. How else could they have
accomplished organized group hunting, fashioning of simple
tools, and the deciphering of the migratory patterns of big
game on the African savannah? These complicated skills
require the comparison of current visual cues with past
experience in a computational and predictive way. Pattern
recognition is what we are talking about here.

Source: Enric/WikiCommons
Further still, the ability to make and use tools, a skill that
began in apes and exploded in hominids, requires a great
deal of visual and tactile memory. As fully modern Homo
sapiens began making tools that were more and more
sophisticated, we suddenly found ourselves with the ability to
depict our memories using primitive painting implements.
With our newfound cognitiveabilities, our impressive memory-
recall, and eventually tools, it is not at all surprising that the
first art produced by our ancestors depicted the very subject
that probably spawned all of our cognitive abilities in the first
place: the hunt.

Cave paintings are the earliest artifacts that anthropologists

and art historians agree are truly art, but I find it hard to
believe that they didn’t also facilitate functions in the
communities in which they were created. We could
speculate all day about what those functions could have
been, but I think the point is that the benefits of being able to
create a visual representation was immediately recognized. I
also seriously doubt that the cave paintings were the first
such attempts at visual representations. They were just the
first that ended up surviving through the eons.

ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER ADVERTISEMENT

Art aids in communication and education

Source: dave parker/Flickr

As language was developing in Homo sapiens during the

great leap forward, humans began teaching each other
about the tools they’d made, the food they found, and the
skills they had perfected. This was the beginning of the
concept of education. I can’t imagine that the education of
the paleolothic era didn’t also make use of visual aids, like
education does today. Whether they were just crude
drawings made by dragging sticks in the dirt, or more
elaborate representation on stone “canvases,” I am sure that
drawings accompanied spoken language (or gestures) right
from the beginning. Once again, the key feature was the
ability to use visual representations to induce memory recall
or visual understanding. By drawing something, an early
human could make another human remember something.

Various forms of drawing, painting, and other visual

depictions almost certainly facilitated communication and
education among early humans. That much seems rather
obvious. In addition, it seems likely that early humans also
used the new innovation of artistic depictions for various
efforts of problem-solving and calculation. As
cognition continued to develop, it began to grow into
consciousness and introspection as we think of them today.

The visual arts were probably right there with us along the
way, helping to provide a means to express the complex
thoughts that were beginning to materialize in our massive
brains. Indeed, appreciation and understanding of art seems
to be among the highest-order functions of the human brain.

ARTICLE CONTINUES AFTER ADVERTISEMENT

For these reasons, I tend to believe that artistic expression

and reactions to art evolved hand-in-hand with higher
cognitive functions in early humans. It is natural that the new
richness of our inner experience would also manifest in
creative outward expression. In turn, the communication of
that inner experience through art would find receptive
observers and the phenomenon of art then became
ingrained culturally.

I also fully expect that artistic talent would have eventually

been transferred from our culture to our genes. After all,
during a million or two years of natural selection, artistic
ability was likely to confer some advantage on those that had
it. This advantage could have come in the form of increased
social standing as a leader in the hunt, a prolific teacher of
skills, and so on. Any special place in the social structure
means greater odds of reproductive success. In this way, I
suspect, humanity evolved into a species of artists and art
enthusiasts.

Do other animals make art?

Once humanity developed a tendency to produce artistic

renderings, there was plenty of biological space for it to
flourish and reasons why it would be favored, but how might
it have emerged in the first place? Surely the behavior of art
production cannot be traced to a singular mutation. What
precursors might have existed that allowed art to emerge?
Are there any examples of animals making something we
would consider artful?

There is an Indian artist named Siri, whose drawings

currently go for hundreds or thousands of dollars. She has
been written about extensively and featured in publications
from Harper’s Weekly to the Los Angeles Times. Her work
ranges from abstract to highly representational art including
landscapes and self-portraits. Of course, she trained for
many years to develop this skill, but she can now complete a
painting in mere minutes. Siri is a fifty year old Asian
Elephant.
Source: liquidkingdom/Flickr

Siri is not alone. Scores of elephants have been taught to

paint. The art that these elephants produce by holding a
brush in their trunks is truly impressive. It’s certainly better
than anything I could produce. What these elephants are
really doing, in terms of producing art or simply repeating a
trained task, is the subject of heated debate. I don’t intend to
wade into those murky waters. Rather, I mention painting
elephants here only to indicate that the technical skill set
necessary to produce art is certainly not unique to humans.
These trained painting elephants can take a visual stimulus,
even one that is new to them, and recreate it through artistic
techniques that they have learned. They appreciate color,
perspective, and proportion, at least in the basic sense. I’m
not saying that these elephants are Cézanne, but they’re
better than Nathan H. Lents, that’s for sure.

In species closer to us, orangutans, chimpanzees, and

gorillas have all been taught to draw and paint. Like the
elephants, some of them are quite good at it. Unlike the
elephants, there is little debate that these primates seem to
actually enjoy making the art and will do it spontaneously,
without reward, and for its own sake. They sometimes make
art that they become quite attached to and never actively
show to anyone else.

Once again, I don’t want to get into a discussion of what this

art creation really says about chimpanzee consciousness,
although that is interesting to me. My point here is simply
that these great apes all have the physical ability to create
visual representations, they enjoy doing so, and the art that
they produce seems to mean something to them. All of those
abilities and features were obviously present in early
humans and their ancestors as well.

So it was not really that big of a jump when early humans

looked up at the cave wall, dimly lit by a dying fire... and
saw a canvas.

Why is creativity important in everyday life? It is because it makes life

infinitely interesting and fulfilling. Creativity is a way of living life that
embraces originality and makes unique connections between
seemingly disparate ideas. Creativity is about living life as a journey
into seeing and communicating the extra-ordinariness of the simplest,
most every day acts.
 Teacher and student

We often think about creativity as making something, but in fact the

root meaning of the word means ‘to grow’. When we are creative we
feel as if the world and all that is in it is vibrantly alive. Creativity’s by-
products are some of the major achievements of civilization–from the
invention of the wheel to Mozart’s sonatas.

Perspective – drawing and painting

Human beings are essentially born creative–from infancy on we find

innovative ways to negotiate life. The most creative people find ways
around obstacles because they see them not just as roadblocks but
also as opportunities. Creativity expands our perceptions and along
with expanded perceptions come new ways of problem solving–from
making an exquisite meal when you don’t know how to cook to
painting an extraordinary landscape when you are living in a freezing
attic and can’t afford a full box of paints.
1. You have an authority problem.
Creative types don’t always get along well with management because they would rather march to the
beat of their own drum.

2. You have a hard time relating with people.

Most people have a strong desire to fit in, something that you don’t understand. Conformity is gross.
3. You like to solve problems.
While most people are running and hiding from problems, you purposely seek them because you love
nothing more than a fresh new challenge.

4. You are your own worst critic.

You wrote a blog many months ago and thought it was wonderful at the time you published it. But
then you read it again later and wonder, “What the hell was I thinking?” You then identify
approximately a thousand ways it could have been better and kick yourself for being so stupid.

Note: Coincidentally, this is why I REFUSE to read my own old blogs and articles.

5. You ask lots of questions.

A stagnant mind devoid of curiosity doesn’t have the capacity to create.

6. You carry a notebook everywhere you go.

Because how else can you remember all those brilliant ideas that strike you on the fly?

7. You find beauty in the ordinary.

Creatives live in the present and are in constant awe of the world around them.

8. You are numb to rejection.

Let’s face it: it’s a hard world out there. If becoming a writer or actor or artist was easy, a lot more
people would do it. Getting that dreaded rejection letter stinks at first, but eventually you become able
to just shrug it off and go on to the next one.

9. You understand the power of atmosphere.

There is a reason some authors travel to a rustic cabin or sandy beach to write their novels. Some
atmospheres are more conducive to creativity than others. Maybe you like to pack up your laptop and
go to a coffee shop, downtown bench, or under a tree at the park. Whatever the case may be, you
know the locations that boost your creative juices.

10. You think most people have poor taste.

You might find the movies and music most people enjoy to be downright terrible. I don’t know about
you, but I believe a kitten dies every time someone listens to Nickelback.
11. You are a people-watcher.
Why do people watch TV when real life is infinitely more interesting?

12. You aren’t in it for the money.

Money pays bills but it doesn’t provide happiness. There are much easier ways to make a living. This
isn’t about money, it’s about passion.

13. You experience emotional highs and lows.

Your emotional life is not a straight line. Instead, it is more like the path of a roller-coaster full of dips,
drops, hills, loops, and twists. Sometimes you might experience an eruption of happiness and a crash
to sadness within mere moments of each other. The most painful parts usually find themselves in
your art.

14. You seek inspiration.

Inspiration doesn’t happen on its own. Whether it is the opening of an art gallery, a theatrical
production, or live music at a downtown bar, you search for inspiration wherever you can find it. It’s
nice to know you’re not alone in your desire to create.

15. You have an interesting sense of humor.

Off-color jokes are the best kind of jokes.

16. You evolve like a boss.

An ability to adapt to challenging scenarios is necessary for survival in the creative jungle.

17. You hate stereotypes.

You understand that human beings are way too complicated to be dumped into gender roles or
stereotypes.
18. You don’t have a filter.
Don’t you think life would be much more fun if everyone just said what they were thinking with no
filter? There is no such thing as TMI (Too Much Information).

19. You take time to think.

Your brain is your greatest asset.

20. You don’t bend to pressure.

Whether it’s a hater who thinks your work of art sucks, a family member who thinks “you should get a
real job,” or a friend who thinks your idea “will never work,” you don’t cave to outside pressure