Lesson I

How art can meet some human needs?

➢Beauty
➢Happiness and Hope
➢Identifying and understanding oneself
➢Grief and healing
➢Remembering and mark-making
➢Raising awareness
➢Culture and togetherness
Now the question is…

What is Art and

Humanities?
Humanities: Its Meaning, Importance and Scope

“Humus” - ground

“Humanus” - human
- cultured
- refined
 “artis”

❑human creative skills (e.g., artisans)

❑Importance: It is indeed important in our lives.
❑Art, like love, is not easy to define.
❑It is an activity that provides the beauty and pleasure. It
is also made from one’s skill as well as one’s feelings and
emotions.
 Though we have different, notions of beauty, still beauty is the
common denominator when we are talking about appreciating forms of art.
There are 2 ways of considering beauty

vs
Relative Absolute

“beauty is in the “beauty is in the

eye of the thing itself”
beholder”
 Relative beauty

Consideration of beauty is subjective and depends on the person

looking at the thing. In this way, it is said that “beauty is in the eye
of the beholder”
 Absolute beauty

It considers the view that a thing is beautiful by virtue of itself.

Beauty is objective and resides in the thing regardless of the people
looking at it.
Absolute beauty
How art can meet some human needs?
 Happiness and Hope
There is something about art that mirrors the soul
of those willing to confront it. In a societal tone,
artworks tend to echo the hopes and anxieties of an
age. There is a wide range of properties of art why it
gives a sense of joy and hope to its audience. These are
examples:
 Happiness and Hope
❑When paintings are placed in a daunting
environment such as hospitals;

❑The experience and process of creating art itself;

❑And identifying oneself with the properties of an

artwork: an homage to something; works
addressing diaspora, displacement, and other
social issues.
Happiness and Hope
 Identifying and Understanding the self
❑A lot of social issues evidently reflect this struggle for
identity: gender issues, disconnectedness brought on
by social media, regionalism, and even mental health
issues. Art can serve as a powerful tool to help us
communicate and relay our confusion. Even
psychological interventions use art as therapy to aid
in processing some sensitive experiences.
Identifying and understanding the self
 Grief and Healing
❑ Throughout the years, artists have interpreted these shared
human experiences in different ways, which also help us process our
grief. Some may use art as a tool to express pain and process it in
therapy. Nonetheless, it plays an important role in making grieving
somehow dignified.
Grief and Healing
 Remembering and Mark-making
❑ The monument of Rizal in Luneta
Park is one example of a type of art
that helps us remember. Without
the tangible characteristic of art,
we will not be able to sustain our
nationalistic values well enough.
Remembering and Mark-making
Remembering and Mark-making
 Raising Awareness
❑In the Philippines, many socially-concerned artists
have emerged in the age of modernism portraying
politicians and the governments system in their most
hateful actions.
Raising Awareness
 Culture and Togetherness

❑Lastly, forms of art are often localized so that they bring identity
also to certain regions. This is very evident here in the Philippines,
which is geographically separated by thousands of islands – we are
very regionalized.
Culture and Togetherness
 Art has the power to transform, to
illuminate, to educate, to inspire and to
motivate