In our lives, everyone can choose something special that is close to his or her heart. We are surrounded by several beautiful and attractive images. However, many questions come to mind regarding

Choice of Beauty

In our lives, everyone can choose something special that is close to his or her heart. We are surrounded by several beautiful and attractive images. However, many questions come to mind regarding how we view beauty: Can we really enjoy beauty? Do we need beauty and why do we need it? How can beauty satisfy our emotional and mental needs, and make us happy? Probably everyone tries to reach an absolute state of happiness. Beauty produces enjoyment, but only if this beauty fits in with our tastes and values. Everyone understands “good” and “bad” differently, but, even if the definition of beauty can be described differently, it is always connected with emotions that are inspired by that beauty. Contemporary society pays a lot of attention to the image. Although, often people do not realize that their definition of beauty is based on certain standards. Because of the popular opinion’s impact, individuals have begun to forget what real beauty is, especially in art. The current understanding of beauty and art is superficial: only what is generally accepted as good is considered beautiful. Modern art does not show negative emotions, by the reason that people do not really want to see something negative. What do we know about beauty, then? Are all of those objects really beautiful? Beauty has to be deep, real and thoughtful. Beauty can be reached by having an idea that evokes some emotions, by creating balance that leads to harmony, and by understanding how to make appropriate choices, which will help to achieve happiness.

Looking at this from the perspective of art history, it is possible to compare reality and imagination through a comparison of two great styles such as Impressionism and Expressionism. Impressing and expressing can be defined as two opposite actions. What is the Impressionism? According to Venturi, “What the Impressionist painters actually accomplished was the finding of form closer to the first impression of the appearance of things than other painters had” (38). The general purpose of Impressionism is based on catching a quick first look, performed from a subjective and individualistic view about an object. Impressionists didn’t fill their artwork with the specific symbols, nor did their art reflect any problems. They portrayed the external side of the object. The beauty of Impressionism was reached by harmonizing colors, which became the main idea of this style. No doubt, this period in history invested a lot of new theories of color into painting in general. Balance in Impressionism exists simply on the surface, in the interactions of the media, which makes this style able to create amazing emotions in our hearts. But what ideas would Impressionism convey if we would take all of these colors out of the artwork? Those images without color often will not be aesthetic anymore or will not evoke positive emotions in the viewer. Thus, the whole composition becomes useless (Figure 1).

How does the artistic world define expressionism? An Expressionist’s goals and ideas portray objective reality through their own emotions and understanding while trying to represent the real meaning of objects. Then, expressionism is filled with deep ideas and with specific problems of that time, even if its representation has controversial beauty. The mixing and connecting of colors, shapes, lines, and organization evokes in an audience not just fleeting feelings, but also moves them into deep thinking. Expressionists had a connection between the media that they used, but also balanced it with their ideas and artwork’s content by choosing an appropriate form of representation. These compositions are more thoughtful, although they are not framed in habitually normal boundaries. As an example of Expressionism, we can look at the artwork of Käthe Kollwitz (see Figure 2). Smith writes: “Juxtaposing working drawings and finished prints, as well as different states of the same print, it shows that Kollwitz was as sensitive to the nuance of technique and material as to social injustice. It enables the viewer to retrace and even second-guess Kollwitz's esthetic decisions, exploring what made her carefully worked-out compositions so formally powerful”. In her artworks, she expressed pain, sorrow and fear created by war, which is socially meaningful and significant. With that, her art was filled with ideas. A first look at these works generates disgust and negative feelings, but because they depict war, they are appropriate feelings. When an idea is balanced with its presentation, the viewer deeply perceives that idea, and this idea is considered pertinently.

Beauty is an external expression of internal content. Because the canvas itself has no content, but what is being portrayed does, then art is beautiful when its external image conveys the idea of the object’s internal content. In this way, beauty is equal to depth. Impressionism has harmony, but does not have depth and, therefore, its beauty is just superficial. Impressionism, in this case, looks attractive, but it is shallow. Expressionism can alienate the audience with its unusual, ugly, and somehow unique appearance, but it creates a deep sense that appeals much more significantly to nature. Expressionism takes the substance of the object and reflects that substance on the surface, which produces “deep beauty” and really affects our feelings. Therefore, deep beauty is something that generates not just the harmony of its external media such as lines, shapes, forms and colors, but also harmony of this interpretation and sense. Everything around us has to have a sense. Then beauty cannot be reached without balance of surface and substance. If a beautiful picture or image does not evoke particular emotions (regardless of whether these emotions are positive or negative) or does not include in itself some function, then this picture or image is useless.

Art does not have its own substance; rather, its object has substance. The human body is a canvas and the way that one expresses his or her human essence. Actual beauty in expression reflects inner values. In other words, a person is a whole composition, and his or her substance is an internal world. The surface is a canvas for the representation of this inner world. Here we again can touch on the concept of balance through constructing parallels between artworks and individuals. Seeing some image of person, people think that they are attracted to some specific part of this image that is part of their preferences. However, the mind catches a full balanced composition of this person. If that balance exists only on the surface, individuals no longer are attracted to this image, and try to find another one by their needs for emotional joy. These “compositions” are meaningless. Humans, as artworks and compositions, should have balance not only in external appearance, but also between the appearance and content of "idea", which is the personality. The outer balance of a person depends of his or her inner harmony and vice versa. It means that beauty is not what one looks like; instead, it is self-expression.

a) b)

Figure 1. a) Claude Monet, Water Lilies, 1906.b) Claude Monet, Houses of Parliament, 1904.

Figure 2. Käthe Kollwitz, Woman with Dead Child, 1903.

Beauty involves a harmony. The definition of harmony takes its roots in Ancient Greece. Translating from Greek, the word ἁρμονία (harmonía) means “joint”. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology in English Language determines harmony as being “the combination of simultaneously sounded musical notes to produce a pleasing effect”, which shows that balance cannot exist if there are less than two parts. These parts cannot exist separately. They must be balanced in their negative and positive aspects. Negative is not necessarily bad, and positive is not always good. Also, if one ignores the negative nature of the object, it leads to a defective view. Feelings, thoughts and actions cannot be divided into good or bad, just as a canvas cannot be divided from its idea or a body from its soul. Both of those worlds’ balance leads to emotional equilibrium, which gives some power, as it represents unity and wholeness. In addition, feelings are supported by logic and awareness of a work of art that produces the meaning of existence from this artwork or person. Balance of surface and substance creates a sense of real beauty. Thus, personality affects the beauty of one’s appearance. If the identity of the body is balanced, the person automatically and unconsciously is perceived by others as attractive. In this case, the world, as a single unit, cannot exist only in positive colors. By exiling the negative part, art hides the reality and creates a foggy imagination. By exiling the negative part, people became unable to compare ugliness and beauty, which makes them to forget the real definition of it. But if humans allow an existence of the negative part of nature, then they can soberly evaluate situations. It is impossible to escape from the negative aspects of life. More than that, showing these aspects of life, of reality, pushes people to change that negative aspects towards for the better.

Beauty leads to happiness. We need to feel happiness, but does feeling happiness equal having happiness? In comparing works of art to humans, man is an artist of himself. He can independently choose what suits him for his existence: clothes, behavior, interests, way of living, and other things. Otherwise, when a person chooses something that is just popular, it is not necessarily appropriate for his being, and he feels a temporarily sense of happiness. A simple perception of beauty is a social blindness, to some extent, in which humans cannot make choices, shape their lives or and support personal dignity. There is only feeling of temporary satisfaction until a certain standard has a place in society. It leads to disappointment in the end: people do not get real satisfaction at a deep level. Being dependent on social ideals is being imbalanced and, as a result, it is equal to being not beautiful. Choosing a popular opinion is not necessarily bad; it may be appropriate, but one should be aware of each choice. Then, following something with the understanding of cause and effect is not dangerous. Blindly following something without realizing it is dangerous. Acceptance of self and self-awareness provoke emotional satisfaction. But when one chooses the beauty that does not match his or her sense of self, it produces discomfort; discomfort develops into uncertainty, and uncertainty leads to stagnation.

It is not always easy to see true beauty, because the real meaning of beauty is hidden. Nevertheless, understanding this balance in art and projecting it on human beings has an important role in society as long as it is an understanding of interactions’ integrity: performance and theory, theory and composition, whole creation and environment, rational and impassioned natures. Therefore, choosing something that is not appropriate for oneself, by the reason of popularity, produces emotional and physical imbalance in humans. Actual beauty is one’s appropriate choice, and an understanding of real, deep, balanced, and meaningful beauty is a way to achieve happiness. Deep beauty includes and balances all aspects of life. Real beauty produces not just “fun”, but rather it specifically feeds one’s mind, fills one’s soul with itself, and, through that, mirrors itself on the surface. Choosing and balancing all of these parts appropriately leads to harmony, and, as a result, one’s happiness is real.

Works Cited

Smith, Roberta. "Review/Art; Social Consciousness in Prints by Kathe Kollwitz." The New York Times. The New York Times, 15 Oct. 1992. Web. 08 May 2014.

Venturi, Lionello. "The Aesthetic Idea of Impressionism." The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism (Spring, 1941): 34-45. JSTOR. Web. 05 Aug. 2014.

"Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon." Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, ἁρμονία. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 May 2014.

"Definition of Harmony in English:." Harmony: Definition of Harmony in Oxford Dictionary (British & World English). N.p., n.d. Web. 15 May 2014.

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