What Is Art, Really? A Thoughtful Musing on a Question Without a Final Answer.

Here’s a question that’s for years and years been echoed through galleries, in classrooms, sketchbooks and maybe been hotly debated around dinner tables: “What is art?”

The truth is, there’s no single answer. There never has been, and my feeling is that perhaps there never should be. Art, at its core, is personal. Deeply so. It moves differently through each of us, landing in unique places, stirring up memories, feelings, thoughts—sometimes comfort, sometimes discomfort.

Ask ten people what art means to them and you’ll likely receive ten beautifully unique answers. For some, it’s about craftsmanship. For others, it’s about emotion. For some, it’s rebellion. For others, peace. For some it’s about an abstract impression and others a realistic representation.

And then there’s the quiet truth: art doesn’t always need to mean something to be valuable. It might simply be a moment in time, captured with heart. A colour palette that feels like home. A brushstroke that reminds you to breathe.

So how do we measure something so immeasurable? Is realism more valid than abstraction? Is digital work as “real” as oil on canvas? These questions spark passionate debates, and they will for generations.

While it’s natural to have preferences—to be drawn to certain styles or stories—it’s also important to remember preference is not a measure of worth.

No one art form is more artistic than another. What one person might pass by with indifference, another may stand in front of, transfixed. That’s the magic of art: it is felt differently by every individual who encounters it.

Then comes the second question—one just as loaded: “Who is art for?”

Is it for the artist, or for the viewer? The answer might be… both. Or either. Or neither.

For the artist, art can be a sanctuary. A place to get lost in detail. A way to process emotion, to speak without words, to express something that otherwise might remain buried. There are times when the process is all that matters—when what ends up on the paper is simply a by-product of a deeper internal dialogue.

For the viewer, art can be an invitation. A moment of stillness. A spark of connection. Maybe the viewer is drawn to the composition, the palette, the story they see reflected back at them. Or maybe they’re not drawn to it at all—and that’s okay too. Art doesn’t ask to be enjoyed by all; art simply is.

There’s beauty in this ambiguity. In the dance between creation and reception. In knowing that what is deeply meaningful to one may not speak to another—and that’s not a failure. That’s the spectrum of human experience.

In teaching and facilitating creativity, I’ve watched this unfold again and again. I’ve seen students lose themselves in a painting that speaks only to them, and others marvel at something entirely different. I’ve seen quiet pride in the process, even when the outcome isn’t what they’d hoped. I’ve seen tears, laughter, joy, frustration. This, I think, is the heartbeat of art—not in arriving at a perfect outcome, but in showing up, again and again, to explore what lives inside us.

So what is art?

Maybe it’s not a question we need to answer.

Maybe it’s a question we get to keep asking, each time we make or experience something new.