390. Invincible Art

What is divine cannot be debased merely by talking about it. We would never imagine that the splendour of nature could be degraded by talking about its parts or how they function. We would never for a moment think that human beings are reduced by talking about their experiences or feelings. Even if we were to condemn nature or humanity with extreme vitriol, we would understand that we could deal no real damage to either.

At the same time, we have the tendency to believe that criticizing an artwork might cause it irreparable harm. As though mere words could hamper the work’s beauty and cause it to fall from grace. But anything like this is impossible. What is valuable in an artwork can no more be harmed by language than nature or humanity or the universe itself.

Even words fully intended to disparage can do no harm to an artwork. Language is entirely ineffective because art does not operate in the realm of language. This is surprisingly true even when the artwork in question uses language as its medium. Everything that is powerful in an artwork has its power because it is a metaphor for some aspect of our experience. It is a way of using image and sound and even language to reach into the depths of experience and show it to us in a new way.

To talk about an artwork is a lesser mode of communication than the artwork itself uses. For the impact and force of metaphor is always greater than language in its practical use. Metaphor can take us in the direction of truth itself, while practical language can take us only as far as truth’s conventional proxies.

The very best we can do with words is to create further metaphors that direct others towards the beauty of an artwork, and by doing so, craft another artwork in language. The worst we can do is to produce a lot of meaningless noise that is ignorant of this beauty, but that nonetheless draws attention to the artwork. Talking about an artwork is always something that helps it, insofar as it provokes us to see the work and look for its beauty for ourselves.