What is the nature of culture? Let us narrow the question to what is the nature of arts? And let us start with a thing we can point our finger at: a work of art. What is it?
Let us take an example, say, The Lord of the Rings. What happens, when we read it? At least two things.
Firstly, we accept another world, one built by J. R. R. Tolkien, as if it is ours, in a way. We identify ourselves with the heroes; we love and hate; we get scared, triumphant, sad, happy, impatient, avenged, and have all other possible feelings. It is as if it is us living and acting there -- whatever happens there, we take it close to our hearts. Again, their world becomes, in a sense, ours.
Secondly, it is a different and strange world. That is why it is interesting to us.
And so, here we can sum up the first definition for a work of art: it is the paradox of a new, strange world accepted as our own -- an alter ego of our world.
This alter ego, in a sense, is less real, and in another sense is more real, than the physical world. It is less real because it is virtual. You can get in and out at any time, at will. However, it becomes more real when it affects you, draws stronger feelings, and influences your decisions in a greater degree than the physical world does.
One could say that the definition was deduced from just one specific example, one in the genre of fantasy. What about other genres?
It is all the same. Let's take an example that is really close to physical reality -- a newspaper article. Try extracting a list of plain facts from the article and compare it with the article itself. Which one would be more real in terms of influencing the reader: the list, or the article? Which one is more likely to get noticed? Which one is more likely to get real attention, understanding, and empathy? The answer seems to be obvious: it will be the article, or in other words, the list as processed by the journalist, thus presenting a conditioned world, a more visible and understandable one, more real in this sense. How was this reality achieved? The journalist has turned the physical reality into "more ours" (so it became touching), and, at the same time, "more strange" (so it became interesting).
Once again, in a piece of art (whatever it is: painting, novel, poetry, song, sculpture, drama, dance. . .) the artist creates a new world, a strange and real one. Actually, a work of art itself is the ''seed'' of a world that can be infinitely explored by the audience. However, this new world is not the only phenomenon created by its author. Necessarily, other new things surface:
New forms of expression,
New elements of human language,
New human attitudes,
New understanding of human dignity. . . generally speaking, a new layer of humanity.
At the same time, the artist recreates his own alter ego (one that understands all of the above listed). . .
Furthermore, he creates a new audience (the people who will understand all these new things).
To sum it up, every artwork creates a new layer of humanity consisting of a new world (less and more real than the physical one), a new author (capable of creating that world), and a new audience (capable of understanding, believing in, accepting and enjoying all of the novelty), with all their new forms of behavior, thinking, and speaking.
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