December 19, 2021, the final stretch of the year. The end-of-year mood has started for some time, after all we are just a few days away from Christmas. Panettones in supermarkets, lights lit around the city, Christmas trees mounted on windows, a retrospective of the year, resolutions for the coming year, etc. I kept thinking about all this, about what I could write about the end of the year and, perhaps, the beginning of the next one. But my reflection today is brief, it does not delve into specific facts of this year or detailed expectations of the coming year.
2021 was a year of many losses, in every way. Many even say that it is an extension of 2020, almost like a continuum . In the paragraph above, I described a privileged, protected end-of-year climate, a time of lights and panettones, but the truth is that the whole year was a period of many human losses, losses in rights, losses in values, losses in achievements that we had made as a country. Thus, the Christmas that is designed for so many is far from being a bright and plentiful Christmas. It is difficult to think about how many years it will take us to recover from so many losses. We are exhausted, hopeless. I read today that the goal is to have no goal. In dark times, of pandemic and civilizational regression, it seems almost impossible to make plans.
In this scenario, apart from our role as citizens, voters, I am taken directly to art and culture. I know that, here, I am not talking about anything new, but, more than at any other time, art and culture seem to me, once again, to confirm how essential they are. No wonder they are so attacked by those who distill violence, hostility and brutality. The phrase "Art saves" always resonates with me. In Bad feeling in the culture, Freud states:
Beauty has no obvious utility, its cultural necessity is not recognizable, and yet culture cannot do without it (Freud, 1930, edition L&PM).
Since I read it for the first time, the passage above has left such an impression on me that it has become one of those that we appropriate and create a synthetic form. I often say that Freud says something like "Art is not necessary, but indispensable". This has always had a lot of impact on me.
When I talk about art and culture here, I think of this great category that encompasses theater, visual arts, literature, cinema, series, etc. I think about so many things to reflect on the idea that art is essential, but today I will be brief. It does not seem coincidental to me that this category resists, expands, despite the threats and attacks it has been suffering lately. Art humanizes us, strengthens us, makes room for what we feel , names (although not in exact words) the joys we experience, as well as the pains we carry.
At this moment, my compass points to this, going to an exhibition, seeing a movie, reading a book, watching a play, painting, and so on. Art as a possibility of naming, but also, why not, of escape, escapism, salvation, since sometimes life becomes too real. When it comes to art, even pain can hold something beautiful.
