Conceptual Art

Conceptual Art is artwork that is designed around the concepts of ideas rather than the art piece itself. If you were to break down the word conceptual, you would have the word concept. Concepts are ideas and the meaning behind those ideas. A conceptual artwork needs to provoke meaning and ideas to the viewer. It doesn’t always have to be the same meaning or ideas that the artist came up with but a meaning that provokes thought and curiosity for the viewer. In the artwork of Damien Hirst, Mother and Child divided, 1993, he is exploring mortality. Hirst forever separates a calf from its mother revealing emotional sorrow that disconnection can bring with death but at the same time the freedom that death can bring to the living. He also reveals the we are have trusting our insides to work to keep us going. I think that this piece is brilliant. We are all born being captured and imprisoned in these bodies that we are born in. We are prisoners to the complexity of our bodies working correctly, healthfully, intelligently and when they are not the energy and spirit wants out. Death brings freedom to our energy and spirit reconnecting us back to its source. I think all the time, what if I become so ill, or what if parts of my mind and body just stop working, will I be able to live with true happiness. I probably could but wouldn’t want to. I rather allow my energy to be free. When we are born we don’t get to choose which vessel we want to ride we are just given it. Some vessels are whole, some are not the most attractive and some aren’t the smartest but those choices are not our own. What I am trying to say is that death doesn’t always have to be sad it can be a release of tension and pain and can be a gate way to happiness.