Art and Poetry

If there is one art form deader than representational art in the eyes of the modern world, it is poetry.

I have been reading a new biography of Michelangelo, and another autobiography of sorts by William Holman Hunt on the Pre-Raphaelites. One thing that struck me about both is the influence of poetry on their work and thinking. Michelangelo even went as far as to write sonnets, which are more interesting as insights to his character than as works of art. The Pre-Raphaelites were influenced by Keats, Shakespeare and the romantics, and several of their best known paintings are scenes from Hamlet and Keats's "Eve of St. Agnes". Rossetti, of course, published poems as well.

They didn't just know these works, they internalized them and could easily quote them at length. It might even be said that they drew greater inspiration from poetry than the artists around them or their immediate artistic influence.

Is this one of the "big" pieces missing from contemporary representational art, and why beauty and depth are lacking? The most you could hope for from a contemporary realist painter is a few lines from a "classic" Rolling Stones song... does this influence the mind's ability to conceive of and create beauty?

There is certainly some neurological evidence to point in this direction. The book "The Brain that Changes Itself" cites cases of boys "curing" ADD without drugs by learning to write (by hand) a new alphabet (such as Urdu) and memorize a long poem.

Prior to the 1960s, it was common for schoolchildren to be required to learn a long poem. Almost any educated person over 65 can recite, at length, a "classic."

I have a strong hunch that memorizing long meaningful poems (not just gibberish or shallow rock music lyrics) has a strong organizing effect on the brain and might enhance creative powers in other disciplines.