Why does Beauty matter?

Whenever I think of the reasons why some people are (or seem to be) happier or more serene than most, I always wonder if it has something to do with how they perceive things and other people. I'll just write about what I've observed around me since I'm not a sociologist/psychologist...

I watched the film American Beauty recently -- for the 3rd or 4th time -- and everytime I watch this film it gets better. This time I decided that the character Rick Fitts, the son of the in-the-closet Marine Col. is the most important character in the film. He appears to be a problematic guy at the start of the film but really, he's the only person in the story who isn't unhappy. I think this is because he sees Beauty, his eyes are always opened to see it and his soul ready to receive it. This gives him strength to endure his father's violent self-denial and abuse, and his mother's catatonia. His calm, poised stance in the face of verbal and physical abuse, prejudice, and fear, comes from his knowledge that whatever happens he would still rather live and make every effort to do so in the best possible way than to give up and become a zombie walking aimlessly in a shopping mall. I think this is because of Beauty.

Beauty -- and I give it a capital B because I am not only speaking about aesthetic beauty as accepted by critics or philosophers or even the aesthetic tradition of the Ancients, but rather the Beauty that transcends, the essence in things, their core (each person has his own idea about it)-- is to me the only thing which makes life alive. People who have given up seeing it or who for some reason have ceased to believe in its existence have no real purpose. I've observed this in many museums. Listless bodies wrapped in gray cloth walking from painting A to painting B all the way thru to painting Z as if they were in the supermarket, checking items off their list as they go. "Mona Lisa? Check. Déjeuner sur l'herbe? Check. Venus de Milo? Check". They take photos sometimes, when they're not worried about being seen as tourists; other times they don't take photos but those are the ones who go to museums to be able to say they've been, not to see anything. Not really SEE. Obviously some go to see, and they're easy to spot: they stand for a long time in front of one piece; sometimes they close their eyes in front of it. Moving.

This might sound rather brazen, but it is what I've seen and felt in most of these places. People who were going there to be seen, not to see; parading around a gallery in order to feel good about themselves, rather like in the olden times: going to church to appease their conscience and especially to make sure everyone saw them there, thus securing a position as upstanding members of polite society. Ardent, genuine faith was then as enthusiastic admiration and genuine emotion is now. Non-existent.

"Artists" who don't believe in Beauty aren't capable of making anyone see it, either. And there are many such artists today. Too bad. People who insist, tiresomely, that art is useless. What a shame.

Are we really only matter? Only DNA? Then why do people who have every material possession that can be bought get depressed? Chemical imbalance. OK. Why do they get sad? Because yes...there is such a thing as sadness! It isn't all about depression. Dissatisfaction, emptiness. These feelings and words come up quite a bit in middle and upper-class circles. A sense of incompleteness. World-weary doesn't cover it, though it is, I suppose, how it starts. Chic-blasé. And then you can't shake it, it takes over, everything means the same, everyone is identical in their mediocrity. No one's eyes are more brilliant than everyone else's. Why bother?

Whether one believes in God or not, it isn't particularly controversial to say that when we are in the presence of something beautiful, grand, extraordinary, whether it be out in nature, or looking at a painting, or listening to a piece of music, or looking at a special face; or reading words which make us cry or laugh... we feel a sense of more, of infinity. It is fresh to find ourselves before something far greater than us, to know that there is continuity, charm in life. Power. Maybe that's called faith, but maybe it's only the ability to sense the ephemeral and intangible, because everything else rots, invariably. Beauty, like truth, like music, stays.

I've noticed that when one stops sensing Beauty with one's heart, the next step is becoming physically blind/deaf to it; the soul withers away. Dead while technically alive. Souldead.

Finally, Beauty does effectively disappear from one's life. Because it is alive, and it doesn't stay where it won't be able to live.