By Ashley Ni
“The arts and society share a symbiotic relationship. Just as society needs art to add meaning to life, the arts need the support of society in difficult times." - Manasi Prasad
While the pandemic continues to wear, people around the world are either living in self-isolation or under tight lockdown measures - which includes the many members of the artist community. COVID-19 has seriously affected the art world, but the sense of human interaction through art has remained stronger than ever before.
“The arts and society share a symbiotic relationship. Just as society needs art to add meaning to life, the arts need the support of society in difficult times." - Manasi Prasad
While the pandemic continues to wear, people around the world are either living in self-isolation or under tight lockdown measures - which includes the many members of the artist community. COVID-19 has seriously affected the art world, but the sense of human interaction through art has remained stronger than ever before.
Many galleries and museums around the globe such as The British Museum, Pergamon Museum, Van Gogh Museum, and more have started online viewings through sharing platforms or software, and artists resort to social media platforms such as Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to display their works. Musicians stream their work online, collaborate on the internet, and even teach classes via video conferencing. A band that goes by BTS, or “Bulletproof Boy Scouts” has held a live concert for fans who were unable to attend previous ones due to the pandemic, and just recently participated in the “Dear Class of 2020” event held by YouTube where they each gave speeches and performed three songs, all live.
Billions of people all over the globe flock online to listen to music, read books, and watch movies during the prolonged lockdown. By posting and sharing their artistic works, many people themselves have become artists - whether it’s painting, dancing, cooking, or even meme-making! COVID memes and videos have become popular around the world, highlighting the crisis’s lighter and darker sides, sometimes adding humour.
In this time of crisis and isolation, the role of art, whether we realise it or not, becomes more central to our lives.