Art is Advertising for What We Really Need

Mary Cassatt, Mother Playing with her Child, 1899

At the center of our societies is a hugely inventive force dedicated to nudging us towards a heightened appreciation of certain aspects of the world. With enormous skill, it throws into relief the very best sides of particular places and objects. It uses wordsmiths and image makers of near genius, who can create deeply inspiring and beguiling associations and position works close to our eyelines at most moments of the day.

Advertising is the most compelling agent of mass appreciation we have ever known.

Because advertising is so ubiquitous, it can be easy to forget that – of course – only a very few sorts of things ever get advertised. Almost nothing in the world is in a position to afford the budgets required by a campaign; advertising is a form of love overwhelmingly reserved for those wealthy potentates of modern life: nappies, cereal bars, conditioners, hand sanitisers and family sedans.

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Advertising beautifully alerts us to the desirability lots of things we probably don't need that much of in our lives. For its part, art also alerts us to the beauty and charm of bits of the world: but it tends to be the bits that we really do need for a fulfilled life...