How Art Helps Us See the World (And Each Other) Differently

I was at a museum, sitting on a bench in front of this giant painting of a red square on a blue background. Just a red square. Nothing else. And then this guy walks into the room and, goes, “Oh wow, you can really feel the rage.”

I look over at him—because that’s a curious  thing to say about a square— He catches me looking. So I ask, “Rage?”

He laughs and says, well "maybe more like frustration, because the way that paint is applied."

He sits down next to me. “Well, What do you see?” he asks.

“The red makes the blue vibrate.” I tell him.

And just like that, we were talking. About a square. That’s the magic of art—it takes two strangers who would normally exist in that unspoken public space agreement of “Let’s pretend we don’t see each other” and suddenly hands them a conversation. That day, I made a friend. And art did that.

Not in the forced, “Okay, everybody, go around and say a fun fact about yourself” way. You know, where no one listens because they’re too busy panic-searching their brain for a fun fact that isn’t embarrassing. Like that one time I blanked, and just blurted out, “TACOS!” when it was my turn. Not, “I love tacos”, just—“TACOS”—as if that is a fact about me that makes any sense. No one noticed, though, because they were all busy rehearsing their own answer, so they remember to say it as a full sentence.

No, art brings people together naturally. Effortlessly. Like a dog at a party that somehow unites all the introverts who didn’t want to be there but are now best friends because they’ve formed a silent pact of mutual dog appreciation.

It’s funny because, in most social situations, we default to talking about ourselves. We get stuck in these “I, me, mine”loops, instead of being trapped in our personal highlight reels, we’re forced to engage with something bigger—something that doesn’t belong to any one person but somehow belongs to all of us at the same time. That’s how art flips the script.

Art creates a shared aesthetic space—which is just a fancy way of saying, “Hey, we’re both standing in front of this thing, let’s talk about it instead of pretending we’re busy checking emails and text messages.”

And that’s important because, let’s be real, small talk is a nightmare. It’s this delicate dance of pretending to care about the weather while trying not to sound like your local weatherman.

“Yeah, man, I heard it might snow next week, so, uh, that’s… something.”

But art? Art gives us an actual thing to talk about—something beyond “What do you do?” and “So, how do you know Kevin?”

It also allows for different interpretations without things turning into a political knife fight. You can look at the same painting, sculpture, or performance and walk away with completely different ideas about what it means—and instead of that being annoying, it’s interesting. It’s why people can debate whether the Mona Lisa is smiling, smirking, or just suppressing a sarcastic comment.

Art sparks curiosity. It makes us wonder—which is something we forget to do in between doom-scrolling and Amazon impulse buys. And when we wonder, we stop posturing. We stop trying to impress people with our LinkedIn achievements and actually start connecting.

So next time you’re at a musuem, a friends house, a gallery, staring at a mural, or just watching a guy on the subway sketch something weird and beautiful—use art to start a conversation with a stranger.  Share a thought. Let yourself get pulled into the shared experience of art.

Because in a world where most conversations boil down to who’s right and who’s wrong, art gives us the rare chance to just be curious humans, looking at a thing, together.

And that, my friends, is why art is always worth talking about.