Yew

 Chung  International  School  of  Beijing  

IBDP  Theory  of  Knowledge  Essay  

2010-­‐2011  

-­‐Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).  
   

Candidate  Name:  XXXXXXXXXXXX  

Candidate  Number:  XXXXXXXXXXX  

Word  Count:  1589  

   
 Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).

The relationship between art and truth is an elusive one, putting into account the purpose

of art and the nature of artistic truths. An assumption is made concerning the first account by

giving art an inherent purpose – “brings us nearer to the truth.” A second assumption addressing

the latter account is that truth itself can exist in a lie, creating a paradox of fiction. More

importantly, if the second assumption is correct – why must it be so? Why did Shakespeare

impart a fundamental truth about the human condition through the fictitious claims about

Macbeth, who never existed? And why, for centuries, has it spoken so truly to his readers? Using

emotion as the primary way of knowing, this essay attempts to explore the implications of the

first and second assumption, and in the process, hopes to dissect the relationship between art,

emotion, lies, and truths.

Whenever I read texts from A1 English, it is not the search for knowledge that appeals to

me, but the experience - that somehow my emotions are evoked by people I know do not exist,

by events that never took place, written by a person whose life has never touched mine. This

leads me to question whether literature is necessarily qualified by knowledge, and whether

“learning, knowledge, and truth [is projected] into an area of human experience where it has no

natural or necessary place.” (Alchin, 44) Taking into account the first assumption, it is therefore

essential to question whether art’s purpose is fundamentally linked to truth and knowledge. Leo

Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” is 1,475 pages long, and took me four months to finish reading.

Disregarding my pace of reading, it is sensible to say that if art’s inherent purpose is to convey a

truth, it is not a particularly swift medium. Furthermore, literature can be said to be measured

against arbitrary standards, where a reader subjectively interprets texts according to his or her

own experiences and knowledge, and whether or not a specific truth is realised is dependent on

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 Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).
the aforementioned factors. Hence, even if it cannot be argued that literature is not a vessel for a

truth, it can at least be established it is not an entirely effective one. As Samuel Goldwyn once

famously said, “If you want to send a message, use Western Union.”

But what specific truths are we speaking of when we speak of truth in the context of

literature? Franz Kafka wrote of Gregor Samsa’s transformation into “a monstrous vermin”, did

he mean it literally? We have “tacitly assumed that by ‘truth’ we mean literal truth, or scientific

truth - one that is verifiable in some sense – when artistic truth is more appropriate” (Alchin, 41).

While scientific truths are principally obtained with reason and perception as ways of knowing,

artistic truths are experienced – with emotion as the principal way of knowing. It is this

emotional experience that draws me into a piece of literature, and it is perhaps why Tolstoy

needed 1,475 pages – to garner a sufficient emotional response. Even so, I believe it is not

inherent within literature to convey a truth, scientific or artistic; because when I too transform

into a vermin, and I too burn as Moscow burns, I find it decidedly trite/banal to reduce

“Metamorphosis” and “War and Peace” into a string of knowledge or a series of truths. Artistic

truths may happen to emerge from literary experiences, but I believe the only purpose inherent

within literature is the experience itself. Perhaps we can then say “Art is a lie that happens to

bring us nearer to the truth.”

While exploring the first assumption, a common ground between literary experience and

artistic truth emerged– emotion. Emotion is what distinguishes artistic truths from the scientific,

and it is with this way of knowing we explore the second assumption. Truth can be understood as

a recurring agreement to features of the human condition, and in art, is principally conveyed

through the medium of emotion. How a lie could possibly bring us nearer to the truth can be

explained by dissecting the nature of emotion.

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 Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).
I was two years old when I had my first emotional response to a work of art. Mufasa had

just sacrificed his life for Simba, and I promptly rushed into my father’s arms, fearing his death.

Engrossed as I was, even at two years old, I knew The Lion King was a work of fiction - a lie. A

psychological study made in Nottingham Trent University created virtual environments for

subjects and observed their emotional responses in accordance to the Thought Theory, which

deny “that [verifiable] existence beliefs are a necessary condition of emotional

response.”(Schneider) The study found that even if we do base our emotional responses on

verifiable existences in reality, it is simultaneously possible to project these emotional responses

into fictional existences. A man with arachnophobia will experience genuine fear of a harmless

spider when there is no verifiable existence of danger. I felt genuine grief and fear at the

possibility of my father’s death when provoked by the fictitious event of Mufasa’s sacrifice. This

leads us to answer the second assumption, the possibility of a paradox of fiction – the

paradoxical event in which a work of fiction leads to the acquiring of truth. This possibility is

less outlandish once we take into account the nature of the medium in which the truth is possibly

acquired – emotion, where in aforementioned conditions have shown it capable of paradoxical

qualities.

However, as emotion seems to play a great role in literature, its merit deserves a

review. After all, emotions are often portrayed as the antithesis of a reasonable, scientific

response and the irrationality associated with it is known to preclude sound judgment. If a man

knows a spider is harmless, he who fears it must be irrational. If a person reacts to a fictitious

account he knows is a lie, he who emotionally responds to it must be irrational. But these

paradoxical qualities are not necessarily irrational. The actual existence of harmful spiders

constitutes the root of all emotional responses to spiders in general. Hence, when a representation

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 Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).
of a harmful arachnid comes to existence, albeit being harmless, an emotional response based on

the knowledge of harmful spiders is released. Emotions and reason, artistic truths and scientific

truths, are thus linked. Whether they counteract or complement each other is another matter.

If we see emotions as precluding judgment, then perhaps we can see literature as a means

of removing emotions as an obstacle to truth, thereby nearing us to truth. Playing on our

arachnophobia example, literature can be said to be a harmless spider, weaving a lie to portray

itself as a harmful spider. It garners the emotional response of fear in the reader, the

arachnophobe, and allows a release of this fear. The reader’s realisation that literature is a lie,

and in fact a harmless spider fear allows him to be rationally relieved, and cleanses him of his

fear. In “Poetics”, Aristotle called this catharsis, and in this way the “soul is purged of its

excessive passions.” (Lucas, 24) Literature is an outlet for emotions, and through it we are less

controlled by our emotions, leaving us more vulnerable to the truth.

Unlike the above claim, I believe that emotion and reason complement each other, and

that emotion, far from being an obstacle, is indeed a valid way of knowing. With the

arachnophobe, his fear amplifies the root of this fear - the actual existence of harmful spiders.

In literature, literary devices and writers’ virtuosity illustrate a fictional account that we

“mentally represent” (Schneider). This mental representation, like the actual existence of harmful

spiders, is based on our knowledge of reality and reason. Emotion, I believe not only amplifies

the mental representation, but allows it to be relevant to the reader – it directly engages the

reader to the features of the human condition. This is too, why I believe that, while I lament the

generation gap between our parents and myself, a 16th century writer can have a hold on us.

Shakespeare masterfully weaved webs of lies with lustrous language and unleashes a wealth of

emotion that shakes the foundation of our own existence. We love, as Juliet does, we ponder, as

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 Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).
Hamlet does, and we regret, as Macbeth does. Without such emotion, the truth would not only be

obscured, but perhaps even thought as irrelevant to us – because we have never felt it ourselves.

In this way, emotion excites the emergence of truth from a lie, and more importantly, directly

engages us with the truth. Furthermore, art is perchance the sole platform that certain emotions,

that certain truths could possibly be engaged - “Art gives liberty of action to forces and

possibilities to which life does not grant the chance of coming into their rights."(Johnston)

Perhaps this is what Picasso meant by “nearer to the truth”, by emotionally engaging readers a

truth in literature, a truth that would not have been relevant, or even possible to us otherwise in

life, we are a step closer to understanding it.

Through the study of emotion, we have seen how truths could possibly exist in the lie that

is literature, and why it has captivated its readers for centuries, and centuries to come. Though

this essay was a modest attempt at dissecting the relationship between art, emotion, lies, and

truth, I believe its paradoxical qualities has still yet to be fully understood.

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 Essay  Prompt  No.  8:  Art  is  a  lie  that  brings  us  nearer  to  the  truth”  (Pablo  Picasso).  
Evaluate  this  claim  in  relation  to  a  specific  art  form  (for  example,  visual  arts,  literature,  
theatre).

Works cited:

Alchin, Nicholas. Theory of Knowledge. London: Hodder Education, 2003. Print. Aristotle.

Poetics. New York: Cosimo, Inc., 2008. Print.

Jonhston, Brian. An observation on the ‘game’ of realist drama. 12 December 2008. Voyages in
Drama with Ibsen. Web. January 2 2011.
<[Link]

Lucas, Frank Laurence. Tragedy in Relation to Aristotle's Poetics. London: Hogarth Press, 1927.
Print.

Schneider, Steven. “Thought Theory,” Paradox of Fiction. 9 June 2009. Internet Encyclopedia of
Philosophy. Web. January 2 2011.
< [Link]

Word Count: 1589