Ane of the great challenges today is that we often experience untouched past the problems of others and by global issues like climatic change, even when we could easily exercise something to help. We practise not feel strongly enough that we are part of a global community, part of a larger nosotros. Giving people admission to information about often leaves them feeling overwhelmed and disconnected, not empowered and poised for action. This is where fine art can brand a difference. Art does not show people what to practice, yet engaging with a skilful work of art can connect yous to your senses, body, and mind. It tin brand the world felt. And this felt feeling may spur thinking, date, and even action.

Equally an artist I have travelled to many countries around the globe over the by 20 years. On one day I may stand in front of an audience of global leaders or exchange thoughts with a foreign minister and discuss the structure of an artwork or exhibition with local craftsmen the next. Working equally an creative person has brought me into contact with a wealth of outlooks on the globe and introduced me to a vast range of truly differing perceptions, felt ideas, and knowledge. Being able to have function in these local and global exchanges has greatly affected the artworks that I brand, driving me to create fine art that I hope touches people everywhere.


Most of the states know the feeling of beingness moved by a work of art, whether it is a song, a play, a poem, a novel, a painting, or a spatio-temporal experiment. When we are touched, we are moved; we are transported to a new place that is, nevertheless, strongly rooted in a physical experience, in our bodies. We get aware of a feeling that may not exist unfamiliar to us but which we did not actively focus on before. This transformative experience is what art is constantly seeking.

I believe that one of the major responsibilities of artists – and the thought that artists have responsibilities may come as a surprise to some – is to help people not only become to know and understand something with their minds only also to feel it emotionally and physically. Past doing this, fine art tin mitigate the numbing event created by the glut of information we are faced with today, and motivate people to turn thinking into doing.

Engaging with art is non merely a solitary event. The arts and culture represent ane of the few areas in our society where people can come together to share an experience even if they run across the earth in radically dissimilar means. The important thing is not that we agree nearly the experience that we share, just that we consider information technology worthwhile sharing an experience at all. In art and other forms of cultural expression, disagreement is accepted and embraced every bit an essential ingredient. In this sense, the community created past arts and culture is potentially a great source of inspiration for politicians and activists who work to transcend the polarising populism and stigmatisation of other people, positions, and worldviews that is sadly so endemic in public soapbox today.

Art as well encourages u.s. to cherish intuition, uncertainty, and creativity and to search constantly for new ideas; artists aim to pause rules and find unorthodox means of approaching gimmicky issues. My friend Ai Weiwei, for case, the great Chinese artist, is currently making a temporary studio on the island of Lesbos to draw attention to the plight of the millions of migrants trying to enter Europe right now and also to create a point of contact that takes us beyond an united states of america-and-them mentality to a broader thought of what constitutes nosotros. This is one way that art can appoint with the globe to modify the globe.

Picayune Sunday, a solar free energy project and social business that I set upwardly in 2012 with engineer Frederik Ottesen, is another example of what I believe fine art can do. Lite is so incredibly important to me, and many of my works employ light as their primary material. The immaterial qualities of light shape life. Light is life. This is why we started Lilliputian Lord's day.

On a practical level, we work to promote solar energy for all – Picayune Dominicus responds to the need to develop sustainable, renewable energy by producing and distributing affordable solar-powered lamps and mobile chargers, focusing especially on reaching regions of the world that practise not have consistent access to an electrical grid. At the same time, Little Sun is too about making people feel connected to the lives of others in places that are far away geographically. For those who pick up a Little Sun solar lamp, hold information technology in their easily, and utilise it to light their evening, the lamp communicates a feeling of having resources and of being powerful. With Little Sun you tap into the energy of the lord's day to power up with solar free energy. It takes something that belongs to all of us – the sunday – and makes it bachelor to each of united states of america. This feeling of having personal power is something nosotros tin all identify with. Trivial Sun creates a customs based around this feeling that spans the earth.

I am convinced that by bringing u.s.a. together to share and discuss, a work of art can make us more than tolerant of difference and of one another. The encounter with art – and with others over art – can help us identify with i another, expand our notions of we, and show us that individual date in the world has actual consequences. That's why I hope that in the time to come, fine art will be invited to take part in discussions of social, political, and ecological bug even more than it is currently and that artists will exist included when leaders at all levels, from the local to the global, consider solutions to the challenges that face us in the world today.

Olafur Eliasson is ane of the recipients of this year's Crystal Awards, presented at the Annual Meeting in Davos. You tin follow him on Twitter via @olafureliasson