The art in the eyes of the "digital generation"

The new generation is considered the "digital generation" where everything is just a click or a touch away on the mobile phone screen; and in this virtual age, where real bonds and emotional relationships have become increasingly fake and digital, the need to establish real emotional relationships, along with emotions, astonishment, wonder, and ecstasy, is felt even more. These are feelings that are often experienced in front of an artwork created by someone who lived centuries before us and who wanted to tell us something through his eyes, but often, they are almost aliens to young people today.

The question arises as to whether one of the reasons why art is no longer so appealing to young people today is because it no longer has the capacity to amaze, or whether it is the young public that has lost this capacity to truly enjoy art.

Everything is at their fingertips, from information, culture, and entertainment to art. While on the one hand, this is positive because the network has become a "showcase" for those who want to put themselves forward, on the other hand, there is sometimes a lack of serious awareness of who is within the circuit. Young people in high school also showed little knowledge of contemporary artists, not remembering their names or works, despite the fact that the Internet offers plenty of opportunities to get informed.

The move further and further away from art considered to be more "classical" seems to have made art more "vague and free" to such an extent that it is difficult for young people today to understand and pass judgment on something they are not really able to understand.

The first approach for students is during their schooling, but it is not enough just to study art, they need to understand it and have some tools to interpret it. You have to take them to a modern or contemporary art gallery to see and arouse their emotions or interest, but I am afraid that is still not enough.

Water lilies by Monet

In addition, there is the opinion that modern art, being more accessible to a vast number of artists or pseudo-artists and no longer necessarily linked to technical skills, is seen as banal and that the works are chosen only for market reasons.

It is also important to say that, fortunately, art today has many and varied interpretations and according to each of us and our perception it can lead to a different meaning. Nowadays art moves and changes continuously, just as our society evolves and changes much faster than in the past.

For these reasons, it is also difficult, if not impossible, to circumscribe it into a specific movement or category as was done in the past.

As Keith Harng said: "Art lives through the imagination of the beholder. Without this contact, there is no art."

While on the one hand there is this "vague and free" judgment associated with modern and contemporary art, a survey showed that 79% of young people are interested in art and consider everything to be art because it is present in everything, it is a manifestation of life, and among them, 63% prefer modern art and the remaining 37% ancient art, perhaps precisely because, despite this vagueness and freedom, the language is simpler, more comprehensible and direct.

Obviously, in the digital age, the online purchase of works of art is a must, and this has grown considerably over the last 5/6 years, with excellent forecasts for the future. The most interesting aspect that emerges from the information on the web is that 91% of those who buy art on the web do so through the online platforms of galleries - practically non-existent in Italy - and auction houses. Of this 91%, just over half still prefer to buy in physical spaces. Purchases by collectors who are beginning to prefer the online channel are also growing. This demonstrates that even this sector, which until recently had a lot of resistance, is opting for e-commerce. And people are buying everything online: Paintings (62% of respondents), Sculptures (22%), Photography (35%), Drawings (31%), Graphics (53%), and New Media (10%). More and more artists are promoting themselves on social media, with Facebook in the first place and Instagram right behind.

Obviously, while there are many pros to buying art online, including convenience, simplicity, the possibility of discovering new artists, and the wider range of artistic expression, there are also many cons. One only has to consider the impossibility of being able to see the work live and therefore the risk of it being different from what one sees online; the uncertainty of authenticity (as we know, online it is easier to be swindled) and lastly the doubts about the reputation of the platforms (the provenance of an artwork is very important).

As Picasso said: "Art is a lie that allows us to recognise the truth."

ILARIA PUDDU

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