Truth in Art: Facts are not the responsibility of the artist. That responsibility is ours...

Through its various forms, the role of art is expression. It seeks to find clear ways to express all parts of human existence: emotions, feelings, jealousies, passions, ideas and experiences. This search for clarity of expression takes place within a distorted reality, where twisting facts is an acceptable means of expressing with clarity what the events of the real world could not. Yet, this twisting of the truth for clear expression can have unfortunate side effects.

One famous subject of this distortion is Mozart's rival Salieri. The two composers were contemporaries in late 18th century Vienna, composing music for the imperial court of the Hapsburg Emperor Joseph II. By inhabiting this same sphere, they obviously came to contest similar posts and opportunities.

The play, and later film, Amadeus is based on stories of such rivalries, given new heights largely based on Mozart's letters that suggested Salieri and a group of Italian composer was blocking his works. The play and film turn Salieri into a jealous, and vicious, rival to Mozart, a distortion that could have destroyed his reputation.

If consumed uncritically, such distortion of fact might be seen as threatening to corrupt or pervert perceptions. But underneath the surface of famous names, places and times, lies another layer of text. On that layer the players on the surface do not matter. They merely act out and give shape to simple stories about the nature of being - of love and admiration, of jealousy, of talent and hard work, effort and reward, faith and hubris.

In seeking out better ways to convey these underlying truths, art plays with truth and perception. Art searches for clarity of expression without allowing for restrictions. Nor should it. Art should not bow to the limitations created by an irrational world, any more that science should.

An irrational world builds up walls around what it finds inconvenient, asks too few questions, and accepts all too readily the facts it is offered without proper scrutiny. In a rational world such things would not be a cause for concern. The problematic nature of art's distortion of truth comes not from a deficiency within art but a lack of critical reasoning on the part of the viewer.

Art does nothing to conceal the actual facts. Quite the opposite: it finds them, discusses them, uses them. They remain in their original sources to be found and assessed. It is not the purpose of art to be our go between to reach them. Instead it is up to us to source our facts sensibly, and to have care and vigilance in our consumption of art., in what sources we trust, and why.