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The Impact of Visual Arts in the Business Place

The Impact of Visual Arts in the Business
Place
by Dina Poon Chong
What is the Visual Arts? Is it relevant to the functional world of business?
When I think of Visual Arts, immediately paintings and sculptures come to mind. I remember
growing up, loving art, but never seeing its true value. In a way, I was one of those persons
who saw art as a fun hobby –
something not to be taken seriously,
and definitely not a lucrative career
path. Ironically, I teach Visual Arts at
the secondary level now. When I ask
my students what comes to mind
when they think of the words “Visual
Arts”, I get responses directly related
to the Fine Arts, along with words like
“expressive”, “creative” and even
“therapeutic”. While I know that most of these students are not going to further their
studies in the subject, I still hope to embed some of the potential of the area in them, which
I believe that they can take with them and incorporate in their daily lives and future careers.
I want to inspire them to become individual thinkers, who can look beyond the horizon. Art
fosters that capacity.
I believe that Art is an integral part of our lives, but how can it be related to our
organisation?
Fine Art - Expressive, creative, therapeutic

Personally, I see it fitting into the business place in one of two ways. We will start off with
the most obvious – the environment. Take a moment, look around you…what do you see?
Isn’t art everywhere? From the paintings on our walls, to the simple labels on our favourite
snacks, the layout of our most-visited webpages, the TV advertisements of our beloved
products, the clothes that we wear, the shape of our furniture and even in the design of our
motor vehicles.
The business of Art supports the Art of Business.
When we enter into an organisation, we immediately assess its surroundings. We notice the
structure of the building, the colour of
the walls, the signage, the decoration (be
it blinds, vases, sculptures or paintings).
We are always told that first impressions
count. Therefore, the ambience is the
first signal to our client and even
employees as to whether they see a
future with this company or whether they
want to get away as fast as they can.
Organisations should be conscious of how
they decorate their spaces, in order to
ensure that they engender a sense of belonging as well as stimulate innovation in
employees and keep those creative juices flowing.
On the next spectrum, the Visual Arts is not only focused on the development of artistic
techniques and the creation of masterpieces. Art is actually an immersive experience,
through which persons can develop their skills in observation, critical thinking and even
problem-solving.
In this twenty-first century, where globalisation is ubiquitous, the world that we live in is
now flat. Technology has taken off on a rampage, knowledge is at our fingertips and
We notice the structure of the building, the
decorations

university degrees have become a norm. Therefore, as individuals and organisations, we
need something that will set us apart. Today’s
business environments demand innovation and
creativity more than ever.
In order for a business to succeed in today’s world, it
needs to maintain a competitive edge. Business
executives are no longer looking for linear-thinkers,
who possess the world of knowledge. They want reliable and creative persons, who are
passionate about what they do and can continuously keep the company at the cutting-edge.
In this sense, the Visual Arts can help people gain new insights regarding the day-to-day
running of a business – developing new ideas, finding relationships between unrelated
ideas, reframing problems in order to generate a new perspective and transforming their
vision into action.
Steve Jobs, who is best known as the co-founder of Apple Inc., is be considered a true
visionary. In a February 1996 article in Wired, Wolf noted Jobs as stating:
“Creativity is just connecting
things. When you ask creative
people how they did something,
they feel a little guilty because
they didn't really do it, they
just saw something. It seemed
obvious to them after a while.
That's because they were able to
connect experiences they've had and synthesize new things. And the reason
they were able to do that was that they've had more experiences or they have
thought more about their experiences than other people.
Business executives are no longer
looking for liners thinkers
Creativity is just connecting things

Unfortunately, that's too rare a commodity. A lot of people in our industry
haven't had very diverse experiences. So they don't have enough dots to
connect, and they end up with very linear solutions without a broad
perspective on the problem. The broader one's understanding of the human
experience, the better design we will have.”
As such, art allows you to perceive the
human experience in a broader and more
nuanced way, which in turn allows you to
see… to connect dots… to innovate and
yield quality design.
Whether the widget-makers and bean-
counters accept it or not, the Visual Arts
through its many dimensions has become
an integral part of our lives. Indeed, Art
can both directly and indirectly impact
the success of a business organisation. And what could be better than to have our
business world of essential services and practical commodities infused with more
insight and more humanity? As one of my students said, “The Visual Arts just makes
the world a better and happier place.”
Wolf, G. (1996). Steve Jobs: The Next Insanely Great Thing. Wired. Retrieved from
https://www.wired.com/1996/02/jobs-2/
Dina Poon Chong currently teaches Visual Arts at the Secondary School Level.
She earned a B.A. in the Special in Visual Arts with Communication Studies, as
well as an M.Phil. in Cultural Studies, with her thesis entitled “Moving Towards
a Trinidad and Tobago Film Language, Culture and Industry”. She has tutored
in Communication Studies and was a part-time lecturer in Caribbean Film
Studies at The University of the West Indies, St. Augustine Campus.
Whether widget-makers accept it or not;
visual arts is integral in our lives

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The Impact of Visual Arts in the Business Place

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