For art to be reality, the whole sensuous being must be caught up in the experience.
Interpretation
Art must engage all of our senses to be truly experienced as reality.
Margaret Mead's quote emphasizes the importance of a holistic sensory engagement in the experience of art. She suggests that art transcends mere visual representation and requires the involvement of the entire sensuous being—highlighting the idea that true understanding and appreciation of art is a multifaceted experience that encompasses emotions, sensations, and perceptions.
In practice
In a discussion on the importance of immersive art installations, one might quote Mead to emphasize sensory engagement.
Earth Day is the first holy day which transcends all national borders, yet preserves all geographical integrities, spans mountains and oceans and time belts, and yet brings people all over the world into one resonating accord, is devoted to the preservation of the harmony in nature and yet draws upon the triumphs of technology, the measurement of time, and instantaneous communication through space.
Prayer does not use up artificial energy, doesn't burn up any fossil fuel, doesn't pollute. Neither does song, neither does love, neither does the dance.
Instead of being presented with stereotypes by age, sex, color, class, or religion, children must have the opportunity to learn that within each range, some people are loathsome and some are delightful.
We won't have a society if we destroy the environment.
EARTH DAY uses one of humanity's great discoveries, the discovery of anniversaries by which, throughout time, human beings have kept their sorrows and their joys, their victories, their revelations and their obligations alive, for re-celebration and re-dedication another year, another decade, another century, another eon.
American society is very like a fish society. . . . Among certain species of fish, the only thing which determines order of dominance is length of time in the fishbowl. The oldest resident picks on the newest resident, and if the newest resident is removed to a new bowl, he, as oldest resident, will pick on the newcomers.
The art of bread making can become a consuming hobby, and no matter how often and how many kinds of bread one has made, there always seems to be something new to learn.
I think you reveal yourself by what you choose to photograph, but I prefer photographs that tell more about the subject. There's nothing much interesting to tell about me; what's interesting is the person I'm photographing, and that's what I try to show. [...] I think each photographer has a point of view and a way of looking at the world... that has to do with your subject matter and how you choose to present it. What's interesting is letting people tell you about themselves in the picture.
Dress designing, incidentally, is to me not a profession but an art.
I find that the only way to make my characters really interesting to children is to exaggerate all their good or bad qualities, and so if a person is nasty or bad or cruel, you make them very nasty, very bad, very cruel. If they are ugly, you make them extremely ugly. That, I think, is fun and makes an impact.
I would wish my portraits to be of the people, not like them. Not having a look of the sitter, being them.
Just as there is no substitute for original works of art, there is no substitute for the world of direct sensual experience.
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