Consciousness matters to us, and many would say it matters more than anything. We relish the beauty of a sunset, the memory-fueled comforts of a homecoming, the inviting caress of a lover's hand. Conscious sensations lie at the core of our being. Without access to this marvel, we'd be poorer creatures living in a duller world.
Yet the fundamental nature of consciousness remains a scientific mystery. The problem is not that we do not understand consciousness at all—some aspects of it are relatively easy to explain. The problem is that one aspect of it continues to baffle everyone, and that's the “feel” or “phenomenal character” of consciousness.
The appreciation of art is experiential, whereby the art is an expression of a particular epoch's human experience and consciousness, particularly in regard to spiritual experience.
One of the things that has been alleged to be the purpose of art is its cognitive function: art as a means to the acquisition of truth. Art has even been called the avenue to the highest knowledge available to humans and to a kind of knowledge impossible of attainment by any other means.
