Beauty is the aesthetic quality that gives the viewer pleasure to the senses, as defined by Princeton Wordnet. According to this definition, I believe that we are predetermined biologically to beautiful objects or persons. Since beauty gives us pleasure and we are satisfied by it, we will want to create this feeling as much as possible and will gravitate towards beauty. The question that results from this is: how do we determine what beauty is?
Every individual has his or her own views on beauty which collectively come together to produce a particular view by a society. Beauty, I believe, is determined by the environment that we grow up in and the ideas that are constantly introduced into our head by family, friends and the media. The setting that one grows up in plays the biggest part in how beauty is perceived. For example, an individual that grows up in either the United States or Western Europe will see a beautiful woman as one with long hair, high cheekbones, silky, light skin, light colored eyes and a nice body. This is an image that we are constantly presented with in movies, advertisements and magazines. The media has created this image of beauty which has become universally accepted by Westernized countries as the ideal woman. However, if you go to some nations in Africa, this “perfect woman” is not admired; instead, obese women are seen as the model of beauty. I read an article a few years ago, which I found on BBC News, that demonstrated that women in Mauritania are encouraged to eat and are even force-fed. This idea is passed down from generation to generation and eventually becomes the standard for beauty. Different environments create different images of beauty that become universally accepted as the idea is reiterated to individuals.
I believe that beauty is a necessary component in art and in humans. People elicit feelings of pleasure and satisfaction when seeing different artwork and different types of people. If there is no beauty within art and humans, we will not be attracted to anything and both will lose their uniqueness. Museums are prominent throughout the world and people travel great distances, such as to the Museum of Natural History in New York and the Louvre Museum in Paris, in order to see artwork that is inspirational and pleasing to the eye. Similarly, beautiful men and women are necessary because individuals need something to be attracted to. We are free to decide what beauty is to us, whether visually or internally. Whereas one woman may seem attractive to some, others may find her repulsive. It is this beauty that allows individuality to emerge. The freedom to decide what beauty is allows us to pursue this ideal as we attempt to become beautiful ourselves. The definition of beauty is personal to each individual yet we can find some of it in artworks or humans, which shape our opinion of them.
Beauty is determined by the ideas that are introduced by different individuals and media in our society. As we grow up, we personalize beauty with influence from the different ideas that have been presented to us. Beauty is necessary in art and humans because we are always searching for it and when we find it in art or humans, we appreciate it and develop a fondness for it. Beauty is different in every culture but it can be found everywhere.
Harter, Pascale. “Mauritanaia’s wife-fattening farm.” BBC News. 26 Jan 2004. Web. 27 Nov 2010. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/3429903.stm>
