Can art enhance your life? Here’s what I learned from Ali Smith, Tracey Emin, Claudia Winkleman, and more | Art and design

HOh several times a day do you reach for your phone? Do you jump when you receive a notification and spend trips locked in your little black mirror? What about during meals, or upon waking up? Does it make you feel rich and energetic? I’m as guilty as the next person: swiping, liking, swiping. But in a world designed to distract us, how can we take five or 10 minutes away from that, and instead add something that enriches our lives?

I like to look to artists for answers. It makes us slow down and think about different ways of looking; To notice nature and beauty. Times are changing before us. They remind us of the joys of manufacturing, and in a world where artificial intelligence is trying to outsource our creativity to machines – the joy of discovering something ourselves. Artists see the potential in something: like a word that can be combined into a sentence that can grow into a paragraph, or a book; Or a tube of paint that can be used to create an image. Not only do they make us see something from a different perspective, or teach us something about their world, they capture our attention, inviting us into stillness as well.

It’s been scientifically proven: A 2024 study commissioned by the UK government found a great deal of evidence that consuming art can improve your mental and physical health — and also, as Sarah Carlsberg writes, “reduce health care costs and increase the country’s productivity.” Last month, King’s College London found that when 50 people between the ages of 18 and 40 viewed the paintings in person, their stress hormones decreased by 22%. (Half the group was tested to look at the transcripts: their levels fell by only 8%.)

Whatever our situation, art and artists can guide us all. As someone who has always kept the words of creative people close to me—whether for inspiration or reflection, to help me in relationships or to structure my day—I’ve compiled 366 short pieces of wisdom for every day of the year in a new book, How to Live an Artistic Life.

From the words of artists including Tracey Emin and Marina Abramović to writers like Ali Smith and Iris Murdoch, each entry includes meditations, rituals, encouragements, and creative exercises. Guided by the seasons (January’s theme is Beginnings, February is Love, August is Beauty, and November is Memory), I respond to each paragraph, bringing the artists’ words to life, so anyone can participate in their creative work.

I wrote this book at a time when I was feeling uninspired and distracted. It was reading these artists’ words that pulled me out of a dark place: whether learning the routine of writer Patricia Highsmith who made work life “as pleasant as possible” by sitting on her bed “surrounded by cigarettes, a cup of coffee, and a donut…” or, as art critic Jerry Saltz advises, when at a museum, asking the person next to us: “What do you think about that?” Conversation can be the greatest springboard for ideas. Museums are historically places for dialogue, debate, community and promoting personal connection, and surprisingly many of them are free in the UK.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed, writer Hisham Matar and broadcaster Claudia Winkleman suggest looking at just one painting at a time. Revisit it at different moments, and notice how it changes depending on how You It changes. Or, if you don’t have access to a museum, look up something in a book or online: show it to someone else and ask, what is it supposed to be? As Smith told me: “Whenever you stand in front of art, you present it and something inside you awakens to it.”

Why do we look at art? Perhaps it’s because, as Paula Rego told her son, the film director Nick Welling: “An artist is someone who goes where no one has gone before, but who brings back something you’ve never seen before but that you recognize immediately.”

Living an “artistic life” does not necessarily mean being an artist. It’s about enriching what you already have and, as Laurie Anderson advised in an article in December (the joy-themed month), focusing on “whatever makes you feel free and really good.” While health courses charge hefty fees, artists like Abramović remind us of the power of sitting still: “Doing nothing is the beginning of something.”

Be in the world. Talk to people. Go places, even if they are not far away. Look at the vastness of the sky instead of at our technologically filtered selves. Regain your attention and give it to each other. Next year is a gift. Get out there, seize it, and live it brilliantly.