In 1941, as London was reeling form the attacks of the German Blitz, Churchill submitted an annual budget to the government that contained significant funding for the arts. It caused some debate. Art and the arts are not a frill, they are not an option, they are not a decorative elaboration we can dispense with in times of trouble. On the contrary, it is precisely in times of distress that we need the arts all the more, because they keep our humanity, our souls alive while we fight for survival as individuals and communities. It is precisely for this reason that the people of Sarajevo continued to go to plays and concerts while mortar shells rained down on their city, and why prisoners in solitary confinement so often resort to drawing, painting, or writing.
Art keeps the spirit alive and nurtures the soul, even under the most difficult of conditions.
Art is a necessary and essential element of human existence, so essential and so central that the quality of human life can be measured by the degree to which the artistic impulse is encouraged. And the quality of our communities can be measured by the degree to which they embrace, support, and promote the arts. If you will grant that art is a basic and inseparable element of the human condition, then a number of points follow. Whatever we do as humans is artificial in the strict sense of the word, that is, it is not something given by nature. Thats how we distinguish in archaeology evidence of human activity from purely natural phenomena.