What an artist is trying to do for people is bring them closer to something, because of course art is about sharing. You wouldn't be an artist unless you wanted to share an experience, a thought.

Art is about reaching across

Most of us think art is about making beautiful things or expressing yourself into the void. But Hockney points at something stranger and more human: artists are actually trying to hand you something. They're building a bridge between their inner life and yours, betting that if they get it right, you'll stand where they stood and feel what they felt.

This matters because we live in an age of endless content where sharing often means broadcasting to nobody in particular. But real art—whether it's a painting, a song, or even a well-told story—isn't performance for its own sake. It's an act of reaching. The artist is saying: I noticed this, I felt this, and I think you will too if I can just get it across clearly enough. When it works, you're not just looking at something external. You're briefly inside someone else's perception.

The counterintuitive part? This means an artist genuinely needs you. Not for validation or attention, but because art without an audience isn't complete. It's like telling a joke to an empty room. The work only becomes what it's meant to be when someone receives it, when that bridge gets walked across from both sides.