“When a fine artist dies, we hear that it is a major loss to art. This is usually gross exaggeration: when Mozart died short of 36 years age, just as his career was really taking off, that was a great loss to art. Ditto for Schubert’s demise at 31 or when Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga died days short of his 20th birthday, with so much promise of future greatness.
But when an accomplished and celebrated artist dies in the autumn of their years, with great accomplishments behind them, not that much ahead of them, and often after they have retired or passed their artistic peak, it isn’t in any meaningful way a loss to the greater community. (Though it certainly is one to friends and family). Instead, one should react with gratitude and joy for having been given so much by the artist, and amazement at how much these women and men were allowed to touch our lives—living on in the memories and legacies, recollections of ours and influences on us...
Continue reading here, at Forbes.com
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