This book persuades us to interpret art as a form of therapy as it provides powerful solutions to many of life's problems.
Christen Købke-View of Østerbro from Dosseringen
'Christen Købke's unassuming depiction of an afternoon in a suburb of Copenhagen latches onto just those aspects of experience that are so hard to verbalize. The light in the picture is tremendously meaningful, even though it is difficult to say what this meaning is. One wants to point out at the picture and say, 'When the light is like this, I feel like this.' Købke has created an image that is in love with nothing happening. The child hangs over the rails, the man in a top hat looks on while his friend makes some adjustment to the bottom of the furled sail. The women say something to one another. Life is going on, but there is no drama, no expectation of outcome, no sense of getting anywhere.
Rather than this being a condition of boredom or frustration, though, it feels exactly right. It is tranquil but not tired. It is immensely peaceful but not inert. In a strange way, the picture is filled with a sense of delight in existence expressed quietly. It is not the light in itself that is so attractive; rather, it is the condition of the soul it evinces.'
