Tagore would not define art, and asked why we make it at all
My father sang Baul songs, and Tagore loved the Bauls: he collected their songs and admired Lalon. So I came to Tagore's lecture "What Is Art?" in his book Personality (1917) with my father's voice in my head.
What I like is that Tagore refuses the question in its usual form. He doesn't give a definition. He asks why art exists at all, and his answer is the surplus in human beings. An animal spends nearly all its energy on survival. Humans have more than they need, more emotion, more energy, more of themselves, and art is how that surplus expresses personality rather than serving a purpose.
My father's songs fit this exactly. Nobody paid him. He sang on the way back from the fields, with nothing to gain.
But I wonder whether this is a real theory or a beautiful romantic idea. Much art in my world is made out of need, not surplus: lullabies to stop a baby crying, work songs to keep rhythm, laments at a death. I sing to mothers in labour sometimes. That isn't surplus; that's the job.