Thought provoking pictures

Each picture opens up discussions and insights I'd never considered before.

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Look, everyone has bad days, everyone has their own struggles, and there are moments when everyone thinks of giving up. But also, everyone deserves a nudge in the right direction, some advice and wisdom, and some encouragement. There’s no shame in getting inspired by others, and we need some motivation to draw from time to time.The illustrations of Success Pictures, the Instagram account with over 800k followers, are just about that. Its motivational pictures with deep meaning focus on…

Polish illustrator Pawel Kuczynski cleverly uses satire to portray today's social, political and cultural reality. At first sight his illustrations might seem funny, but when you look closer, they actually show some serious problems of today's world.

Art is a perfect way to communicate and highlight all the issues and problems that arise. It is also a means to open people's eyes and let them finally see things that were swept under the rug and not touched for the longest time.

Art can give us a better understanding of our emotions and the world we live in. Even though some art pieces can be difficult to comprehend, they might provoke one to think and find his or her own meaning. Art is often connected to human emotions. In the process of creating art, artists express what they are concerned or curious about. In this way, they explore their own thoughts and feelings and at the same time encourage the public to engage in the journey of meaning-making.

There are a lot of issues in today's society. Addiction to social media, devaluation of workers, unhealthy lifestyles, and that's just a few of them. A lot of us don't even notice these problems; we either ignore them or don't run into them at all. However, artist John Holcroft tackles them head-on and illustrates the issues of today's world in his satirical and honest art.

Deep

Just like Neo from The Matrix, we sometimes get a strange feeling deep in our guts that something is not quite right with the world. German artist Steffen Kraft, who also goes by the name Iconeo online, makes amazing social commentary pictures that highlight how ironic, weird and even hypocritical life can sometimes be.

I recently learned of the story of John Berry Meachum, a figure in Missouri history I previously knew nothing about. He was born into slavery in Virginia, but at the age of 21 earned enough money as a carpenter to purchase his own freedom and a short time later the freedom of his father. Throughout his life he had an entrepreneurial spirit. He would purchase the freedom of slaves and most would pay him back. He eventually came to live in St. Louis, where he founded the African Church. There…

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