Why are we so embarrassed about talking about art?

We are sat in a circle in the beautifully cavernous Brighton Dome corn exchange, the survivors of a long day of talking, listening and exchanging. We were there for Devoted and Disgruntled, Improbable Theatre's established Open Space conference, to ask and answer the question 'What are we going to do about theatre?'
We have halved in number and a microphone is going around the room to record our final summations of the day. An old school academic, looking chap, in his fifties takes the mic and grumbles, 'I thought today was just going to be a load of hot air, but it actually turned out to be quite interesting.' He didn't stop there though, he went on to talk for another few minutes more, clearly now enthralled by the elation of talking out loud.
Isn't it strange that in a country so well known for its literature and creative grasp of language we still feel so uncomfortable talking about our art? In one of the group sessions I attended we asked the question, 'How do we get better about talking about theatre?'. It seems quite a straight forward question doesn't it? In the words of Lauren Bacall 'You just put your lips together...'. Yet as the unashamedly intellectual German dramaturgy student in our group pointed out, we are way behind Europe when it comes to talking about theatre. Unlike those on the continent who feel no shame in discussing art at length, who see talking about art as essential as the art itself, we feel uncomfortable talking about art outside practicalities. There is a sense that talking about art for arts sake is uncouth, embarrassingly pretentious, without point or purpose, just 'hot air'. Even the places where we allow ourselves to talk about art, like critical reviews, we impose a rating system, as we are more comfortable talking about whether a piece of art is good or bad, instead of discussing what it is about.

In these money tight times, we have become so obessessed with just getting something made, we forgotten to sit back and look at what we are making. After all, if it's such a struggle to actually do it, you might as well make sure we all get the most from it.