a theoLogy of ArT?
i’m taking an introduction to fine arts class this semester, and quite honestly, i’ve been blown away by how much i really love the content of the course. i was thinking that we would learn about different ages of music, types of paintings, and names of ballet moves … so, needless to say, i was incredibly pessimistic about it going in to the semester.
every time i thought of painting before taking this class, i used to think of a Jackson Pollock, or Andy Warhol’s soup can painting. i (kinda) thought it was just a scheme for people to make money off of each other, and that it was all kind of a big hoax. (see the article regarding the $5 painting dubbed a Jackson Pollock, and causing a major stir in the art world.) i mean, if someone else could paint something that sells for $50 million dollars, then why is it worth so much??
then i was confronted with something beautiful. Rembrandt’s “Peter’s Denial of Jesus” was the first painting which really showed me the masterful skill and ability which it takes to craft something truly great.
Peter's Denial of Jesus - Rembrandt
in the center of this painting, we see Peter denying that he is a disciple of Jesus (located in the right of the painting). rembrandt paints one of the accusers seemingly holding a light up to the future apostle and asking him about it. images of John chapter one come rushing to mind when the apostle writes of John the Baptist “he came to bear witness about the light.“ the woman seems to be holding up “the light” to Peter and asking “do you know about this?” there’s many more themes just like this which i don’t have time to expound upon here.
One of the things which is supposed to distinguish “great” art from other forms is its “in-exhaustability” or the ability of the work to hold the viewer’s attention for an unlimited amount of time. each time you come back to the painting, it should capture your attention. this painting (when viewed much larger) is a terrific example of a work which is inexhaustible.
there was a time when Christians engaged very heavily with the arts. the church commissioned the greatest artists in the world to depict the beauty of the faith in various forms of art like painting, sculpture, music, even architecture. in his article “Why We Need Artists,” Tim Keller says that we need art to fully understand the truth. jonathan edwars also said that unless you take a truth and you imagine it, unless you visualize what it means, then you don’t have a sense of it on your heart.
admittedly, i’m at the very beginning of my study of these things, and i’m very anxious to test and think through the theories of the necessity of art in theology, or art as theology. do any of you have any experiences with these things? do you have a theology of art? does the modern church properly engage with the arts? what do you think?
Wow! This is a big one. I almost feel guilty when this subject is approached by someone that is grounded in the Scriptures, because it is a subject that has been largely ignored in the gospel preaching church. Art is something that should be a part of church life, especially as the church seeks to engage the world with its message. The reason why so many of us have failed to emphasize this, is because the people that often do emphasize it don’t have a sound gospel that their art flows from. So we feel an obligation to focus on the fundamentals of the gospel, because the message they are engaging the world in by their art, is all too often not the biblical one. However, in reality, this should give us all the more reason to paint more skillfully and more majestically with the message we have.
Good word. Not enough is said on this topic. I look forward to hearing more of your thoughts as you journey deeper into a theology of art.
I know for myself, I have a shameful tendency to pendulum swing away from things that characterize some streams of the church which I feel are conforming to much to the ways of the world. And since a lot of people in the church today over emphasize art, to the point of nearly canonizing it at times, I am tempted to avoid art altogether. I try to avoid one ditch and end up jumping right into another one. I agree with Jeff: good word.
I’m in the same boat as Dorian. I always overreact and end up in the other ditch. However, I have recently been thinking about the importance of creativity and art and trying to think through it all. I have heard that Dorothy Sayers book, “The Mind of the Maker,” is the best, for lack of a better term, theology of creativity out there. I have been saying for a few months that I was going to buy it and give it to my church’s worship leader. Maybe I should finally do that…
[...] A friend of ours recently wrote an article about theology and art. He cleverly titled the post a theoLogy of ArT? (notice the artistic-ness of the title). I am glad that he brought this topic up. My church [...]
A Theology of Art? « Gravitas said this on October 30, 2008 at 9:23 pm |
Hey buddy, I just continued this discussion on http://www.2mites.com... “a theology of emoticons”. Let me know what you think.