The Highest Form of Hope

Five hundred years ago, the ownership and display of images was a luxury reserved for the rich, the powerful and the established. The images seen in the halls of power or in the structures of the church were originals; artwork created in order to serve a specific purpose. With the technology that followed the arrival of the printing press, the image made astonishing advances in its accessibility and its superfluity. Today we are not only able to possess images, we can also crop, superimposed, and exploit them as they have been digitally dismounted from their original contexts. The irony of this ‘culture of the image’ is that though images are more accessible than ever, we are more ready than ever to ignore them. The effects of these technological and social changes cannot be reversed, but there may be a way to recuperate the sight for which the post-modern treatment of images has left dimmed and darkened.

In the our current state of technological advancement, images can exist on their own unhindered by a reliance on prototypes because the prototypes no longer limit reproduction or manipulation. “Briefly stated, the liberation of the image consisted precisely in freeing it from any original. The image is now valued by itself and for itself; it has no original but itself; and it intends only one thing: to be accepted as the unique original”(Marion). The uses of historical works of art in publicity images exemplify this separation. The Mona Lisa has been reproduced, reinterpreted, and manipulated not only by post-modern artists seeking to revisit the past, but more often by companies seeking effective ad campaigns. “Images, like industrial objects, are products; they belong to our ‘society of production’”(John Berger). The Mona Lisa is no longer a portrait painted by Leonardo Da Vinci in the 16^th century, but an image of woman used to sell everything from toothpaste to insurance.

The screen represents the pinnacle of this groundlessness. The screen is a world without matter or time (what Marion refers to as an “Anti–world). The images that appear on the screen are effectively apparitions. It is easy to see how actual events – like an earthquake in Pakistan shown on the evening news– can become non-events to the viewer. The footage of suffering children and displaced families does not exist in actuality (that is, in the material world of time and space). The unfortunate victims of the earthquake exist entirely on the screen and will cease to exist when the channel is changed. We interact only with their image, we cannot fathom their existence in actuality.

Marion argues that in a world where the image has no prototype, the image fits itself to spectator. It exists for the consumer, who in turn both “submits to” and “regulates” the image. This relationship is not one of “seer” who is invested in the image, but one of voyeur who “sees for the pleasure of seeing”. The voyeur has no stake and therefore no right to see what he or she sees. The voyeur sees without the responsibility of “being seen”.

This voyeuristic impulse has encourages us to replace the relational event of “being seen” with the non-event of “appearing”. There are a variety of current examples that could be called upon: blogs, facebook, myspace, YouTube. All fulfill Andy Warhol’s promise that one day everyone would have their fifteen minutes of fame. In each example, real relationship (the real event of ‘being seen’) is replaced by the appearance of an individual’s crafted and edited image. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the cult of celebrity worship where human beings are reduced to their appearance in order that they might become products of consumption for the voyeur. Warhol’s Marilyn Diptych demonstrates this powerfully: the more Marilyn Monroe’s picture is reproduced, the more it disintegrates. She is no longer a human being made in the image of God; she is purely an image.

Marion suggests that it is the icon that stands over and against this ultimately dehumanizing vision. The icon, as an image grounded in the perfect and complete humanity of Christ incarnate, demonstrates a way of seeing in the context of relationship to the creator God. In this relationship, Christ has bridged the gap to the One seen, and therefore we are able to look upon him without shame or judgment. Conversely, the irresponsible gaze of the voyeur is an “idolatrous gaze”. The voyeur seeks only to see himself reflected in the image of the other. The basis the Old Testament ban on images was to keep the Israelites from idolatry, for images made to represent God only served to symbolize a deity made in the image of things created – an image of God contained. God is not made in the image of humanity but humanity is made in the image of God. It is God’s revelation through the incarnation that allowed humanity to gaze upon him without fear; through Christ the disciples encountered the Father.

The meeting between icon and worshipper cannot be understood as simply a dichotomy of viewer and object. There is an interaction with the prototype who is effectively “seeing” the viewer as well. Marion refers to this as a “second glace”; where the gaze of the viewer and the gaze of the prototype meet.

In front of an icon, I do indeed remain an onlooker, but I experience myself also as seen. Thus, the image is no longer a screen, since, through it and in its features, another glance – invisible as all glances – explores my face. The prototype interacts, through the objectifying image, as pure gaze crossing another gaze.

When we encounter an icon, we do not merely encounter an idolatrous mirror as in the gaze of the voyeur, but we encounter the gaze of the Other. “It [the icon] beautifully expresses the genuinely Christian understanding of how the finite and the infinite are related”(D.B. Hart). The icon is therefore a humanizing force, because it sets our sight within the context of our relationship to the Creator. It is the image of the world transformed, not the “anti-world” of the screen. In a culture dominated by dehumanizing voyeurism, the face of Christ as seen in the icon affirms every face by recalling the incarnation of Christ.

Labels: art, culture, faith, icons, images, media

Labels: awesome things, just for fun, life in general

Labels: aesthetics, art, Begbie, christology, creation, creativity, faith, gift, land, peace

This relational foundation of shalom places a strong emphasis on the outward orientation of creativity. Wolterstorff is therefore highly critical of views that hold to more platonic and inwardly orientated focus on creativity, such as the writing of Dorothy Sayers. For Sayers, art is important because it points to the image bearing quality of humanity: God is a creating God and he has given us the ability to also create. Because the act of artistic creation points toward God, the ultimate reality, artistic creation in and of itself is connected to the divine. Therefore the emphasis for Sayers is on the internal processes of artistic creation; how the artist draws out from him or herself (the Idea, Power, and Energy) in order to create whereas Wolterstorff focuses on the exterior dialogue between artist and material, artist and community, and artist and God.

Sayers does offer valuable insights, specifically to how artists can understand their own internal processes, but also as to how the creative process can reflect the nature and character of God. Art making for myself has been a way of synthesizing what I have learned or experienced internally. In this way the arts do portray a picture of incarnation. Christ himself was made visible to us so that God could be revealed. One is immediately reminded of the icon as a way of the invisible made visible. The church has a long tradition in presenting pictures and allegories of who God is through the sacraments; the Eucharist is a picture of Christ’s body and the body of the church, Christian marriage is a metaphor for God’s love for the church, and baptism is a symbol of conversion and acceptance into the community of the resurrected. Not only are these sacraments allegories, they are also real, tangible ways the community can interact with the truth. It is in this way I can understand Sayers and David Jones when they speak of art as ‘sacramental’. The sacraments point beyond themselves symbolizing a larger truth that cannot be fully grasped in its entirety without the allegory to help mediate.

What may be overlooked in a sacramentalist view of art is that sacraments are the activities of the body of Christ. They are communal in nature. Robert Farrar Capon writes that with such a view we are “just members of a crowd of individuals following our own noses and achieving, at best, our own amusement. If, however, we are all together in the oblation, than it becomes something more than an amusement – it becomes culture”. Capon gives an answer as to how our experience in the created world can be formed into communal expression, which can ‘speak into being’ cultural incarnations that point to Christ.

Though Sayers probably overemphasizes “self-expression” through her metaphor of artist as creator, self-expression in our current cultural context can never be fully removed from art-making. Wolterstorff tends to overlook the power of art to effectively and peacefully communicate the thoughts and ideas of the artist. The type of dialogue that happens through art making and art viewing is a mode of communication that is more congruent to peaceful dialogue than pure dialectic. This is not to say that art, in its nature, is immune to being violent. But there is something to be said about the peacefulness of contemplative art. Contemplation of the arts can persuade the viewer to slow down and to open him or herself to what another has to say.

What can be said of both Sayers and Wolterstorff is that creation is of utmost importance when contemplating the meaning and the practical outworking of the arts. For Sayers creation is important because of what it says about the artist as one made in the image of God. For Wolterstorff creation is important because it is the context in which one takes up the vocation of the artist as well as the very media with which the artist works. In order to synthesize these two poles, one must look at what Jeremy Begbie presents as a theologically expanded view of the relationship between creation and creativity. It is one that can serve as both a synthesis and critique of Sayers and Wolterstorff.

Labels: art, Begbie, creation, creativity, culture, faith, peace, Sayers, Wolterstorff

Labels: environment, ethics, just for fun, space, video

I've been asked to share a little bit of what I've been learning over the last couple months, and though I wish I had time to write something that is not directly connected to classwork, it has become apparent that that will not happen!! The following is a couple excerpts from a paper I've been working on for The Christian Imagination with Loren Wilkenson which focuses on the work of Nicholas Wolterstorff, Dorothy Sayers, Annie Dillard, and Jeremy Begbie (I would highly recommend reading Jeremy Begbie - I plan to take a class from him this summer!) seen through my own personal and cultural background. So that is the context for the next few posts... For more interesting material you should go over to Paul's blog where he's posted a video of Noah singing along with Karsten!

* * * * *

The church my Russlander great grandfather built is located forty kilometers northwest of Saskatoon. It is a simple whitewashed wooden structure with a green tin roof, sitting double-steepled atop a hill surrounded by rolling fields of canola. The interior is painted a muted light green and well-worn pews stained rich sepia by the long years line each side of the sanctuary. The floors are scuffed and rich as the pews while the gothic shaped windows draw the eye upwards to the unadorned vaulted ceiling. This was the center of communal life for this small Russlander community. It was here that milestones, both in life and death, were marked and seen as a testament of God’s grace at work in the world. This year the church that my great grandfather built is closing in order to move the congregation to the community center of the town nearby. The hope is that, by moving their place of worship nearer to town, the church can better serve the community and fulfill its missional role.

For the Anabaptist ‘peace’ is central to the understanding of the church’s role in the world. But there is a tenuous relationship between living as a peaceful presence in the world and the responsibility to speak into a world where violence reigns. My own denomination has been strongly influenced by the evangelical impulse. It was this impulse that led the leaders of my great grandfather’s church to transition from German to English services and eventually encouraged many congregants to move into urban centers and take up secular careers like my grandfather who became a public school principle. Anabaptist communities, like the Mennonites of central Saskatchewan, are no longer tied to the land as they once were, and as such the community commitment to traditions of craft, music, and community life have begun to wane. And though these demographic and cultural shifts are reflections of greater trends in Canadian society, I wonder if the Anabaptist commitment to peace will be unable to find physical form as these traditionally counter cultural communities become like everyone else. There is no denying that balancing relevant cultural and social engagement with the Anabaptist commitment to live as a ‘city on a hill’ is a difficult tension to maintain. And perhaps this tension between “against culture” and “in agreement with culture” needs to be laid aside for a more embodied and incarnational encounter. The question I want to ask is what does a peaceful aesthetic look like?

It seems appropriate, when trying to develop my own understanding of the arts founded in Anabaptist practice and culture, to begin with Wolterstorff. The very little that has been written on the arts from an Anabaptist perspective has focused primarily on the work of Wolterstorff for his strong affirmation of the materiality of art-making and responsibility of the artist as one who actively building shalom. This philosophy of arts finds its foundation in the creation narrative. The earth is humanity’s home and Adam (literally “earthling” in Hebrew) is charged with responsibility over Creation. His duty as a creature is to be creation’s “gardener”, to shape and order nature, for the purpose of supporting human flourishing. This vocation is understood as threefold: first to God, then to humanity, and finally to creation itself. Shalom can be understood as the harmonious condition of all three relationships. Material art objects are active expressions of this ‘shalom building’, and are not primarily a means of personal expression or what Wolterstorff labels as “objects of disinterested contemplation”.

No culture has existed without the arts, and certainly Anabaptist and Mennonite communities are no exception. There are several very positive affirmations one can make of this distinct cultural aesthetic. The aesthetic of the Mennonite tradition is one that is grounded in the created world. It shows an appreciation for functionality and the everyday, specifically of the traditional work of the household and the community. This creative work of the household is most often observed in the form of ‘craft’. From Wolterstorff’s perspective craft is worthy and admirable as a way in which humanity has answered the call to steward creation because it is so strongly tied to purpose and action and usually functions as a vehicle for enriching human life. Seerveld, another author from the Dutch Reformed tradition, takes the value of craft and the creative work of the household farther. He writes that living an aesthetically obedient life includes choosing hand made and home made objects mass produced objects of consumption. The simplicity of Mennonite furniture, the practices of gardening and canning, harmony in hymn singing, quilting and stitch work all are facets of a rich aesthetic tradition grounded in a respect for creation that does not often get the credit it deserves. Unfortunately, in the last fifty years true and thoughtful functionality have been consistently laid aside for convenience and productivity. Seerveld strongly labels this value of productivity and convenience over an aesthetic that values creation “Baal Worship”. One only needs to consider the bland anesthetic cityscape of midwestern suburbia, which is more suitable to a lifestyle of consumption than to wholistic human living, to understand what Seerveld is describing.

From what Seerveld and Wolterstorff write, interaction with ‘space’ and ‘land’ are good indicators as to whether or not we are fully embodying our human vocation. A box store or strip mall is an example of space shaped by consumerism, whereas space which demonstrates a “dynamic wholeness” is at peace with human life and the created world. “Dynamic wholeness” does not necessarily mean opulence or extravagance. Though my great grandfather’s church is primarily an example of restraint and minimalism, this does not make it less obedient in an aesthetic sense. The aesthetics of restraint, subtlety, and symmetry are all appropriate in their own context, especially when considering how minimalism is in aesthetic agreement with the prairie landscape. A simple well-built church may be a more aesthetically obedient choice than an ornate Cathedral, dependant of course on the environmental and cultural circumstances. This being said, minimalism and simplicity should not be confused with aesthetic poverty exemplified in the box store inspired mega churches of suburbia.

Not only have our spaces for living working and worshipping become aesthetically malnourished, our society has become increasingly withdrawn from the creative process as a whole. We no longer live as creative and aesthetic people, rather we choose to consume product of mass-production and seldom engage in the creative making ourselves. Something profound is lost in such a radical transformation. We are no longer at peace with creation, our neighbor, our Creator, but live as detached people without a homeland. Our living spaces reflect this alienation. The suburbs (created to allow people of means to escape the violence of the city), where people are relegated to their own plots of land detached from the places they work and do business, ironically create an environment where violence can occur unchecked because there is no sense of relationship or community in the suburb. The absence of relationship cultivates violence.

Labels: aesthetics, consumerism, land, peace

Just thought I'd give a little plug for my friend Shannon's show coming up on November 4, 4:30-7:30. She'll be exhibiting her work along with the other participants from the By/For residency. The By/For Project is a really cool idea to help churches become patrons of the arts. Several churches pool together funds to sponsor the project, the proceeds of which will be split between the artists and the churches. The project then tours among the sponsoring churches (and Regent College). So come on out to see some great art and to visit with the artists (Also, check out Shannon's blog which includes a video)!

Labels: art, by/for, faith, regent college

A certain category near the top of my "things to do before I turn thirty" list was successfully checked off last night.