I am at the Willow Creek Arts Conference this week. It's always one of the highlights of my year. There is something so comforting about being surrounding by people who are all artists of varying degrees, to be in community with right-brained people, to feel the collective sigh of appreciation over a great piece of art.
So here are some thoughts. I think art is the most subjective subject ever created. Even artists can't all agree on what constitutes as art. The great tragedy of this is that if artists don't value each other, the chances of the world at large valuing us is increasingly diminished. Art is frequently viewed as frivolous, an extraneous form of expression, by people who don't "get" art. For me, art is like breathing fresh air when you've had months and months of coldness, rain, or excessive humidity...that fresh air just sweeps through everything in you and restores the soul to a place of hope in the goodness that really does exist in the world. Art does that for me. Without it, I would be even more cynical than I already am.
I also think that art has the power to change the world. No, really. Hang with me here. Art in all its forms--film, literature, painting, sculpture, music--can impact cultures and political systems. I just finished writing a paper on the effects that a new kind of criticism can change our perceptions of the environment and the role we as humans play in its destruction, restoration, and preservation. Everything is interconnected, and the more we realize it, the better off we will be. Art gives us a reason to appreciate the beauty of the world. It gives us reason to take notice of God's miraculous creation and to place our lives in the context of something bigger and better than ourselves. We cannot isolate ourselves from the world. Not in any manner--politically, socially, environmentally. We live in this world, and ultimately it's God's world, not ours. What have we done? How can we rectify our human history? How does art change our perceptions?
These are the questions I ask myself. I also have a rant about the state of the English language...but I will save that for another time and post.
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we are falling through the cracks every minute of our lives... i want to witness the dawn and the dusk and the spaces in between... i am learning daily the art of observation...
3 comments:
If it is true that decisions are 5 parts emotional and one part rational then it only stands to reason (ironic) that art is the way to change the world! I agree.
P.S. Don't forget - teaching is also an art.
Art has the ability to move the soul in ways no other medium can. I can remember years ago viewing a Wyeth painting in a Vermont museum and later viewing a Cassatt at the Art Institute. Both moved me to tears and I can't paint the outside of a house! On an emotional level, art affects our very being. Whether in the form of a painting, a piece of music or a great movie, you walk away thinking. To this day when I hear the music from Schindler's List, I get tears in my eyes because I remember the inhumanity of the Holocaust and the courage of people like Schindler who took a stand. All you need to do is watch that film and say, Never again.
Charrrrr????
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