conjectural navel gazing; jesus in lint form

Well, I don't know what L'Engle is thinking, but I don't believe that religiousness is an objective quality. But neither is it a subjective quality. It lies outside the subject-object dichotomy, as does all things that are truly of God, of which art is but one.

Heavens, you've got me thinking along lines that will take me a week to put together, by which time this post will be old news.

God reaches us where we are.

Icons don't do much for me, but I love Dali's version of the Last Supper. I find much of the 1982 Hymnal to be just so much old music, but there are hymns (along with some of the old spirituals) that bring tears to my eyes, so sure am I that God is in the music. On the other hand, there are songs by pop bands that grab me in nearly the same way, but contemporary Christian music generally strikes me a just so much pap.

So, if you want to call that subjective, feel free. It doesn't make it any less real.

Is the revelatory nature of godly art ever and only discerned by personal experience? If you or I think it revelatory of God, is it? Or is such revelation ever and only discerned by God's community? Whether or not you or I think it revelatory of God, does the community think so?

Those are the questions I have. How does God act within art? I think God must have some independence, but I am not sure how that would be expressed within the bounds of our given conversation.

"How does God act within art?" I'd say, "However God wants." And quite possibly, differently for every person who experiences the art.

I don't think art can force Jesus, or any other manifestation of God, on any given viewer.

Viewers like L'Engle who are already committed to Jesus can find their commitment supported and strengthened by artistic experiences. But if an unbeliever hears the St. Matthew Passion (for example) and is deeply moved in his/her heart, that doesn't automatically mean that that person will convert to believing in divinity.

Tripp, what do you perceive "the bounds of our given conversation" to be?

This is just off the top of my head and due to some recent reading I am doing on the origins of Modernism and thus, postmodernism etc.
So, well, L'Engle seems to be seeking in art what Kant sought in the categories of understanding. Some universal place where various competing ideas could stand and find agreement. L'Engle sounds very much the Modern here. If you interpret her correctly she wants to find God, Father Son and Holy Spirit, in all art that deserves the name. Now while I don't seek to tell God where God can and cannont appear, I think it is also mistaken to say that God simply and purely can be found in all art without destinction. I think there probably is a taste bias in L'Engle, which allows her to make certain claims about the "spiritual" in all art.
Taste is inevitable in our evaluation of art though (and here I agree with Kant) our evaluation of art should be something other than simple taste. Kant says this is disinterestedness, L'Engle seems to say its... well I am not sure .. the spiritual? ( I disagree with both)
Wes brings up the problem of subjective evaluation and it goes back to Kant of subjectivity and evaluation especially of such things as Art.
The problem is that there is a very real subjective component to art, what appeals to one doesn't to another, this is taste. Unfortuantely since we seek to evaluate all art without destinction we have difficulty escaping the evaluation of art based solely on the basis taste (which are very real experiences and can lead one into religious emotive states).
I would appeal to function (here I am following the ideas of the philosopher whose name I am forgetting at the moment). Icons because of both technical/artistic and theological development have a very specific function and purpose that distinguishes them from most forms of modern and contemporary art. Pop art functions differently from fine art Rock and Roll serves a different purpose from Chant or Baroque or Clasical music. I am moved by a variety of music and art each in a different way. However Icons were just relics of the past untill I understood their purpose and the theology that made them possible.
There is then of course the question of technique and expertise. Again I will say it seems that L'Engles appraoch is reductionistic and does not take seriously the complexity of the phenenom we lable art.

Tripp, I think it is possibly a mistaken question to ask how does God act within art as if "art" were one singular thing. It seems to me that God's relation to Icons is different than his relation to a Rothko painting or a Dali piece. Though I may draw parallels and even these destinctions sometimes blur. Though in the Case of Dali his work at times approaches the Iconographic, but it seems to me it is because his purpose at times approaches the purpose of Iconography. I am thinking of his works the Last Supper, St John of the Cross, and a third cucifixion painting whose name I am forgeting. However, there are destincitions.
Also, to some degree Christians are not asked to identify how God act is in some abstract and general way but to witness to God's acts in history as ultimately revealed in Jesus Christ. A part of the purpose of the Icon.

We should also make sure we clearly define/describe art. It it paintings, music, drama? But what about the ornate working on saddles? The unseen copings on cathedrals? Are gargoyles revelatory in the way that excess fringe (or whatever it's called) on a bridle is?

Cliff:

I would say that, for L'Engle, all creative endeavor is "art." That is the definition that I have been running with. She does not define it so clearly, but there you go.

She lists Bach, Mozart, Reuben, Shakespeare, Tolstoy and myriad others to play in this wide notion of art.

If all creative endeavor is art, which I'd be willing to run with, then I think it is impossible to speak singularly about the relationship between God and the artist, and the artist and art and God and art.
We can talk about fruit and can talk about what is a fruit verses a vegtable but Tomatoes Plums peaches and Kiwis are all fruit, and I only cook pasta sauce from one of them. Also, A farmer grows all of them very differently and they all grow best under very different conditions.

Larry: I disagree. I think L'Engle is right that God is revealed in all "true art"...the reveklation makes it true. And that revelation is to the same purpose: the revelation of Christ to the world.

But I even irk myself by stating that I agree with her. The trouble I have is that I am not so certain that our intention/skill as artists is the last word in the creation of art.

I am gonna play the Baptist card and say that Dali's work and the icons created for specific religious use can have the same status (True Icons) in spite of the intention of the creator. Again because God is free to act and because the person receiving the art is free to respond to it, be moved by it, pray into it if so desired.

An icon, "The Holy Spirit" serves here, is only wood and patina until the viewer and God enter the picture. The intention of the artist means little. I always enjoyed icons as a sort of folk art until I decided to pray with them. My intention had to change. It was not until then that it became true art. Until then it was simply pretty.

Megan:

Re: "bounds"

I was refering to our musing on the "Incarnation" and how we have been playing in that.

All "True Art" is revelatory of Christ? Hmm. This doesn't match up with the varieties of meaning and purposes that art can funtion as.

This may be true in some broad sense.
I simply don't accept that making a destincition between Dali's work and an icon, is limiting God, rather it is seeking to understand difference and its function.

As for the perception of the individual: perception can be mistaken. Or perception can see byond because of what is brought to it, what happens for me when I view Giger's work. I see beyond his intent but my appreciation of Giger is really inspite of Giger not because of his art.
I see Christ revealed in Giger but I wouldn't recomend Giger be hung in church. Though Giger moves me very deeply, because there are other things besides God at work. This is also true in Dali.
One of the points of iconagraphy is to so focus art so as to leave only the revelation of Christ, so the Spirit can transform wood and pigmant and form. This is why an Icon can be approached in prayer without reservation.
Dali may move me to prayer or revernce but I would only pray before a Dalin painting with caution filtering out that which is extraneous to Christ.

Tripp:

You wrote: "An icon, "The Holy Spirit" serves here, is only wood and patina until the viewer and God enter the picture. The intention of the artist means little. I always enjoyed icons as a sort of folk art until I decided to pray with them. My intention had to change. It was not until then that it became true art. Until then it was simply pretty."

Based on this, and the tenor of your comments, you seem to be saying that the individual, not the community, determine what art is or is not revelatory.

I would say that the icon was always revelatory, even if you never would have seen it. But I say that not because of my own individual experience, but because this is what the community says.

That doesn't mean the individual is irrelevant, but I wonder how far you can take your paradigm. Shall we put "Piss Christ" in the home icon corner, because some individual finds it revelatory? Shall we put it in the church? Why or why not?

Chicken/egg, Cliff. You may experience it through what the community says, but there is a historical reality to encourage that. The icon was there before you were.

It has to be both. In the instance of an icon, one that has served a religious purpose, been bless and sanctified, certainly the is a community involved. But you, the individual, had to enter into that for it to be an icon for you. No?

Also, once upon a time these things were just paintings until someone(s) intention toward them moved toward the sacred. They were an invention of the church...and more than likely, the invention of a single person within it.

But I dunno the history.

Was the decision of the community entirely arbitrary? Or is there the possibility, Tripp, that iconography developed into and is what it si because there is something that differentiates icons from other art?
After all there is still the issue of whether any peice of art can be prayed to/with/infront of? What art is appropriate to use in worship and prayer?
This is at least where I see Cliff's questions taking us.
The Orthodox at least believe they have settled that question. I agree and think that is a good thing, and in fact frees us up and God. It is a limit that liberates.

Icons have a liturgical purpose, a role in prayer and discipleship that is unique. Yes. And, I must confess, that I do not know the history nor the roots of praying with icons. But I am not sure that undermines my point.

There is a communal affirmation and and individual action. Ya gotta have both.

You could decide to hang Dali's "Crucifixion" on the wall of a church. Then the community could decide whether or not to pray with it as one would a traditional icon.

I have a hard time understanding any tradition that says "DON'T pray with/in front of/because you are moved by this thing."

Why on earth would a tradition tell its participants NOT to pray?

These are mostly rhetorical questions from one who has no loyalty or attachment to any denomination.

And p.s., I was waiting for someone to bring up "Piss Christ." :-)

Were you surprised it was me? Or did that just reinforce all your perceptions and images?

(Hey, if you knew my daughter, it would really blow your mind that I'm her father!)

Neither -- or, the only impression of you that it reinforced was that you're a smart, educated man.

Awwwww, go on!

Piss Christ?

Description here, http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Piss%20Christ

and not-so-good picture here:

http://www.usc.edu/schools/annenberg/asc/projects/comm544/library/images/502.html

Megan,
I think you reversed my point, which may be useful to explore. However, it was not that the tradition tells not to pray, but that it tells what is most beneficial most apporpriate to pray with/to/infront of. There is a distinction here but it is an important one I think.
However, there are religious traditions that do in fact tell their adherents not to pray in front of/with/to images, Judaism and Islam come to mind. One can argue that certain forms of Buddhism do as well, though this is controvertial since statues abound even in the iconoclastic tradition of Zen buddhism.
The image is not an absolute good nor is art, therefore not all forms of art are necesarily appropriate for the purposes that a religious tradition invites its adherents. For Judaism and Islam representational images obscure the transcendence of God, thus art must be limited and restricted. Orthodoxy similarly restricts art that is reserved for prayer and meditation. These restrictions are only negative if the individual has absolute priority.

Baptists are, at least philisophically, iconoclast. No images. No way.

"However, it was not that the tradition tells not to pray, but that it tells what is most beneficial most apporpriate to pray with/to/infront of." This isn't what you said at first, so I wasn't so much reversing your point as failing to understand it (as you failed to state it clearly) in the first place.

If a denomination can't make the distinction between praying TO an image and being moved to pray BY THE INFLUENCE OF an image, then I have no use for that denomination. But then, I have no use for most denominations, so that will surprise exactly no one. :-)

"These restrictions are only negative if the individual has absolute priority." Which I think the individual almost does -- second to the absolute priority of God -- as it is the individual who will stand before the judgment seat and have to answer for his/her choices -- to pray or not to pray, to worship or not to worship, to give to the poor or not to give to the poor, to work for justice or not to work for justice, etc. It's not any church that's going to be standing there, it's an individual soul.