“Art for Art’s Sake…”

Art.

  Something to be positive about.  Something to celebrate.  Something, I would like to argue, that has a concrete definition. 

I tried to begin this blog a few days ago, and here’s how I started: 

What is art?  Is it an expression of one’s emotions so that the abstract feelings inside someone come to the surface and are put down into something concrete and visible?  Is it creative communication of one’s ideas?  What is its purpose?  To make one feel good, to help one understand himself, to communicate truth, to teach a lesson, to have fun?  What a myriad of ideas are contained in this one little three-letter word! 

I’d been challenged to write a blog about art, but when I sat down to do it I got all befuddled and walked away more confused than I had started.   I was trying to define what I meant by the statement “art for art’s sake,” and wanted to point out that when the Christian artist waters down his art to promote Christianity, it quickly becomes offensive and hollow.  But I couldn’t find the words to express what I meant, and started implying things like that the gospel shouldn’t be central to what an artist does.  So should the gospel penetrate everything we do, every piece of art we create, or should we ignore the gospel to go for “pure art, for art’s sake”? 

Since that discouraging and confusing attempt at writing, I have been helped so much by H.R. Rookmaaker, who wrote a chapter at the end of Modern Art and the Death of a Culture[1] entitled “Faith and Art.”  He seemed to agree with my idea: “…art must never be used to show the validity of Christianity.”  But then he completes his paragraph with an aspect I had entirely missed: “Rather the validity of art should be shown through Christianity” (228).  He implies that art, in its truest sense, is never something that is contrary to the gospel.  Instead, the Truth we find in the pages of Scripture is what makes art true art.  The Truth of scripture is to every area of life what water is to the oak tree.  Water not only draws the roots of the tree deep into the earth, securing the tree to the ground, but also reaches up and flows into every branch, every joint, every leaf, nourishing them and giving them life.  Even the most outwardly autonomous branch, the one that grows down rather than up, only remains a live branch when the water is flowing through it.  Thus, even art, which by all appearances defies the boundaries of truth and tangibility, is only truly art when it finds its source in Truth. 

Good art, therefore, must be in compliance with Truth and reality.  And a Christian artist should be the best at creating that type of art, because he has access to the Source of all Truth (Creator God), and His infallible Word. 

Rookmaaker says it well again:

 …Christian art is not art that uses biblical or other Christian themes.…No, what is Christian in art does not lie in the theme, but in the spirit of it, in its wisdom and the understanding of reality it reflects.  Just as being a Christian does not mean going round singing hallelujah all day, but showing the renewal of one’s life by Christ through true creativity, so a Christian painting is not one in which all the figures have haloes and (if we put our ears to the canvas) can be heard singing hallelujahs (228).

So my challenge to the Christian artist, and to myself as a Christian-writer-artist, is this: portray reality.  Create, and write about, only what is True.  Be careful of distorting reality to make Christianity, or life, more attractive.  Beware of the Thomas Kinkade-style of art that gives the false message: the Christian life is like a comfortable cottage with a fireplace and a river flowing by, worry-less and trouble-free.  Paint things that are beautiful, but that are beautiful because they are real.  The way Jesus loves us is the most beautiful thing in the world, but that doesn’t mean we should paint Him on the cross scar-less and blood-free.  Often it is pain and suffering that makes a thing beautiful – don’t ignore those things. 

Art for art’s sake?  Art in its truest form, adhering to the rules of reality and Truth.  Art that stems from the Truth rather than utilitarian art that thrashes in the dark to teach morality.

 

Christian art is nothing special.  It is sound, healthy, good art.  It is art that is in line with the God-given structures of art, one which is good and true (Rookmaaker 228).

Art has a meaning as art because God thought it good to give art and beauty to humanity (230).

It would be false to say that art is only good if it promotes Christianity.  That would be a perverted kind of utilitarianism. 

If we are going to use art for these specifically Christian purposes – adorning a church, or attracting the unbeliever – then we must see that the art we use is really good.

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[1] H.R. Rookmaaker, Modern Art and the Death of a Culture (Wheaton: Crossway Books, 1973), 225-52