Tag Archives: art

Throwback Sundays…Squashing creativity & lots of questions

When I was a child I had big dreams. I created with abandon. I didn’t care what people thought. Somewhere along the way I learned that creating & dreaming meant risk and that risk was bad. And that everyone would simply laugh at me if I failed. And they encouraged me to just do what was safe. And so I did.

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard a musing similar to that in the last couple of months. It makes me kinda sad. I think it’s great that we’re aware of our society’s tendency to kill creativity and that we want to try to change that that future generations. But how? (full post here)

I’m still asking that question. Suggestions?

In Between

What do you do with the space in between?
The space between your dreams & the perhaps not so shiny daily reality.
The seemingly large chasm between here & there.
Between what you want & what you have.
The gap between the life you were designed to live & the live you’re living.
What do you do with the space between a Kingdom that is here & not yet?
A hope that is realized & yet to come.
The gray space between the darkness & the light.
What do you do with the space in between? The kind of space that creates tension. 

I think we usually do one of three things:

  1. Make a choice. Pick one side or the other. Simply to alleviate the tension.
  2. Attempt to run out of the space in a completely different direction.
  3. Wait. Sit in the space. Accept the tension. And wait.

Number one often leads to poor choices that we end up wishing we could hit the rewind button on at some point. The second often leads to the same thing. Before we know it the life we’re living looks nothing like the one we know we were created for. 

The third option? It may be the hardest & most immediately painful of all. But, I’m convinced it’s also the most rewarding. And even more than that, the tension of the space in between may be the birth place of some of our greatest creativity. 

So I encourage you to sit in the space. But don’t just sit there. Ask God to meet you in the space. Learn from it. And more importantly, fill it. Fill the space with beauty through your art. Extinguish the darkness with the light. You may just discover that the space was not as unwelcoming as you once thought…that it didn’t want you to stay anymore than you wanted to be there. And before you know it, you might look back to find that you’ve created your way out of it.

 What do YOU do with the space in between?

*** This post was inspired by the Luminous Project. Luminous is an event in Nashville for creatives on May 9-11, 2012. To find out more, check out luminousproject.com. You can use the promo code ‘luminousLOVE’ to get 30% off the ticket price. ***

 

In the Peripherals

Beauty often resides in the peripherals of our lives. We walk past such humble miracles, such as the babe in the manger, in a little village of Bethlehem, all the time. In the frantic pace of life, we need to slow down & simply observe natural forces around us & create out of that experience. What makes us truly human may not be how fast we are able to accomplish a task but what we experience fully, carefully, and quietly in the process. 

Artists are often found at the margins of society, but they are, like the shepherds, often the first to notice the miracles taking place right in front of us. Since sensationalism, power, & wealth dominate our cultural imaginations, we may not be willing to journey to the ephemeral, as the Japanese poets of old have, to see beauty in the disappearing lines or to see poetry in the drying puddle of water. The world seems to demand of us artist-types that we be able to explain & justify our actions, but often the power & mystery of art & life cannot be explained by normative words. 

My art reaches for the heavenly reality via earthly materials. The intuitive core of my creativity, like the shepherds’ hearts drawn to the birth of a Savior, simply desires to pay homage to the mystery of the moment. Lest we miss the birth of a Savior. Lest we fail to glimpse the glory of heaven hidden beneath the earth.”

Mako Fujimura “Refractions” pg. 27-28

Beauty in the peripherals.

That is what it seems Christmas is all about in the end. The beauty of paradox. Of mystery. The beauty of a heavenly King submitting, as a Son, to the authority of His Father & being born a baby…a baby who was The Word, the Light. A baby through whom the world…the universe…was created. A baby with that much power & glory born a human birth in a messy stable. From the beginning it seems He was demonstrating that His presence won’t erase the mess, but it will help to illuminate the beauty to be found in the middle of the mess. 

I don’t know about you, but for me it never seems to fail. I stop for a day or two to celebrate Christmas but as soon as December 26th hits it’s back to the races. Soon I find myself caught up in the “frantic pace of life” & walking past the humble miracles. The artist in me longs to slow & ponder the miracles. Longs to really truly see. To find, everyday, the beauty of heaven in the mess of life. 

This Christmas season, I’m resolving to slow a little bit longer…to look a little bit harder…to ponder the miracles…to find the beauty in the peripheral messes of life.

Will you join me? 

From “A Letter to Artists”

As someone who values & appreciates art, who believes art & beauty can be significant in a journey of faith, I’m often looking for meaningful thoughts & writing on the such things. I took some time to read Pope John Paul’s letter to artists recently & wanted to share a couple of my favorite parts.

“…I intend to follow the path of the fruitful dialogue between the Church and artists which has gone on unbroken through two thousand years of history, and which still, at the threshold of the Third Millennium, offers rich promise for the future.”

“Those who perceive in themselves this kind of divine spark which is the artistic vocation—as poet, writer, sculptor, architect, musician, actor and so on—feel at the same time the obligation not to waste this talent but to develop it, in order to put it at the service of their neighbour and of humanity as a whole.”

“Artists who are conscious of all this know too that they must labour without allowing themselves to be driven by the search for empty glory or the craving for cheap popularity, and still less by the calculation of some possible profit for themselves.”

“Every genuine art form in its own way is a path to the inmost reality of man and of the world. It is therefore a wholly valid approach to the realm of faith, which gives human experience its ultimate meaning. That is why the Gospel fullness of truth was bound from the beginning to stir the interest of artists, who by their very nature are alert to every “epiphany” of the inner beauty of things.”

“The ‘beautiful’ was thus wedded to the ‘true’, so that through art too souls might be lifted up from the world of the senses to the eternal.”

“Even when they explore the darkest depths of the soul or the most unsettling aspects of evil, artists give voice in a way to the universal desire for redemption.”

“Art has a unique capacity to take one or other facet of the message and translate it into colours, shapes and sounds which nourish the intuition of those who look or listen. It does so without emptying the message itself of its transcendent value and its aura of mystery.”

“What an impoverishment it would be for art to abandon the inexhaustible mine of the Gospel!”

“I appeal especially to you, Christian artists: I wish to remind each of you that, beyond functional considerations, the close alliance that has always existed between the Gospel and art means that you are invited to use your creative intuition to enter into the heart of the mystery of the Incarnate God and at the same time into the mystery of man.”

Beauty is a key to the mystery and a call to transcendence. It is an invitation to savour life and to dream of the future. That is why the beauty of created things can never fully satisfy. It stirs that hidden nostalgia for God which a lover of beauty like Saint Augustine could express in incomparable terms: ‘Late have I loved you, beauty so old and so new: late have I loved you!’.”

If you have an interest in art & beauty & faith, I encourage you to take a few minutes to read the letter in it’s entirety!!

In the meantime, any thoughts on the excerpts above? 

A Book for the Soul of an Artist

I first heard of Gary Molander when I read “The Idiot’s Guide to Church Burnout” on CollideMagazine.com. That was January 16th, 2010. I know because that’s the day I clipped the article into Evernote. It was also a day that was a dot in a picture that a couple of months later God would connect.

The last line of the article I read that day haunted me “I want to be clear. Burnout is a very real thing. I’m not questioning its existence. I’m questioning its root cause. And I really don’t think the root cause is being overworked and underpaid. I think the primary cause is our inability to marry our deepest God-given passions and desires to a structure or organization where we honestly believe that God can change the world through us.” It haunted me because that’s exactly where I was. But I was no where near being ready to admit it.

Fast forward a year…almost exactly…it was January 20th, 2011. I know because the magic of technology tracks things like that on emails. Gary emailed to say he was working on a book “Pursuing Christ. Creating Art.” and he wanted me to write an introduction to a chapter on the Church. At this point, and even up to the point that I sent that piece to Gary, we had never had a face to face conversation. To say I was humbled is an understatement.

Gary may not have the title “pastor” at any church. In fact he writes in his book “I think it’s a really good thing I’m not a pastor anymore…” But, Gary is a pastor at heart. And he is a pastor especially to artists because as an artist himself he understands that wiring & what it means to experience life from that corner of the world.

In “Pursuing Christ. Creating Art.” Gary time & again reminds us that it’s not about us. He speaks from a knowing & broken place as an artist himself but one he refuses to wallow in. He validates the emotions of artists but challenges all of us not to use them as an excuse. An excuse for anger, bitterness, divisiveness, inaction, & more.

In sharing his own stories, experiences, & struggles as an artist Gary encourages each of us to take heart, & to remember that we are first & foremost children of God. At the end of the way, that is what matters. And at the end of the day misplacing our identity in anything or anyone else will leave us producing false art.

There are so many incredible “one-liners” from the book I could fill this post up with, but I’d rather encourage you to read them for yourself in the context of the book. You can pick up a copy here.

I think we all need to be reminded, from time to time, to wholeheartedly pursue Christ while creating art rather than getting lost in a pursuit of art that leaves us unintentionally creating Christ. 

*Image taken from the e-confessional companion guide for the book. It’s beautiful. And helpful. Check it out here