Beauty and Worship: Art for Play, part 2

Art for Play, Awe, and Wonder

We are talking about discovering, enjoying, uncovering, celebrating God’s creation, the beauty of the world.

'land of milk and honey'

“Now as Erich Fromm wrote in his meaningful book "The Art of Loving", the earth is always symbolized as a woman (mother earth) and according to the Old Testament, the Promised Land is the land of "Milk and Honey". Here Fromm says that any mother can feed her child with milk, a liquid that gives life and symbolizes the acceptance of life and growth but rarely, truly rarely can one find a mother who feeds her child with honey too, a substance so sweet that bequeaths love for life. What Fromm meant was that a true mother would give her child the ability to accept and then above all to love life.

'Art for play' or 'Art for awe/wonder' are ways of trying to talk about those forms of art making which are primarily about enjoying life and experiencing it more deeply. About getting in the mud and playing with the good materials of the world. The lost art of Alchemy was something like this, engaging in direct and joyful observation of how beautiful the colors, textures, and interactions of elements are. (See James Elkins book, 'What painting is' for a great discussion of the similarities of painting an alchemy.)

The mode of play and experimentation with the materials of creation give us the intimate knowledge necessary for all the other forms of art.



This was an old window frame set up like a table. I places sand in it and let the kids from the valley center draw in the sand while took continuous still images. The images were turned into this video. These 'Sand trap drawings' are an example of art for play. They are low risk and fun giving the kids a means of discovery, and feeling successful. The finished product is not the point as much as the simple pleasure of playing in the sand.

Picasso had a famous long exposure shot where you see him drawing (from when the flash went off) and you see a bull drawn with a light (created during the long exposure in the dark). These are not original but a way of playing with light.

This one was done with the boys on the streets.

This is an image produced by 'KIDS with CAMERAS' Our Sierra Leone Beauty and Brokenness photos were another great example of giving the kids a chance to play and discover what happens when you take pictures. The results may turn into advocacy naturally but there is important reflection that is happening in the process of playing with a camera.

Here are more examples of 'Art for Play' that have appeared on this blog already. Another great example was Caleb Coppock and one of the boys from the boys home playing with the reflections of sunlight in CD’s. I found Ron playing with bubbles with the kids at the center. The question of when does play turn into art is a good question, but maybe we should just start with acknowledging that great art always starts in a celebration of materials, of discovery of textures and colors. Jackson Pollock is a straightforward example. Here are some other art for play examples...


I find the simple structure of the Hiku a liberating low key way to experiment with words and ideas.

Retreat Haiku May 2005

1

Leaflets jump for joy

When through the umbrella comes

Spattering wet joy

2

Grace curving through limb

Raising leaves high to the sun

Gentle bow his hymn

4

Frogs green jokers laugh,

Mountains water gathering

And wind make my bath

5

Straight backed noble grass

Tips its hat in river wind

Roaring green applause

Also, reflective journaling, brainstorming, writing about events of the day are great ways to dig into the raw materials of your life. Other ways to playing in the mud might be working in clay, paint, charcoal, carving, making noises, sounds. All the baby talk of infants is their way of finding their voice, figuring out what combinations of air flow and air stopping makes what kinds of sound. Without this experimentation it is difficult to learn to speak.

In Art for play we are gathering raw materials, learning to enjoy them, use them, delight in them. we play in the sand, clay, and mud learning their inner properties. It is necessary for any artist to 'baby talk', to play in the mud, to be an alchemist wondering at the beauty of the stuff of the world before she can find her voice and articulate a beautiful idea for the love of God and community.

Beauty and Worship: Introduction, part 1

I have debated about how post some of the materials from a talk I gave the the Word Made Flesh staff in the summer of 2007. The workshop included staff from the many different Word Made Flesh Fields, a few have formal art training but most just seemed curious about finding and sharing ways that art may be a part of our lives seeking Christ among the worlds poor. I will try to cover the basic material in a series of blog posts. So here is the "Introduction to Beauty and Worship"...

Introduction to "Beauty and Worship Workshop"

1.Working Definitions for "Beauty" and of "Worship"


I am not a theologian primarily but an artist. I do believe in relying on the wisdom of great theologians, so I hope that my best guesses are informed ones.

Beauty = Diversity in Unity

Maximum Beauty = Maximum diversity in Unity

Worship = Gathering and offering back to God a transfigured creation

These are obviously short and over simplified definitions, so lets look into Chutnification to clear up some other issues before we start...

2. Chutnification and Aesthetic experience

“What is required for chutnification? Raw materials, obviously—fruit, vegetables, fish, vinegar, spices. Daily visits from Koli women with their saris hitched up between their legs. Cucumbers aubergines mint. But also: eyes, blue as ice, which are undeceived by the superficial blandishments of fruit-- which can see corruption beneath citris-skin; fingers which, with feathriest touch, can probe the secret inconstant hearts of green tomatoes; and above all a nose capable of discerning the hidden languages of what-must-be-pickled, its humors and messages and emotions. . . at Bragzana Pickles, I supervise the production of Mary's legendary recipes; but there are also my special blends, in which thanks to the powers of my drained nasal passages, I am able to include memories, dreams, ideas, so that once they enter mass-production all who consume them will know what pepperpots achieved in Pakistan, or how it felt to be in the Sundarbans. . . believe don't believe but its true. Thirty jars stand upon a shelf, waiting to be unleashed upon the amnesiac nation”. –Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children p530

What we find here in the genius of Salmon Rushdie's novel is a great example of the role of the work of art in social life, of gathering and offering back something transformed, and possibly even of worship itself as I conceive of it.

Gathering Raw Materials(fruit, vegetables, fish, vinegar, spices)

+ Focused attention (eyes/nose)

= empathy/insight/compassion( ‘how it felt to be’)

& a sense identity/vision (‘amnesiac nation’, collective memory)

3.The unexperienced experience...

It is often not until we journal that we realize the significance of the events. We are gathering the 'raw materials' of our day and adding focused attention. It is often not until we talk with some one about an experience that we realize its full significance. Again, the dialogue happening with another person is the result of collecting experiences within ourselves, sorting them, reframing them into a new form and making coherent conversation with them. We only then become aware often of the significance of the experience.

We only really experience our experience by processing it. We need a pickle processing plant! To process all the ingredients of our life and to integrate them into a meaningful whole. By ‘pickling it’ the experience changes into a form that transcends time, and can nourish us whenever we have need.

People spend 2-3 seconds per painting at an art museum. By never processing a painting with great concentrated attention, and by not suspending judgment in order to understand the work on its own terms, we manage to pass by hundreds of works of art without ever really experiencing a single one!

In a figure drawing session during college my Prof played Arvo Part’s Te Deum. At the end of the thirty minute piece he and one of the student were crying? I was unaffected at the time. How did I not have the same experience of the piece as they did? I was jealous of whatever it was they heard. There are ways we can prepare ourselves to be able to experience more fully art as well as life itself.

This is what happens on a broader scale when we never take time to reflect, contemplate, pause, to be present in the moment or to reflect on the days experience. We pass through life really experiencing very little. This is possibly scandalous for those claiming to possess passionate love for the Creator of the planet and all the life it possesses.

4.How aesthetic experience works...

It is also important to recognize how aesthetic experience works. This is generalized and applies to approaching a work of literature, a painting, or the beauty of a person. The elements are the same.

letting go (of control of the experience)

+ concentrated attention

=Aesthetic Experience (contemplative experience)

The process of experiencing a work of art and the process of creating a meaningful work of art use the same processes. To create a great jar of pickled chutney and to be able to enjoy it both involve this same gathering and focused surrendered attention.

5.Missing pieces...

It seems clear that much of the world has the absence of consciousness of the plight of the poor. We live as if poverty does not exist, ‘the experience of suffering destitute poor’ is not experienced.

I want to give a wide range of ideas or ways we can engage life, ‘suck the marrow out of life’ as Henry David Thoreau said, really experience life among the poor, survive it, and find the Kingdom of God among the poor.



6.Conclusion

• We need to learn the process of chutnification, of taking the raw materials of our life, our experience among the poor, and of the beauty of the world and offering them back, food for our amnesic selves and our amnesic world.

we need to see that...

• Beauty is gathering together many parts into a meaningful whole.

and that...

• Worship is the uniquely Christian act of gathering in symbolic ways all of creation into a meaningful whole and offering it back to God.

In the future posts I will build on this foundation into...

1. Art for Play (or Awe)
2. Art for Contemplation
3. Art for Therapy
4. Art for Community
5. Art for Advocacy
   

Bach and At Risk Youth



A few days ago we had a little show for the children at risk at the drop in center. From kids trying to survive school on top of life itself to street youth who have recently seen another friend get killed, this time being hit by a car, we had a diverse group. The high light was John Koon playing for us a couple Bach pieces on his cello. The main sound on this clip is him playing Bach's 3rd Suite for Cello in C Major, Movement #6, "Gigue" and of course our group screaming at the end.

I heard an essay titled, Music as Healer, Music as Teacher, written by William Harvey a freshman Julliard violin student who played at a 9-11 Armory shelter in New York city just after the tragedy. He describes how there is something important about music which expresses the inexpressible experiences we all share together.

Though there is horror and even death, beauty gives us the taste of the new heavens and new earth where God overcomes the mess.