One idea I hinted at in my last post is the reasonableness of taking what we are as given, implying that there are certain fundamental aspects of being human which, generally speaking, we can’t not know (or at least without recognition of which we can’t function properly). On a recent visit to artrenewal.org, I read an article passionately and articulately arguing for a certain amount of trust in what our senses tell us about reality, especially as opposed to the Modernist approach to art and the rest of human affairs.
I firmly believe that recapturing a healthy sense of the beautiful (that is, that beauty is real and knowable) is necessary for a sane society. Questions of the transcendentals (truth, beauty, goodness) are critical to an understanding of the human person and his place in the cosmos. ARC Chairman Fred Ross’ commentary on the subject is incisive and insightful:
Modern and Post-modern Art is nihilistic and anti-human. It denigrates humanity along with our hopes, dreams, desires and the real world in which we live. All reference to any of these things is forbidden in the canonistic halls of modernist ideology. We can see that their hallowed halls are a hollow shell, a vacuous, vacant vault that locks their devotees away from life and humanity. It ultimately bores the overwhelming bulk of its would-be audience, who can find nothing with which to relate.
It has been called exciting and cutting-edge, but the sad truth is that it is incredibly humdrum and monotonous. Whether you glue together pieces of plastic or shards of glass, assemble metal scraps or piles of feathers. Whether you dribble little dollops of colors or drag fat uneven slashes of black. Whether you compile a mountain of paper or wrap the Statue of Liberty. The effect is always the same. MEANINGLESS PRIMITIVISM.
Modernism is art about art. It endlessly asks the question, ad nauseum: What is art? What is art? Only those things that expand the boundaries of art are good; all else is bad. It is art about art. Whereas all the great art in history, my friends, is ART ABOUT LIFE.
Ross demonstrates a bracing sense of the real. He urges his readers to trust their senses–rejecting the arguments of those who would deny that said senses were designed to respond positively to form, order, and intelligible patterns. Ross rightly argues that the end of art is the illumination of the human drama, that is, good art tells the truth. Many who would claim “All is art” also take umbrage at anything that smacks of moral certitude, that there is some real objective purpose to human endeavors.
Again and again I come back to the stark contrast, the fundamental dichotomy, the terrible choice we children of modernity must make: orthodoxy (the well-trod, but narrow mountain path) or nihilism (the wide, fog-covered slope leading only to ever-greater darkness). Of course, this ‘choice’ doesn’t happen once, but these are the destinations, the only two readings of reality that in the end are consistent.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Kelly // Nov 2, 2007 at 10:01 am
“the end of art is the illumination of the human drama, that is, good art tells the truth” — I have had many a conversation about this topic. Some argue that modern art does tell the truth, but in a focused sort of way. They will say, for instance, that the enlargement (distortion) of certain body parts (a nose perhaps) is meant to bring out that element of reality, as if it was momentarily put under a microscope for our inspection. I tend to enjoy realist, renaissance, gothic, or ancient Greek/Roman art myself, but I was wondering if anyone who appreciated modern art (granted, that’s a broad category) could comment on how modern art might represent truth to the audience.
2 Ryan // Nov 14, 2007 at 11:58 am
As a music student in college I first began to take a strong interest in the visual arts. I didn’t take any art classes but I did do some research on my own because I found the connections between movements in music and the visual arts interesting. I discovered many artists that I liked and found interesting, but I never felt moved by a piece of art the way music has moved me.
This definitely changed for me this past summer. After graduating I went to New York, and while I was there I visited the Museum of Modern Art. On exhibit there was the Richard Serra 40 Year Retrospective. I learned of Richard Serra’s artwork just a few weeks before viewing the exhibit and did some research before hand. He is considered a minimalist sculptor, and his work is often done on a huge scale. His most recent works are made of huge pieces of rusted steel, weighing over 100,000 lbs. The viewer actually becomes part of the artwork by physically walking around, through and inside the spiraling pieces of steel.
For me, these sculptures were both beautiful, and thought provoking. Walking inside of these sculptures forces one to think about the surrounding space. In a way, it is the space around you that is actually sculpted, not the steel. I believe that the purpose of these sculptures is to get the viewer to think beyond himself and his own thoughts. In a world where so many people are so wrapped up in their own wants, desires and ambitions, I believe that this is an important truth to be told through art. There definitely seemed to be a spiritual quality to this work. One particularly controversial piece by Serra was his Tilted Arc. It was a huge, 12-ft tall, 120-ft long steel wall built in the mid-dle of Federal Plaza in New York City. Those people who had automatically, and with little thought, crossed that plaza everyday, were now faced with an obstacle that forced them outside of themselves and made them notice their surroundings.
This is just one example; there were plenty of other pieces by Serra that made me think about this, and other truths. I am certainly not an expert on art, and I don’t know if this was the intended message of the art. But, speaking strictly from experience, these pieces had a major affect on me. There is bad art and good art; there always has been. I believe it is up to us to do the filtering of contemporary art ourselves, just as time has naturally done to the previous generations of art. I believe there is real beauty and truth in a lot of modern, post-modern and contemporary art. We must explore these pieces ourselves to find it.
3 Katie Crane // Nov 27, 2007 at 11:19 am
I recently celebrated a birthday, and one of my friends gave me the gift of the following quote which I am delighted to share with you now…
“Our situation today shows that beauty demands for itself at least as much courage and decision as do truth and goodness, and she will not allow herself to be separated and banned from her two sisters without taking them along with herself in an act of mysterious vengeance. We can be sure that whoever sneers at her name as if she were the ornament of a bourgeois past - whether he admits it or not - can no longer pray and soon will no longer be able to love.” Hans Urs von Balthasar
4 John Nepil // Dec 15, 2007 at 11:02 am
Dave wrote, “A healthy sense of the beautiful is necessary for a sane society.” Applying this to the Church’s mission, I propose that there will be no new evangelization without a renewal of the arts, without a recovery of the Catholic aesthetic.
More than ever before, the world is starved for transcendence. Postmodern man has despaired of ever knowing truth or ever loving good - but beauty still speaks to the heart.
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