DESCRIBING THE STORM CHAPTER THREE In this lesson we continue our discussion of the new-framework of thinking, in which man sees himself as living in a meaningless universe. If there is no God and man is not created by God, and the universe is but an accident then there cannot be any meaning in our existence. In this lesson we will look at some of the ways in which modern art expresses this despair. Modern Art In a book entitled Break-up: The Core of Modern Art, the author (Katharine Kuh) begins with these words: The art of our century has been characterized by shattered surfaces, broken color, segmented compositions, dissolving forms and shredded images during the last hundred years, every aspect of art has been broken up color, light, pigment, form, line, content, space, surface and design. In the numbered illustrations supplied with this lesson there is a striking parallel. It is found in the sketches drawn by artist M. Jager while under the influence of the drug LSD (see illustration below). As the drug begins to take effect, the artist more and more loses touch with reality. The result is that each succeeding picture tends to go further in the direction of disintegration. This is strangely similar to modern art, in which things (and especially man himself) become distorted and fragmented until all recognizable meaning disappears. In the sculpture by Michael Ayrton entitled Evolution of the Minotaur (on page eleven), we see what appears to be 11
a semi-human figure. The minotaur was a mythical monster supposedly half-man and half-bull. But here it is difficult to see any clearly recognizable features of either man or bull. One may perhaps imagine that this is an attempt to represent man as he struggles to rise up out of his evolutionary past. But the important thing is that in this (as in so many works of modern art) meaning must be put into rather than clearly seen in the work. In Portrait of Vollard (on next page) by the noted artist Pablo Picasso, we see a few faintly recognizable features of a man. But the rest of the picture is deliberatelyfragmented, or broken up. The artist seems to be saying that we can no longer see man as a whole, but only fragments or aspects of man. Before we go further, let us pause to make an important point. It would be a great mistake to think that paintings such as this are unimportant. We, as Christians, certainly should not agree with such art. It reflects the new framework of thinking, which is anti Christian in its basis. But it is important. It is important because it shows us exactly how modern man, in our society, under the controlling influence of the new framework, sees himself. Modern science has broken man into bits. It can tell us much about various parts or aspects of man (such as the nervous system, the genetic code, brain functions, etc.), more than ever before, in fact. But the terrifying thing is that it cannot tell us that the whole man has meaning or significance. As one modern thinker has put it: In no other period of human knowledge has man become more problematical to himself than in our own days We no longer possess any clear and consistent idea of man. The break-up is not, then, just a clever stunt that this artist or that thought up. No, it is an expression of the 12
prevailing spirit of the age in which we live. As one famous British painter has put it, Man now realizes that he is an accident, and therefore sees himself as a completely futile being. Salvador Dali is perhaps the most famous of the surrealist painters. But in his work the new framework is expressed in a different way. In his paintings content [is] purposely unhinged in denial of all rational expression, allowing disconnected episodes to re-create the disturbing life of our unconscious. In other words, Dali deliberately blurs the distinction between (what, under the old framework would be called) the real and unreal. This can be seen in the illustration on the next page, where the real is distorted and the unreal is painted with photographic detail. If there is no God no creation no divine plan, and so on, Dali seems to be saying, then who is to say that the world of dreams is any less real than the real world? In the illustration above there is no recognizable feature. In this painting everything is reduced to broken fragments. To the writer of these lessons this suggests something that one might see in an artist s studio, namely, a piece of paper where the artist tests his brushes, or removes excess paint. One could not prove from the picture 13
itself that it is anything more than this. But the artist can present it to an art museum, calling it a work of art and the museum will accept it as such for one very important reason. Both the artist and those who judge what is art work from the same framework of thought. And in a universe without meaning how can they effectively deny that this is a painting? No doubt a true Christian, who understood these things, would say, This is not a work of art at all. But we must realize that if the curator of one of our great art galleries did have the courage to do this, it would probably cost him his job. To much the same effect is George Segal s Gas Station (above). Here we see on display an actual Coca- Cola vending machine, with a rack of empty bottles, and a paper-mache figure of a tired, thirsty young man sitting on an empty bottle case. Is this a work of art? Well, the answer depends entirely upon your view of the universe. If you accept the modern evolutionist and humanist framework of thinking, then there is no reason to say this is not a work of art while something else is. The point is that in a universe with no absolutes, everything becomes equally important (or unimportant). In the July 6, 1970, issue of The National Observer, an interesting article appeared. It was entitled The New Wave: Art That Isn t There. We quote part of this article. Last year the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston received the following letter from artist Saul Ostrow: Dear Sir: I wish to donate this work to the permanent collection of the Institute of Contemporary Art in the name of Frank Lincoln Viner. Institute officials were unable to find the work Mr. Ostrow was donating, so they dropped the matter. Shortly afterwards a second letter arrived from the artist Due to the fact that as yet I have not heard from you concerning my donation, I must assume it has been rejected and would appreciate the return of my piece. The letter came to the attention of the institute s director, Andrew Hede who wrote Mr. Ostrow: I was unaware that you had offered the Institute a donation. I would be willing to hear about the particulars. The particulars came by return mail. Enclosed, wrote Mr. Ostrow, you will find a photostat of the work in question. Since the original was either lost or never delivered? this photostat is now to be considered as the work I wish to donate. Enclosed was a photostat of Mr. Ostrow s first letter. At this point Mr. Hede might have suspected that he was the victim of a put-on. Not so. Mr. Ostrow was being very serious in a sly sort of way. His donation was an example of a new kind of art, conceptual art. The article goes on to say that conceptual art means this: Every choice the artist makes is an artistic act. In other words, whatever artist chooses to call art is art. If he says a piece of paper with words written on it is a work of art, then it is a work of art. And the new framework is what makes it possible. Joseph Kosuth displayed a wooden folding chair in an art gallery, with a photograph of a chair pinned on the wall on one side of it, and on the other side a photostat of the dictionary definition of the word chair. These were displayed as a work of art 14
called One of Three Chairs. Another work of art was a tape recorder with a continuous loop tape. It constantly recorded and then erased every sound in the art gallery. People who have been molded by the predominant influence of what we have called the old framework of thinking usually react to these things with a question: How can people call such things works of art? Sometimes they do not realize that these people who do these works are indeed serious. They can even be called genuine artists if the function of the artist is to give expression to the way in which most people see reality in a given generation. As the American artist, Mark Tobey, has said, The content of a painting is tied up with time, place and history. It is always related to man s beliefs and disbeliefs, to his affirmations and negations. How we believe and disbelieve is mirrored in the art of our times. This is the heart of the matter. When men turn away from God and reject the absolutes that He gives to them, then it is inevitable that this will show in everything they do. The value of modern art is that it shows this so clearly. But how many Christians understand? Francis Schaeffer has put it like this: The tragedy is not only that these talented men [artists] have reached the point of despair, but that so many who look on and admire really do not understand They are influenced by the concepts, and yet they have never analyzed what it all means. It is for this reason that you can find Christian believers who like anti-christian art. They like it because they have been so much influenced by the spirit of this age that they do not any longer feel uncomfortable with these things (as they should). Again we must warn against the temptation to say, It doesn t concern me. The reason is that a person who professes to have no interest in art who, for example, would never take the trouble to visit an art gallery, or purchase a painting is still subject to its influence (unless, perhaps, he is literally blind). Modern art is not something that is safely shut up out of sight in museums. No, it influences us by the influence it has on advertising, magazines, TV, and so on. It often faces us, whether we notice it or not, in the foyer of a new officebuilding, or even in the city park. But even more important, we as Christians should not want to ignore these things. For these are, as H. R. Rookmaker has said, signs of the crisis of our culture. They embody new ways of thinking. They proclaim the meaninglessness of all we may think sacred. And this should concern us. This art is the work of your neighbours human beings who are crying out in despair for the loss of their humanity, their values, their lost absolutes, groping in the dark for answers. It is already late, if not too late, but if we want to help our generation we must hear their cry. We must listen to them as they cry out from their prison, the prison of a universe which is aimless, meaningless, absurd. In other words, to keep ourselves out of the grip of the 15
powerful spirit of this age, we must understand these things. But that is not all. We must also understand them in order to be able to help others who are held in the grip of this false framework of thinking. It is important, then, to realize that art is rooted in culture. It is not necessarily Christian art simply because the artist himself believes in Jesus Christ. No, the great artists of the past painted as they did not only because of what they believed as individuals, but also because they lived in a culture in which certain absolutes were unquestioned. As Francis Bacon (a noted British artist) has put it: I think that even when Velasquez was painting, even when Rembrandt was painting, they were still, whatever their attitude to life, slightly conditioned by certain types of religious possibilities, which man now, you could say, has had cancelled out for him. When great artists of the past painted, those who viewed the paintings were able to understand the meaning because artist and viewer shared certain standards. Now we are not sure, when we look at a painting, that we see what the artist is trying to communicate. The reason is that there is no shared framework of meaning there are no shared certainties. The sole message is that there is no meaningful message. And the important thing for us is to realize this. It is now crystal clear. When man turns away from God, and from God s word, he dooms himself to death and destruction. And what is death? Is it not dissolution break-up of God s created order? To live apart from God is death, says the metrical psalm. To know the true God in Jesus Christ is life. This is the message that we must understand and experience and then seek to communicate to modern man. Questions: 1. What does Katharine Kuh mean by break-up? 2. How does the series of sketches by M. Jager parallel this? 3. In the series of pictures supplied with this lesson, pick the one that best illustrates break-up to you. Give your reason(s) in a brief sentence or two. 4. Why is it wrong to say that these paintings are unimportant? 5. In the various paintings and other works of art (described or illustrated in the lesson) there are several ways in which break-up is evident. Try to describe at least three different ways. 6. What is the framework of thought that lies behind those different works of art? 7. Why is it that in former times an artist might paint something with content acceptable to a Christian though he himself was not a Christian believer, while today an artist who is a believer may not do so? 8. How is it possible for Christian people to like modern art? Should they? Why? 9. Why is it essential that we understand modern art? 10. What do we mean when we say that art is rooted in culture? 11. Why did art in previous generations communicate, while art today does not? (Or does it?) 12. What (if anything) does God reveal to us through modern art? Projects: 1. Try to find your own example of a work of art that reflects either the old or the new framework of thinking, and explain why to the class. 2. Find an example of the influence of modern art in modern advertising. 3. Write an argument pro or con on this statement: A Christian may make use of the art forms expressing breakup. 16