HopeArts

“Finally, Brothers, whatever is … noble… think on these things.”

What is this verse of Philippians 4:8 (NIV) indicating?  Does this verse indicate a basis for an Christian Aesthetic of Art?

From the previous T.A.T. it seems the question of a Christian Aesthetic  could be considered a two-way ethic, whereby the viewer has as much a responsibility to esteem and keep worthy the subject matter of a piece of creation, a piece of Art, in every bit a way as we might another person. I think that could be an easily argued assertion, at least. If nothing else, the manner in which the artist puts herself into the work of art, doing so vulnerably or / and (presumably) submitted to the Spirit of God, well surely this substantiates and undergirds the moral onus on the viewer.

As a writer I do sort of take some comfort in the old adage that the written piece is often more intelligent than the writer depending upon whose reading it. But maybe there really is something there. An artist creates in a sort of meta-language (i.e. her medium), and this medium speaks across the limitations of language, surely, but Language (meta-language) is that which exists between people, and is as much dependent upon the receiver’s supplying of their own experience-steeped associations and nuances as it is supplied (by the same) from the speaker. And yes, I mean language, not merely communication.

And maybe, here, the real collaboration within Art is the collaboration between audience and artist, like two parents contributing the existential genetic material of experience and understanding (along with  Spirit-born understanding in each) to the child of Creation, a Holy utterance birthed in that co-mingling. In which case, as the viewer comes together, considering what is true, noble, right, just, pure, excellent, praiseworthy, beautiful about that thing the artist has considered true, noble, right, just, pure, excellent, praiseworthy, beautiful, we get something which is just a little bit more of God.

If the artist creates something, some piece of art which deals with Creation — itself reflecting the glory of God — and deals with some aspect of God (like nobility, or justness), then like Japheth and Shem is there any response we can make as the audience which doesn’t intellectually, soulfully walk in backwards, the robes of truth, nobility, rightness, justness, purity, excellence, praiseworthiness, beauty draped across our shoulders to lie upon that Art?