where art, theology, and missional living cross
Beauty and Truth
If:
1. Beauty and truth are in relationship together (i.e. because God is beauty, his creation is beautiful, the culmination of beauty is in the cross and victory of Christ, and the future hope of a restored, re-created, redeemed beauty is our guide), and
2. You disagree with the philosophy undergirding a piece of art (say, for example, it is a nihilistic film, not that it has nihilism in it but is, at its core, nihilistic), then
Must you consider the work, no matter how original, creative, or skillful, a work contrary to beauty?
In other words if something at its core is untruthful, is it unbeautiful?
Let me say something that I don't mean, though:
I don't mean it necessarily then has to have overt Christian themes (or be created by Christians).
Also, I believe that because of the essence of story form (as laid out by Joseph Campbell and adopted by Christopher Vogler--and now I'm veering into stories, i.e. novels, plays, and films), it's hard to find something completely contrary to beauty. For example, The Dark Knight had nihilistic elements in it (the Joker and eventually Dent), but it was not nihilistic in that it ends with hope and a belief in redemption.
But I mean this question in regards to all art (visual, music, performance, etc.). And how often do we really find something completely untruthful, completely absent of the Imago Dei, which is part of every human?
1. Beauty and truth are in relationship together (i.e. because God is beauty, his creation is beautiful, the culmination of beauty is in the cross and victory of Christ, and the future hope of a restored, re-created, redeemed beauty is our guide), and
2. You disagree with the philosophy undergirding a piece of art (say, for example, it is a nihilistic film, not that it has nihilism in it but is, at its core, nihilistic), then
Must you consider the work, no matter how original, creative, or skillful, a work contrary to beauty?
In other words if something at its core is untruthful, is it unbeautiful?
Let me say something that I don't mean, though:
I don't mean it necessarily then has to have overt Christian themes (or be created by Christians).
Also, I believe that because of the essence of story form (as laid out by Joseph Campbell and adopted by Christopher Vogler--and now I'm veering into stories, i.e. novels, plays, and films), it's hard to find something completely contrary to beauty. For example, The Dark Knight had nihilistic elements in it (the Joker and eventually Dent), but it was not nihilistic in that it ends with hope and a belief in redemption.
But I mean this question in regards to all art (visual, music, performance, etc.). And how often do we really find something completely untruthful, completely absent of the Imago Dei, which is part of every human?
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