We had an adult class on choosing our entertainment. We talked about some TV programs last week. This week, we continued in a similar vein.
One visitor, a preacher from upstate NY who is married to the sister of one of our members, piped up saying that a couple of their members are artists and he'd talked to them about changing their profession. I wanted to talk to him Sunday night, but I think he was in Culpepper at a wake or something for his mother who died.
Have any of you run into this? Figure some of the artists deal with nude work.
I'm an artist! What is wrong with being an artist?
God is the ultimate artist! Apparently this pastor has no idea what art is OR who artists are! Does he enjoy beautiful buildings? An artist designed it.
Does he enjoy driving his car? Is it nicely designed? An artist designed it. What about the food he eats? At restaurants, chefs are artists of a different pallet, the plate and mouth.
Artists are all around us. If it were not for artists, we may be wearing drab grey clothing that has no asthetic appeal at all, boxy looking cars, no flowers and grass in the yard, no taste in foods, no imagination at all.
Now the artists in question may be going through spiritual problems that may be related to the type of art they are doing. Or it may be they are having financial problems. But that is not the fault of the art, it is the fault of the person who is doing the art.
I can use my art for good or for evil. Just like my body. Naturism is a good example of art. Created in God's image...art. Can be hidden or exposed, can be used for good or for evil.
Artists are not to be "brushed off" as some necessary evil.
I never really considered myself an artist, but I am a Architectural Draftsman, first taught on a board, but now work on a computer all day. Drawing on the board did allow for a little more artistic work, compaired to the use of CAD, but I do still do drawings that do get a lot of compliments, even if they are computer based!
Ralph, I cringe at this "other" Upstate preacher saying such a thing! He's giving others a bad name! Seriously, Christians make the best artists. They have the Supreme Artist as their guide.
I am sure most of you know that this uptight, excuse me upstate preacher is probably indirectly saying that because artists often paint, sculpt or photograph the nude human body, they are creating an unnecessary temptation for those who view these works of art.
A good Christian would not deliberately tempt people to sin, therefore it is inappropriate for a Christian to remain in a career where he might be required to create works of art involving nudity.
The preacher might have something else in mind, but that's my guess.
My response to both queries about why a Christian is an artist and how a Christian could create a nude piece of art is "Why not? What's wrong with either?"
Something else that preacher might have on his mind- there's a very small referance in the Old Testament to a city(?) of craftsmen/artists/musicians. I can't find it at the moment, of course, but it could be taken to say that people of that persuasion are not righteous, if I remember corectly. Funny thing is, Jesus was a carpenter, which means He was an artist and craftsman...
I'm an artist, after a fashion, and I believe that art can be a wonderful tool to show us the proper way to look at things- as beautiful gifts of God. Too bad those gifted with the ability to express themselves through art too often take the easy road, only showing the worst, most immoral aspect of their subjects.
Here is my view on whether a Christian should be involved with art depecting nudity.
I am working towards creating art on cars and motorcycles among other objects that sits still long enough...a.k.a. Pinstriping and Airbrushing.
I have seen great work out there, watch some great artists. Some of them are heavy on using skulls. Some (usually the same) are also heavy on creating sexually prevocotive images of women on bikes and such.
Now a nude is one thing, scenes like these are another. Should I get involved in that kind of artwork? I have to make sure I have my limits. We have choices of all kinds. Eagles and flags are very popular, pinstripes, flames, animals, you name, all are fodder for airbrushed works of art.
I think I can safely be a Christian and pick and choose my art in a realistic way and still provide ample discussion of naturism and Christianity.
The sculptors and painters of nudes, wittingly or not, are imitating the Master Artist, as long as their work is not twisted morally. I found a quote some time ago by a famous Christian American poet, and I think it can apply to nude art, perhaps giving us a distinguishing guide for separating morally pure artwork from the subtly pornographic...
"Let any sculptor hew us out the most ravishing combination of tender curves and spheric softness that ever stood for woman; yet if the lip have the least fulness that hints of the flesh, if the brow be insincere, if in the minutest particular the physical beauty suggests a moral ugliness, that sculptor -- unless he be portraying a moral ugliness for a moral purpose -- may as well give over his marble for paving stones. Time, whose judgments are inexorably moral, will not accept his work. For, indeed, we may say that he who has not yet perceived how artistic beauty and moral beauty are convergent lines which run back into a common ideal origin, and who therefore is not afire with moral beauty just as with artistic beauty -- that he in short, who has not come to that stage of quiet and eternal frenzy in which the beauty of holiness and the holiness of beauty mean one thing, burn as one fire, shine as one light within him; he is not yet the great artist." -- Sidney Lanier
