homo liturgicus?

John Franklin

“Only he who loves can sing”
~ St. Augustine

I have been thinking about thinking. Though I value its importance I am wondering if the attention we give it is in need of some balance. Two books – one old and one new are the occasion for my taking up this topic once again. Though not much can be said in the space available here perhaps a few brief comments will generate some of your own reflection about this matter. Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview and Cultural Formation by James K.A. Smith explores the question of human identity. He argues that how we answer the question concerning who we are has implications for worship, education and spiritual formation. It has been typical for members of western culture to see themselves first as “thinking beings”. One immediately recalls Descartes’ “I think therefore I am”, a short sentence that has carried a very pervasive influence. The legacy of this notion of humans as thinking beings suggests that ideas have primary importance. Others have contended that we are oriented to the world as believers where not just logic, but myth and story play an important part in our self understanding. Smith appreciates these two options but finds them still incomplete. What is missing he suggests is attention to “desire” as an essential feature of the human person. In taking up this theme it is but a short step to understanding humans as lovers. As Smith puts iton page 51:

“To be human is to love
and it is what we love that defines who we are.” If we can accept that desire is significant for our identity, it opens the question about how our desires are shaped, by what are they nurtured and directed. Smith’s answer to this is that it is the rituals and practices in which we participate that give shape to our imaginations and determine our orientation to the world. The upshot of this line of thought is that we are “homo liturgicus”. We are liturgical beings. Liturgies according to Smith are found not just in sanctuaries – but throughout the culture. What is needed is a discerning eye to understand what practices we participate in and what they mean for the shaping of our desires – what they call us to love. Surely our consumerist society should give us pause as we consider the liturgies of consumption. The second and older work I have been reading is a small book of essays written in the 1950s by Catholic writer John Pieper titled Only the Lover Sings: Art and Contemplation. Both Pieper and Smith are indebted to St. Augustine who was deeply aware of the importance of human desire and its centrality in enabling us to worship. Pieper speaks of those experiences where we “touch the core of all things” which for him is a divine foundation. Such activities he describes as meaningful in themselves. Two conditions are essential. First an attitude of receptive openness and attentive silence, and second the ability to celebrate a feast. Art lends itself to both of these conditions and for many is one way to “touch the core of things”. Also art, as it engages our affective side, speaks our desires, both those of the artist and those who experiences the art. Might we say that art has a liturgical character and points beyond itself to a divine source sometimes hidden sometimes revealed.

John Franklin, Executive Director, imago@rogers.com

pinhole photography & devine interventions

Wenda Solomons

Houses 7, 6" x 6", Gelatin Silver Print, 2008
The Divine Intervention Series, Wenda Solomans

Taking a photograph with a pinhole camera is a spontaneous and serendipitous experience. The lack of viewfinder, the crafty quality of a homemade camera and the simplicity of the process all contribute to a sense of wonder at the resulting image. The hallmarks of a pinhole image (a general fuzziness, infinite depth of field and often some crazy distortion) can infuse the photo with an emotional content not easily achievable with other methods. As old as photography itself, the pinhole process has a deep connection to the history of art and yet its potential to speak in a contemporary voice has been made evident through the works of artists like Bethany de Forest (pinhole.nl), Eric Renner (pinholeresource.com) and Dianne Bos (diannebos.com). As a practicing photo-based artist, my goal is to join this luminous history by working contemporarily using pinhole cameras. For a number of years, I have explored themes of language and metaphor in my work, specifically attempting to broaden definitions and understandings. A series entitled “Divine Interventions” grew from a challenge to see the divine interactions that occur all around us (even in particularly unremarkable settings) rather than where we generally seek them during miraculous events. My work as an artist emerges out of a belief system that acknowledges a holiness in all things and a desire to see it more clearly.

Wenda Salomons is an Alberta-based professional visual artist working in photo-based media. She works primarily with pinhole cameras and produces small, black and white silver prints. She has lectured and led workshops on pinhole photography, as well as pursued the development of her own studio practice. Her prints are held in private and public collections across North America. You can contact her and view her work at www.wendasalomons.com.

photography as theatre

Paul Williamson

Instead of a thousand words, I take a photograph. It tells a story by distilling an idea into one frozen moment in time. It is direct, unchanging and undiluted. Photographs capture the spontaneous – life as it happens. But photographs can tell another story – a deliberate and compelling idea. This is photography as theatre. It leaves nothing to chance. It is deliberate and planned in every visual detail. It is the staging of a photograph in the same way a film or theatre production constructs and stages a scene to tell a story. Several years ago I came across a documentary about the purges Stalin undertook in the Soviet Union of the 1930’s. It featured photographs of victims – men and women who were executed during Stalin’s terror. They were perceived as a threat to the State or a threat to his personal power. But so deep was his paranoia that it was not enough that they should die. Their very memory must be erased. Photographs of their faces were either “painted” over or scratched out. In some cases, those talented in early photographic techniques were employed to make people “disappear.” There are some interesting photographs of Stalin with those who worked for him. As they fell out of favour they simply disappeared from photographs in which they had originally been present. No record of them must remain. It was as if these people had never existed. I felt in small way I should tell their story. This was the reason for Revisionism. It is part of a series that will be called “The –ISM- Collection.” Originally Revisionism was conceived as a single raw looking photograph to mimic those from the 30’s. The first in what is now a series of three. The man holding the erased portrait in the first picture is the son of Soviet dissidents. The photograph in his hands is of a man who was executed in the Soviet purges. In the second photograph, the man holding the victim’s picture becomes a victim himself. The third photograph completes the work of the revisionist. Any record that they ever existed disappears. For obvious reasons, the idea of revisionism translates well into photographic form. Unfortunately, this cannot be said for many abstract ideas. This is the challenge of photography as theatre. Constructing an image to capture a complex idea, in a clear and concise way, can be a daunting process. When it works, photography as theatre has a power that an incidental, spontaneous image cannot. The passive art of photography as record keeper, as a witness to history is replaced. It is not a matter of documenting a moment in time. It is a matter of creating it. It is taking a thought, an idea in the mind's eye and giving it a vision that everyone can see.

Paul Williamson is a Television Producer and Photographer living in Hamilton, Ontario
pwilliamson@cogeco.ca

reviews & thoughts

Young Artists Are Our Future
by James Tughan

Since John Franklin, Phyllis Novak and I toiled over the Lausanne paper, “Redeeming The Arts”, in Thailand 2004, we have each been continuing to apply the clear mandate of that unique global meeting of Christian advocates for the arts. For my part, this has meant finding ways to build a better support system for artists in our own spiritual community, in our churches and in our schools. It has meant sowing seeds in the minds of young talented visual artists in particular, who clearly lack sufficient encouragement from knowledgeable church leaders, high school teachers and yes parents. By encouragement I mean a commitment to supporting the idea that artists are valued members of the faith community, and that they can have viable paid careers in broad variety of career paths that go far beyond traditional fine art. We cannot allow these gifted students to simply disappear and give up on being artists. It also means, in working with churches, children, high school students, college students and international groups that my focus has been on “Art as Language”, rich in aesthetics but also potent in communication, no matter how subtle. One recent facet of this work, has occurred in the ongoing fine art program at Redeemer University College, where I work as adjunct faculty. Our figure drawing students this year completed a project which I believe breaks fresh ground in re-interpreting the metaphor of “Taking Up One’s Cross” in a project called WINGSPAN. Shown below is one of the drawings, this one completed by Denise Bentum.

James Tughan can be reached at perigee@cogeco.ca