On Being a (Christian) Artist in a Time of War and Economic Injustice

I have been struggling, lately, to understand my place as an artist in the face of a world in chaos. It is Spring 2003 and my country has just gone to war against Iraq. The State in which I live is facing a 4.2 million dollar budget shortfall and many of the services that used to form our “safety net” are being cut. There was recently an “emergency meeting” of the Celebration and Worship Committee at my church to approve increased spending on visual liturgical art for Easter. Meanwhile, I have been designing websites, writing essays and making paintings instead of being of practical use.

Admittedly, I’ve written letters and made phone calls urging politicians to peaceful and merciful actions, but I am nagged by the notion that I am part of the problem and not the solution.

I am an artist. It has taken me about forty years to be able to say it because our culture insists on seeing art as something mysterious that is open only to a few and at which you have to excel to be counted. I am discovering, instead, that it is a way of seeing, a way of being, a positive addiction that I break only at peril to my soul. The times of deepest unhappiness in my life have been when I have not made art because I was convinced there was a more important use of my time. I am an artist in the same way I am right handed; it is a natural part of who I am. You could probably train it out of me, but that might very well cause other problems.

The source of my struggle is that I have chosen to be Christian on top of it. There may be other religions and ethical positions (or, more likely, lack thereof) that would make being an artist easier, but, for various reasons, here I am. Since I am a Christian. I am called to follow one who was a master of paradox. While exhorting his followers to lives of extreme love-in-action , Jesus also took time to make sure there was great wine at a wedding . One minute he urged a rich young man to sell everything and give the proceeds to charity, the next minute he was praising a woman anointed his feet with expensive ointment instead of selling it and giving the money to the poor. Jesus’ approach was far too situational to satisfy those of us looking for a set of procedures. (In fact, I suspect that was one of the points he was trying to make.)

I was raised in a household that held as heroes those who worked with the poorest of the poor. My mother has a friend who serves as a missionary in the slums of Rio de Janeiro, teaching women community health care practices. I remember glances exchanged between teachers when, in first grade, I announced I wanted to be a medical missionary. When I went to college, I majored in Human Services because I was determined to be “useful.”

Art making seemed to me to be utterly selfish, a practice to be set aside as I assumed adult responsibilities even though it was what fed me and made my heart sing throughout my childhood.

Several times, in the last few months, circumstances seem to be asking me, “Art or Bread?” and, of course I answer “bread.” Showing someone a picture won’t feed his or her hungry belly; if I were hungry, I’d want food, not aesthetics.

Art has, however, a power we recognize but can’t explain. I know that, not writing, not painting, not reading, I risk a slide into depression. I recently wrote a profile of a woman who hires people who are homeless to make art and finds that their success at this “job” (in terms of attendance and longevity) exceeds any more traditional employment programs in which they’ve participated. The day Colin Powell made the case for war with Iraq before the U.N. Security Council, “they” hung a curtain over a tapestry of Pablo Picasso's "Guernica." The painting depicts the terror in a small village in northern Spain where about 1,600 civilians were killed or wounded in three hours of bombing, when Francisco Franco allowed the German air force to use the town for target practice during the Spanish Civil War. [Who, exactly, decided to cover the artwork was unclear. The U.N. media liaison said the placement of microphones in the hallway outside the Security Council meeting room resulted in a risk of photographing diplomats standing next to the backside of a horse. He didn’t explain why they couldn’t move the microphones.] Apparently, making art—and even viewing art—can change the way people act in the world.

It’s Paul who gives me a glimmer of hope as I consider this question with Bible in hand. He writes about all of us being parts of one body, different parts having different gifts. . I am wishing to be hands—practical, strong, visible hands—when (I’m beginning to suspect) God has made me more of an ear lobe—filling some function, I assume, but not a flashy or obvious one. I will just have to take it on faith that God has made somebody else a hand.

Perhaps, in that case, I can be in the world in the way I am in my immediate family. It is my role to do the laundry, remind people it’s OK to have emotions, and advocate for picking up the mess and the consumption of green vegetables. Helping me to live within this role is knowledge that my husband does the cooking, fixes all things electronic and mechanical, and buys toys and desserts. As a family, we walk in middle ground.

Being near art invites people to slow down, to look closely, and to think. (Those are exactly the same actions required of the artist.) I need to remind myself of the utility of that. A slower, observing, thinking human is much easier for God to catch. (There may be some cultures that need folks to speed up, but I don’t live in one.)

I’m experimenting with the theory that most of the misery we’re experiencing in the world is caused by a peculiar self-absorption that results in each of us pursuing our own needs and interests as though we were alone on the planet. I was about ten when I recognized the importance of John Donne’s words:

“ No man is an island entire of itself, every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the Sea, Europe is less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”

I memorized it, with a seriousness that may only be achieved by a ten year-old.

It seems to me that art making carries a danger of selfishness. I work alone but, in the end, I want an audience for my work. That involves a certain amount of ego as I encourage myself to keep working, and some shameless self-promotion to launch my work into the world. How can I (how can art) combat self-absorption?

I’ve come up with four principles to guide my art-making in these troubled times: community, stewardship, celebration, and humility.

Community: My creative process sometimes, but not always, requires solitude. For the last few years, I’ve been making art videos that all—one way or another—have become collaborations with other people. One thing I can do is to create out loud, inviting others into my process. When I launch my art into the world, I can use it as an opportunity to bring people into conversation with each other. Connection is the cure for self-absorption. Art connects.

Stewardship: God calls me to care for his creation. Making art takes resources of time, money, materials and energy. I want to be conscious of what resources I’m using and how, to minimize the cost of what I’m doing. I want to be responsible about supporting the needs of other “parts of the body.” I want to separate myself from the clenched commercialism that can make my art into products and my time and energy into commodities.

Celebration: A couple decades ago, I was so despondent about the damage human beings were causing to each other and the earth, I wondered why we were part of creation. One day, driving through the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, I came up with an answer that satisfied me: God put us here because we can appreciate beauty. I’ve found more answers since, but that one stays with me. Art is a celebration of beauty (or sometimes a lament of ugliness).

Humility: In a television interview, a young gospel singer was asked if she finds her recent fame difficult to deal with. “I’m OK as long as I remember God is the star of the show,” she replied. In the press of activity that is my life, especially the ones that require me to promote myself and my work, I need to remember that I am not the point of what’s going on here.

While using these principles may help me be more gentle with myself as I go about my life these days, the question of whether I am spending my time wisely remains, I am called to be a part of creating God’s Kingdom on earth. I understand so little of God; I have only the most primitive idea of what God’s kingdom might be, that holding the question of whether I am working for it is essential. It is, I realize, a sacred question. I will carry it with me and live the answers.