I find it amusing that today's word of the day (from the Merriam-Webster daily email) is "luftmensch" (pronounced LOOFT-mensh). It means "an impractical contemplative person having no definite business or income."
In other words, me.
I especially find it amusing considering my blog topic for today.
The Transforming Culture symposium presented the six plenary questions in what felt like a story (as a friend said and I affirm). The first plenary session was done by Andy Crouch. (Side note, for those going to the Calvin Festival of Faith and Writing later this month, I believe he'll be speaking there.) He addressed the question, "In what way is art a gift, a calling, and an obedience?"
In other words, it's the call to adventure, the beginning of any story.
I cannot begin to give you his entire message, but I will tell you what it generally impressed upon me. Please keep in mind that what I talk about today on my blog is not a transcript of Andy's session, it's my interaction with it. For more of his words directly, I'd suggest pre-ordering his book, Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling
Back to the session. Andy went through the creation account in Genesis in order to understand culture. He developed the idea that creation was not just utilitarian but also beautiful, that, in fact, some of the aspects of creation (i.e. gold, opal) hold their real value in beauty alone. These aspects reach their full potential when they are discovered and cultivated by the gardnerers. Speaking of these gardeners--our gardening comes from and mimics God, the culture-maker or cultivator.
As gardeners, we cultivate, or create art from the beauty God's given us.
It's a gift.
This art is unutile. It is unuseful. It is itself, without any attachments to utility or pragmaticism, worthwhile.
This is the beginning of my story. Crafting stories, or story-telling, is a gift from God. It in itself is beautiful and worthwhile. Do you know the freedom I have in this? While evangelism or social justice are not bad things in art (although they are often badly done), I don't have to submit to them. My stories are beautiful stories because they echo the voice of the Storyteller.
As Andy said, my stories are beautifully unuseful to God.
They are like incense lifted to God. They are like a cheetah running and running because he can, because God created him to run. They are like honeysuckle weaved around a fence that has no other use other than to be pleasing to the eye, delightful to the nose, and surprising to the tongue.
What do my stories have to do? Be beautiful.
Andy pointed out that there are two things artists do that requires a vision of life as a gift: (1) play and (2) pain (enter into pain).
This statement affirmed me. It's okay that I like to play with Play Doh. It's okay that I dance around the house for no reason other than my favorite song just came on. It's okay that I have to pause the movie because I'm crying too hard to continue. It's okay that a squirrel dead in the road breaks my heart.
Besides affirmation, it also firmly plants us in art in a world that is at once created beautifully, corrupt, redeemed, being redeemed, looking forward to redemption. One without the other is less than. Play without pain leads to art that is too easy, comfortable, willing to let us settle for a life that has no ultimate hope because it too easily finds hope in the fading. Dare I say it is sentimental? Pain without pain leads to art that is masochistic and without grace.
Andy's bringing together of these two aspects reminds me of my vision of art as baptism: immersing itself into Christ's death and emmerging in Christ's resurrection. As little Christs or the Body of Christ or the Church, we incarnate His redemption and love and suffering for the world.
This is our call as Christians.
This is our call as artists--a call to create beauty without being afraid of brokenness. A call to champion the "unuseful" in our world (and here, Andy meant people that the world considers "unuseful").
God doesn't love us and delight in us because He has to or because He needs us. He loves as an outpouring of Himself. We are beautifully unuseful to God.
My art is beautifully unuseful.
So must my love extend to the beautifully unuseful.
now there's a goal I hadn't quite reached for yet in life. But it speaks of spontaneity. And that I know I've wished for in greater quantity.
"They are like honeysuckle weaved around a fence that has no other use other than to be pleasing to the eye, delightful to the nose, and surprising to the tongue. "
Energy and thirst quenching for the hummingbird
Protection for the song sparrows nesting young
shade and camaflauge for the cottontail rabbit
(just in my back yard)
I could go on and on about the honeysuckle....
but unuseful is just NOT a word I could use to write about the honeysuckle or what you do.
(:
just one look around the creation should be enough to convince you that our God is something more than a utilitarian creator. thanks for this heather.
And when we've looked past creation (oh, and the age of creation too) what about the occurences within that creation and in society itself? All things come from god, so how can you infer an entirely benevolent creator. Ignore the bible and just look around; I don't think you can infer what you call god.
I don't believe all things do come from God. I believe he allows them in order to give us free will. The evilness, the bad things, the tsunamis and terrorism and genocide and fraud and embezzlement come from our bad choices (which stemmed from the fall--again, I depend on the Bible as the Story that explains how I understand the world, God, and the identity of both myself and community). I also believe that though he allows this, he will set things right. There is a happily ever after. He wil re-create and restore the earth so that it is once again a place of beauty without evil.
I'd love to dialogue with you more on this (if you'd like), but I must admit up front that my understandings come from the Bible, and that though my experience, the art I see, the nature I see, the science I understand, the myths and stories of my culture and other cultures support what I know to be true in the Bible, it takes a leap of faith (if you've read Kierkegaard) to believe it to be true, and I can't prove that to you.
If you would like to continue the conversation, please feel free to email me or to continue you it here in the comments.
Wow, these words are so good to hear. I often find myself wanting to do more with my life, to do something worthwhile or just to do what I love and make money doing it and not feel so useless. It's good to hear people articulating beautiful unusefulness.
p.s. I wanted to see what the internets had to say about being "beautifully unuseful" and came up with only this post (actually a blog linking to this post). The funny part is that Google suggested this: "Did you mean 'beautifully useful". This beautifully unuseful thing is completely counter-cultural, isn't it? I love it.
How freeing to hear someone else say that it is ok for some of us to sit and just BE. I rather like sitting and BEING. Nope, don't feel very useful when I do that, but it affords me an interface with my Lord that I do not find when I rush-rush, do-do, go-go, function-function.
Design = Mary
Function = Martha
Perhaps?
Wish I could have sat next to you in this lecture. I think your ribcage would be sore because I'd have kept elbowing you. :) Then we could go have coffee and get all artsy-fartsy braniac until the wee hours.
Elbowing fights with Erin and Heather, listening to art lectures with Erin and Heather, coffee talk with Erin and Heather . . . sounds blissful to me!
I think we should plan one big blogging party--in real life, I mean. Lots of coffee. Favorite wines. Chocolate, of course.
And good conversation.
Of course, we may all need to be sitting at computers to understand each other...
My heart's going pitter patter at just the thought of something like that.
And the chance to elbow Christianne in the ribs... even better!
I'll be happy for the rest of the day now. :)
thanks
Great post! I am so encouraged by your words of truth here! Thank you. :)
What a beautiful post! Loved it. And loved seeing your heart for this.
This post made me think of two things. The first is a talk I listened to a few days ago by Dan Pink (author of "A Whole New Mind" and "Free Agent Nation"), in which he discussed utility and design. He shared how so many utilitarian goods in the world can really only compete with one another on design. For instance, ever heard of the designer toilet brush? What about the designer flyswatter, which costs $14?
Raises eyebrows, doesn't it? Obviously your distinction made by Andy Crouch made me go, "Hey! Utility and beauty! I was just listening to Dan Pink talk about that!" I like the way he, too, elevates design in a world run amok with utility. Even though I'm pretty sure he thinks the designer items listed above are somewhat ridiculous. :)
And second, you actually already touched on my other thought toward the end of your post, and that is that we are beautifully unuseful to God. There is nothing we do to merit God's grace and favor and love. It simply is, because he loves us through the blood of Jesus. And that is enough.
It's interesting, though, how our beautiful unusefulness is how we stand before God, plain and unadorned and yet adored, and yet it is from that place that we go forward and live lives of "utility" (for lack of a better word) within the world, moving the limbs of the body of Christ.
Love this, Heather. Truly.
And it makes me think of Oscar Wilde's introduction to Picture of Dorian Gray: "All art is quite useless." So true--but also so wonderful in the way you've described it here.
Post new comment