Art made with a sense of hope provides a potent factor at the deepest levels of an artist's consciousness, since hope radically alters one's inner intention and feeling of purpose. (Gablik, 1991) Now may the God of all hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Letter to the Christians in Rome 15:13) v. to have a wish for something to be true. n. a feeling that something desirable is likely to happen. n (archaic) a feeling of trust.
As people of faith, we have hope in the Divine, we have hope in the power of goodness, we have hope in the positive transformation of people's lives, we have hope in a beter future and a more fulfilled present.
As artists, we have hope that our work will make a difference, we have hope that the time in our studios brings honor to the God we serve, we have hope that the success we experience rests in the hands of someone greater than ourselves, we have hope that a life spent in service to the materials and people of art is of value.
Hope.
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2 comments:
The artist and the prophet are the same... called to open the eyes of the blind, through hope, to prepare the way for the coming good. The power of hope is for both the artist in her own process, but also for her audience or the recipient of her work.
To quote Kandinsky from "Regarding the Spiritual in Art:"
The spiritual life, to which art belongs and of which she is one of the mightiest elements, is a complicated but definite and easily definable movement forwards and upwards. The movement is the movement of experience. It may take different forms, but it holds at bottom to the same inner thought and purpose. Veiled in obscurity are the causes of this need to move ever and upwards and forwards, by sweat of the brow, through sufferings and fears.... there never fails to come to the rescue some human being, like ourselves in everything except that he has in him a secret power of human vision. He sees and points the way...
If the artist be priest of beauty, nevertheless this beauty is to be sought only according to the size and intensity of that need. That is beautiful which is produced by the inner need, which springs from the soul. Maeterlink, one of the first warriors, one of the first modern artists of the soul, says, 'There is nothing on earth so curious for beauty or so absorbent of it, as a soul. For that reason few mortal souls withstand the leadership of a soul which gives to them beauty...'"
Through the fragile grace of the divine comes the humility of the soul... which grants compassion and hope for the triumph of life... this, as artists, is what we are called to embrace in ourselves, and hence to share with the world.
Peace to all (or any) who read this.
The soul is rich in its diversity of capabilities. both for discernemnt of what is beautiful and the will to create in spite of the distractions so common throughout our lives.
Thank you for your thoughtful and inspiring response.
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