Response to Dave

Dave commented on the poem ‘On the Road Home’ and speculated about the lines
“It was when you said
The idols have seen lots of poverty,
Snakes and gold and lice,
But not the truth";
Dave thought that the lines might mean, “that religion have had various effects or perhaps that religion is a tool for amassing inequality as the idols, here, have seen both poverty and gold.” I thought that the lines might mean that the idols have seen many different types of religion and to them all of it was wrong ‘poverty’ that none of it was the truth. The different types of religion were classified and compared to snakes (sneaky, swindling), gold (of false value), and lice (infestations of peoples minds but in the end, of little real value).

Sunday Mornings

I thought the Wallace Stevens poems were very interesting. His comments on death and beauty were thought provoking. In paragraph V of ‘Sunday Morning’ he comments that ‘Death is the mother of beauty’ and in section VI questions ‘Is there no change of death in paradise? Does the ripe fruit never fall?’ I think that there are two meanings to ‘death is the mother of beauty.’ The first meaning is that following death there is rebirth. There is rebirth of nature every spring following the ‘death’ of the plants, flowers, and leaves in late fall. The new plants that grow in the spring are aesthetically beautiful. I think that he also means that death makes us appreciate what is around us. When we have a life threatening experience our one of our first responses is to start bargaining for our life. We are naturally somewhat afraid of death and therefore want to stay alive. When we feel like our life is going to be taken away from us we value what we have and our want for life is increased. After we survive the threatening experience, at least for a little while, we take in everything around us and appreciate it for what it is. The grass that was once seen as ‘just grass’ suddenly becomes a fabulous green field that smells and appears to be fantastic as is blows in the wind. In that way we find beauty through the threat of death upon our own lives. In response to Stevens’ question ‘Is there no change of death in paradise? Does the ripe fruit never fall?’ I would say if there is no death there could be aesthetic beauty of the ‘ripe fruit that never falls’ but the praise and obsession over the beauty of the fruit will never be reached. It’s hard to notice static things that are unchanging but just because something’s beauty isn’t noticed, it doesn’t mean that it’s beauty does not exist.

Adam and Eve

Catrina makes an interesting observation noting the irony about the then and now view of clothing from the time of Adam and Eve to now. God looked down at Adam and Eve when they began to cover themselves and now the Queen of England is scolding today’s youth for not covering themselves enough. I notice the lack of the leader’s control in both of these situations rather than the leaders’ objection to the extent of how clothed his or her people are. I find the ‘Adam and Eve scolding’ from God the beginning of the unspoken social rules. Adam and Eve never told God they were going to start wearing clothes but together started a change in the way the society (Adam and Eve) did things. This is the way that human beings interact socially with one another. People are very socially in-tune with one another and when they encounter a situation in which they are unsure of how to behave they look to what the other people around them are doing. In this way a group of people can sometimes change under their leaders nose. It seems that sometimes people need something more tangible to rely on for support and acceptance rather than a leader who is far away or a God that they cannot touch.

I was reading Oliver’s latest post and what caught my attention was that he referenced the 5 points that responded to a critic (See Oliver’s post). Those 5 points also stood out to me while I was reading “Paths to the Absolute” and in particular the second point: 2) This world of the imagination is fancy-free and violently opposed to reason. To me this point doesn’t make much sense the way it is written. I would think that what is meant by the statement is that art is to be expressed and created through the experience of the creation of the piece. There are no rules to how the piece is created but rather the creation of the piece is an extension of the artist’s thoughts and feelings at the time of the creation. If the statement is intended to be interpreted this way I can see the creation of the piece of art as religion because the artist is creating his or her own world and expressing this world within their mind through their production. However, the point still makes me feel like there is a contradiction within the statement because in order to be opposed to something isn’t it necessary to oppose due to reason?

I thought Catrina's blog on Red was very thought provoking. Catrina said in her blog two things that I found very interesting; "The family survives on self deceit, as clearly the daughter knows about her father's affair. They choose to live life ignoring its imperfections, so to undermine that structure would be wrong. " and "No situation is straight forward, no person is as they seem, and there can be no single truth." These were very powerful statements to me and I feel like everyone can take these messages in and see how they fit within humanity and their own lives. To choose to live a life that ignores its imperfections is in a way a perfect life. As it is commonly said ignorance is bliss. If someone chooses to live their life in a way that ignores everything that would be an imperfection to them and get them down or feel anything less than positive would be a very uplifting way to live life. If all of the imperfections could actually be ignored life and the world around us would be 'bliss.' The other remark that Catrina made "No situation is straight forward, no person is as they seem, and there can be no single truth" is scary but true. The fact that there may be no single truth keeps this world more open minded and it keeps people from being what they seem. Without a single truth people can always be deceitful and not as they seem because they don't have to be one way or another, they can do whatever they want and get away with it. So is the price that we pay for freethinking and no right answer is that we can trust no one?

Religion in Art

I feel like it is hard to decipher specific religious views of an artist. So much of the art we have been looking at lately is vague to the viewer. There are little to no signs of distinctive religious symbols and even if there were, the other objects in the artwork don’t clearly show an action or state of being. I think that the religion in the artwork is found in its creation. The artist has a religious experience when creating the artwork. An experience that is so personal that final images within the artwork have great meaning and symbolism that evoke certain feelings for the artist but not for the viewers. A religious experience can be retold but the listener will never feel the full strength of the experience like the person to whom it happened. I think that the experience of making art can be religious in that the artist can devote themselves to the work and discover new ideas about themselves in the course of the project and let their thoughts and feelings about religion be expressed through each brush stroke or line drawn. The religion in the artwork can be very difficult to see as an outsider looking into the artwork but the piece is still a bundle of religious experience and meaning tied together through color, brush strokes, and the artists mind all displayed on one piece of canvas. Art can be interpreted by each individual viewer and the interpretation may be similar to the ideas of the artist but the artwork and it’s meaning will carry exactly the same meaning to someone else. I also think that a viewer may find an understandable idea within the artwork and interpret its importance and meaning according to the artist, incorrectly. In this way, I believe that art is not created for others for it’s aesthetic value, but rather art is created in order for the artist to capture their experience and give them a window through which to return to that idea later on.

Red

Outside of class I ran into Dave and we briefly discussed the movie Red. Dave shared with me his ideas of how he saw the movie as religious. He mentioned that he saw the old Judge as God because he was omniscient (by listening to everyone’s phone calls), a judge (makes the final judgment on people), and can see the future (dream about Valentine’s future happiness). I had not thought that the movie was strikingly religious in any way before talking with Dave. The points that Dave argues make sense to me that the judge could be seen as God, however, there were some very humanistic qualities that the judge had that I thought were not like God at all. The judge felt remorse for spying on his neighbors after meeting Valentine and turned himself in to the police. As far as we know God is the highest power and no one shows God that he made a blunder. In the scene where Valentine first meets the judge he is indifferent about the return of his dog and he says that he cares about nothing and Valentine suggests that he stop breathing. As we see later in the movie, one of the reasons the judge is so unfeeling is because he lost the woman he loved and he never got over it. Of what I know about God, God is both caring and forgiving neither of which the judge appears to be in this scene. I liked Dave’s argument for the judge to be seen as God but I think there is too much evidence that the judge has faults and cannot meet the criteria of God.