On the Strange Place of Religion in Contemporary Art PDF Download

Author: James Elkins
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135879702
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 154

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Book Description
Can contemporary art say anything about spirituality? John Updike calls modern art "a religion assembled from the fragments of our daily life," but does that mean that contemporary art is spiritual? What might it mean to say that the art you make expresses your spiritual belief? On the Strange Place of Religion in Contemporary Art explores the curious disconnection between spirituality and current art. This book will enable you to walk into a museum and talk about the spirituality that is or is not visible in the art you see.

Author: Makoto Fujimura
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300255934
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 184

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Book Description
From a world-renowned painter, an exploration of creativity’s quintessential—and often overlooked—role in the spiritual life “Makoto Fujimura’s art and writings have been a true inspiration to me. In this luminous book, he addresses the question of art and faith and their reconciliation with a quiet and moving eloquence.”—Martin Scorsese “[An] elegant treatise . . . Fujimura’s sensitive, evocative theology will appeal to believers interested in the role religion can play in the creation of art.”—Publishers Weekly Conceived over thirty years of painting and creating in his studio, this book is Makoto Fujimura’s broad and deep exploration of creativity and the spiritual aspects of “making.” What he does in the studio is theological work as much as it is aesthetic work. In between pouring precious, pulverized minerals onto handmade paper to create the prismatic, refractive surfaces of his art, he comes into the quiet space in the studio, in a discipline of awareness, waiting, prayer, and praise. Ranging from the Bible to T. S. Eliot, and from Mark Rothko to Japanese Kintsugi technique, he shows how unless we are making something, we cannot know the depth of God’s being and God’s grace permeating our lives. This poignant and beautiful book offers the perspective of, in Christian Wiman’s words, “an accidental theologian,” one who comes to spiritual questions always through the prism of art.

Author: W. David O. Taylor
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
ISBN: 0830890300
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
The church and the contemporary art world often find themselves in an uneasy relationship in which misunderstanding and mistrust abound. Drawn from the 2015 biennial CIVA conference, these reflections from theologians, pastors, and practicing artists imagine the possibility of a renewed and mutually fruitful relationship between contemporary art and the church.

Author: Daniel A. Siedell
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 1441201858
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
Is contemporary art a friend or foe of Christianity? Art historian, critic, and curator Daniel Siedell, addresses this question and presents a framework for interpreting art from a Christian worldview in God in the Gallery: A Christian Embrace of Modern Art. As such, it is an excellent companion to Francis Schaeffer's classic Art and the Bible. Divided into three parts--"Theology," "History," and "Practice"--God in the Gallery demonstrates that art is in conversation with and not opposed to the Christian faith. In addition, this book is beautifully enhanced with images from such artists as Andy Warhol, Jackson Pollock, Enrique Martínez Celaya, and others. Readers of this book will include professors, students, artists, and anyone interested in Christianity and culture.

Author: Taylor Worley
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429671059
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 271

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Book Description
This book explores how four contemporary artists—Francis Bacon, Joseph Beuys, Robert Gober, and Damien Hirst—pursue the question of death through their fraught appropriations of Christian imagery. Each artist is shown to not only pose provocative theological questions, but also to question the abilities of theological speech to adequately address current attitudes to death. When set within a broader theological context around the thought of death, Bacon’s works invite fresh readings of the New Testament’s narration of the betrayal of Christ, and Beuys’ works can be appreciated for the ways they evoke Resurrection to envision possible futures for Germany in the aftermath of war. Gober’s immaculate sculptures and installations serve to create alternative religious environments, and these places are both evocative of his Roman Catholic upbringing and virtually haunted by the ghosts of his excommunication from that past. Lastly and perhaps most problematically, Hirst has built his brand as an artist from making jokes about death. By opening fresh arenas of dialogue and meaning-making in our society and culture today, the rich humanity of these artworks promises both renewed depths of meaning regarding our exit from this world as well as how we might live well within it for the time that we have. As such, it will be a vital resource for all scholars in Theology, the Visual Arts, Material Religion and Religious Studies.

Author: Andreas Andreapoulos
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134936621
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 188

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Book Description
Religion and spirituality are key aspects of the contemporary art scene. Following Ronald Barthes' 'death of the author' - which argued for the dissociation of work from creator - works of art have withdrawn as independent objects, giving way to a growing religious awareness or practice. 'Art and Theology' examines the connection between art and religion in ancient Jewish drama, Greek tragedy, the Renaissance, the Byzantine icon and the medieval cathedral. The book explores how art lost its sacred character in the late Middle Ages and how the current withdrawal or 'death' of art and the fusion of the limits of art and life are consistent with the medieval view of the religious icon.

Author: Jonathan A. Anderson
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
ISBN: 0830899979
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 388

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Book Description
In 1970, Hans Rookmaaker published Modern Art and the Death of a Culture, a groundbreaking work that considered the role of the Christian artist in society. This volume responds to his work by bringing together a practicing artist and a theologian, who argue that modernist art is underwritten by deeply religious concerns.

Author: Daniel A. Siedell
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
ISBN: 1630877913
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 170

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Book Description
Modern art can be confusing and intimidating--even ugly and blasphemous. And yet curator and art critic Daniel A. Siedell finds something else, something much deeper that resonates with the human experience. With over thirty essays on such diverse artists as Andy Warhol, Thomas Kinkade, Diego Velazquez, Robyn O'Neil, Claudia Alvarez, and Andrei Rublev, Siedell offers a highly personal approach to modern art that is informed by nearly twenty years of experience as a museum curator, art historian, and educator. Siedell combines his experience in the contemporary art world with a theological perspective that serves to deepen the experience of art, allowing the work of art to work as art and not covert philosophy or theology, or visual illustrations of ideas, meanings, and worldviews. Who's Afraid of Modern Art? celebrates the surprising beauty of art that emerges from and embraces pain and suffering, if only we take the time to listen. Indeed, as Siedell reveals, a painting is much more than meets the eye. So, who's afraid of modern art? Siedell's answer might surprise you.

Author: Thomas E. Crow
Publisher: Power Publications, Sydney
ISBN: 9780909952990
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The first in the new Power Polemics series, Thomas Crow's No Idols: The Missing Theology of Art turns away from contemporary cultural theories to face a pervading blindspot in today's art-historical inquiry: religion. Crow pursues a perhaps unpopular notion of Christianity's continued presence in modern abstract art and in the process makes a case for art's own terrain of theology: one that eschews idolatry by means of abstraction. Tracking the original anti-idolatry controversy of the Jansenists, anchored in a humble still life by Chardin, No Idols sets the scene for the development of an art of reflection rather than representation, and divinity without doctrine. Crow's reinstatement of the metaphysical is made through the work of New Zealand artist Colin McCahon and American artists Mark Rothko, Robert Smithson, James Turrell, and Sister Mary Corita Kent. While a tightly selected group of artists, in their collective statute the author explores the proposal that spiritual art, as opposed to "a simulacrum of one," is conceivable for our own time.

Author: James Elkins
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 9780252069505
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Book Description
He also addresses the phenomenon of art critiques as a microcosm for teaching art as a whole and dissects real-life critiques, highlighting presuppositions and dynamics that make them confusing and suggesting ways to make them more helpful. Elkins's no-nonsense approach clears away the assumptions about art instruction that are not borne out by classroom practice. For example, he notes that despite much talk about instilling visual acuity and teaching technique, in practice neither teachers nor students behave as if those were their principal goals. He addresses the absurdity of pretending that sexual issues are absent from life-drawing classes and questions the practice of holding up great masters and masterpieces as models for students capable of producing only mediocre art. He also discusses types of art--including art that takes time to complete and art that isn't serious--that cannot be learned in studio art classes.