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Re: thoughts on christian art

Alfred B Johnson <hoopyfrood at juno_com> wrote:
> 3)  The reason I cringe over the term "Christian Art" is that it has been
> attached so firmly to CRAP over the years, especially in the age of mass
> produced and mass mediated art.  I just don't wanna put Christian
> lamb-and-lion lala art in the same camp as a Flannery O'Connor or Bill
> Malonee or Michael Knott or CS Lewis or JRR Tolkien.  Pretty clearly, to
> me, these are Christians doing great art, as opposed to other Christians
> who, however well-intentioned or useful their product may (or may not)
> be, are producing what I will judiciously call not-great-art.

I agree that "Christian Art" has been over-used as a marketing
ploy in recent years, but trying to separate things based on
whether or not it's "good" is too arbitrary (even if you do
your best to be judicious).

In my mind, when I call something "Christian Art", I'm referring
to a work where the Christian theme is foremost.  When I listen
to the local "Contemporary Christian" radio station, what I hear 
is music primarily concerned with getting a particular message 
to the listener, and secondarily concerned with the musical 
qualities used to express it.  But when I listen to music like 
OTR or Sam Phillips, what I hear is music that is primarily 
concerned with the qualities of the music and lyrics.  Any 
Christian message that is present is there because the artist is 
a Christian, and their beliefs inform and are reflected in their 
art.
You cited CS Lewis, and I think he's a good example of what I'm
talking about.  One of his most famous books, "The Screwtape
Letters", is undoubtedly Christian literature.  Whether or not
the literary qualities of the book are well-done, the Christian
message is of primary importance.  Another well-known book,
"Out of the Silent Planet", is not.  There are definitely
Christian themes in the novel, but they are not the main focus.
(For contrast, read "That Hideous Strength", where in my opinion
the Christian allegory completely overruns the characters and
plot.)
I don't limit this kind of classification to Christian themes.
I read Norman Spinrad's novel "Little Heroes", and was really
bored because the literary elements of the book are trampled by
the "free the people!" theme.  Robert Heinlein's later novels
also suffer from over-theming.  (I'm sure there are people here
who will disagree, but I've found most books from "Number of 
the Beast" on to be almost unreadable.)  And as for Ayn Rand... 
oy, don't get me started.

One more caveat here, which is that I only find it necessary
to make these distinctions in music and literature.  I think
the reason is that anybody with a spare thousand bucks can
publish a book or press a CD, so people who are more interested
in spreading a message than in telling the message well are
free to do so.  In the art world (painting, sculpture, etc.),
it's much harder to get your work seen by the rest of the world
unless it actually is good art.

There is an implicit statement in my post, and in what several
other people have written, that liking a certain work of art
only because of its message and not because it's actually good,
is Wrong.  Would anyone care to take issue with that?

Mike.