What Does It Take To Be A True Artist?

Let's begin to answer that question by watching the video below:


 After seeing this video, many of us may feel inspired. We're left with these ideas that we can impact the lives of others. Then we also are likely to have noticed the power of this presentation. Hopefully in Music Club, we are analyzing her amazing capability as a singer. She sings with power and emotion. And oh, doesn't she just look beautiful--all dressed in white. The performance and media presentation were both spectacular.

But the amazing truth about modernity's notion of helping others presents us with some notions about legacy that we need to face. Throughout the entire song and presentation--made to show the hurting and the needs of others--the song continues to drive home the idea that "I Was Here." In the context of helping others, how could there be anything wrong with that? We should want the world to know us for our love and generosity. We should leave a mark on time that tells the world we loved, we gave, we lived. However, the most amazing difference, that we may miss if we aren't careful, between the view presented here and the view of truth that we ascribe to as Christians is this: Let the world know that God was here. Let the world see that God worked in your life and in the lives of others. If by chance the world remembers any of my efforts in this life, let it be to bring them closer to the God of gods, King of kings, and Lord of lords.

The modern concept of legacy and generosity leaves us sorely lacking. It asks you to give and share and love because it raises you up. It allows you to be honored and revered. It exalts your name. It makes you look good and comes back to benefit you. It doesn't ask you to give or love or share simply because it is right. It doesn't recognize the self-sacrifice behind what real creativity means. Instead it renders the great beauty of our calling to love as a mere form of self-promotion.

At the very end it presents the question "What will you do?" That is a great question to ask! We should daily ask ourselves, "how should we then live?" Yet let's examine this question in the context of this song. The song is asking you to remember that "I was here," that "I made a difference," that the good you see in this world came as a result of my own personal goodness. It isn't asking you to love the broken or help the hurting simply because it is good to do so. The reason for that is because the concept of "goodness" comes from within the self. I find it interesting that the mantra we are left with is "What Will You Do?" Do you remember the question stamped across bracelets and t-shirts that was widespread throughout the 90s? WWJD? What Would Jesus Do? Perhaps it became an overused slogan that watered down an important truth. But in reality it is the most simple form to reign in our base desires and pull us under the hedge of our calling to seek justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God. I do not think it is a coincidence that Jesus is replaced with you in this video. Modernity would have us deny the necessarily humble mindset altogether. No. In this age, we aren't to look up to anyone being or person. We are to look within ourselves. Save ourselves. Be our own gods. And be proud of this honorary status at that. Be proud that we are known, that we are salvation, that we are gods. This viewpoint couldn't made any clearer than in the Kanye West music video, Power (viewer discretion strongly advised for language and depictions of promiscuity), in which you see the artist stylize like a Greek god, surrounded by basic carnality, music swelling to reinforce the message of power and might within humanity. (According to West's lyrics, it appears he is specifically refering to the black race within humanity, personified by West in the video. A viewpoint formed due to the cultural twists from the abuses and evils of slavery to the modern day adoration and stereotyping of so-called black culture in large portions of the music business. This mindset is better explained by other artists such as Lupe Fiasco in songs such as Dumb It Down and B**** Bad, in which he uses the irony of his own success in the music business, derogatory curse words, and specific persona depictions in an attempt to defeat some of the stereotypes existing in modern, popular music. Again, viewer discretion strongly advised for language and depictions of promiscuity.)

In the context of modern standards for deriving truth and goodness, by looking inwards, we see that helping others is a way, not to be God-like rather, to be like a god. J.F. Baldwin says it best in his book The Deadliest Monster:

 "And so we arrive at last at the biggest paradox: Christians, the very people who claim that man can do nothing to save himself, expect more goodness of themselves than any other adherent of any other worldview. 'Christianity is strange,' writes Blaise Pascal. 'It bids man to recognize that he is vile, and even abominable, and bids him to want to be like God.' [...] The irony is profound: men who deny their sinfulness and posture as gods-in-the-making stay 'mere men,' while men who acknowledge their sinfulness become, by Christ's power, sons of God! 'For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it' (Luke 9:24). Broken vessels can only be used when they recognize that they can accomplish nothing on their own--then suddenly these broken vessels find that they are expected not only to live well, but to be holy. 'Man,' as Chesterton says, 'is not merely an evolution but rather a revolution'--a being called from death to life, from blindness to sight, and from sin to heroism [...] Every other worldview says we should help others because in the long run it will help us. Only Christ provides salvation first, and then demands that we die to ourselves every day."

I do not share this point of view because I believe these artists are only evil and their music is without redeeming qualities. I share this perspective because there are notions of truth and deception that need to be called out. I share, not because Beyoncé ought to be demonized, but rather because her music requires the same levels of scrutiny that we apply to everything we see and hear. Of course, based on the scriptural notion that light should not hold company with the dark (2 Corinthian 6), I know that all music is capable of bearing evil. Whether the music is mellow like Jack Johnson, dramatic like Béla Bartók, or dark like Marilyn Manson, lies and truths are in wait of our reaping. It takes a discerning ear to recognize that even Christian music is capable of spreading a lie or misconception of God. For more on the matter of discerning what we are listening to, refer back to How We Listen.

The "I Was Here" video has lies twisted up in its facade of truths. My job as a Christian is to discern what those lies are and find the truth that entices us to the facade in the first place. This video is the perfect display for the modern view of legacy. But the biblical view of legacy leaves you with something much more frightening, enduring, and powerful than anything found in the performance above. At the end of my life, I will not be bothered in the least if no one knows my name. If my name be remembered, I hope it will be for the students I have come into contact over the years. Let the world see my life and your life and say "Yes. Truly, God was here."

As an artist, this notion has certain implications that we need to recognize. Please take these quotes and lists into account. Apply for yourself what the idea of legacy really means as it pours out of your artwork.

“Truth in art does not mean doing accurate copies, but that the artist’s insight is rich and full, that he really has a good view of reality, that he does justice to the different elements of the aspect of reality he is representing. Truth has to do with the fullness of reality, its scope and meaning […] It is artistic truth!” ~ H.R. Rookmaaker

Rookmaaker, author of Modernity and the Death of Culture, defines creativity with these parameters: “Realizing one’s possibility, acting in love and freedom within given structures, fighting against sin and its results, all this is also what creativity means […] We are called to be creative in this sense. And we are called to bear the cross that often goes with it, for mankind often prefers darkness to light.”

“We must not love in word or speech, but in deed and truth; that is how we will know we are of the truth.” ~ I John 3:18, 19

Six Concepts that make way for True Art:

1. Understanding Truth: Adherence to the Spirit of God. Only the Spirit of God convicts. Only God saves. By understanding what God requires of you (Micah 6:8) and living out the specific calling God places on your life and worldview, you allow yourself the room to live in an understanding of the truth. By understanding that only God provides your calling, it cannot be baptized over others with force, you can rest in His specific calling for your life and His revelation of truth as it applies to what He whats you to share with the world.

2. Ability: Not necessarily a talent you’re born with but a discipline. “Genius is seldom recognized for what it is: a great capacity for hard work.” ~ Henry Ford
My dear friend, who is an aviator and Army lieutenant, has her masters degree, and has a flourishing career all at the age of 25, has said for years that her sisters are smarter than she. School has been an effort for us both for years. And yet she succeeds wildly, always at the top of her class. Her peers and leaders ask her if this just comes naturally to her, and she answers them emphatically, "No!" It takes so much work. In school, we worked hard together to get good grades. It didn't come to us naturally. But she is the perfect example of why genius is really just a capacity for great work.

3. Intelligence: a backbone to deny irrationality. Art consists of law and limitation. “The most beautiful part of every picture is the frame.” ~ G.K. Chesterton. The ability to be creative in such a way that the artist invents progress without resorting to the ease of creating without limits. Creativity without guidelines is not nearly as masterful as creativity with.
When you remove all limits and begin to create, the result is something like Duchamp's toilet, which is featured as art and is hailed as such to this day. It takes intelligence to recognize the power of a boundary. This is where the two ironic ideas of creativity as both freedom and structure come together through grace.

4. Knowledge: “pursuit of knowledge” is the “mandate for the artist.” ~ Greg Wilber “Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful.” ~The Astronomer, Rasselas, by Paul Johnson
Here we pointed out in class the first of which, integrity without knowledge, is much like what we see in the video above. It shows a desire to help and seemingly good character, but without the knowledge of truth as  foundation, it is rendered weak and useless overall. The second of which, knowledge without integrity, is akin to examples of Malthusianism, Darwinism, Communism, or Socialism. It shows an understanding of figures and data, but transfers it in so deadly and dangerous ways that mercy is little more than genocide, infanticide, and euthanasia.

5. Craftsmanship: An artist has dominion over the craft. This requires submission to the truth “in order to subdue the media.” ~ Wilber. Understanding your craft and medium gives you the ability to create in beauty and truth. You take ownership and responsibility over your tools and your trade to communicate and express creatively the scope of reality.
Just know your medium, know it well, and use it to tell the story God calls you to.

6. Teaching: A true artist is a teacher. Passing on the baton divorces art and ego. The true artist exhibits a “desire to prepare the rising generation […] A true teacher desires his students to surpass his works.” ~ Wilber. A teacher comes to the understanding that a real legacy isn’t about having the world know your name, rather true legacy let’s the Lord use you to better understand God’s name. It’s God-confidence, not self-confidence.
Sharing yourself with your students and imparting the specific calling God placed over your life with them is how we leave a lasting legacy.

*This list was developed by Gregory Wilber of New College Franklin. The notes were derived from a lecture shared with the Humanities students of Franklin Classical School in 2005.