The Master's Artist

Art, Faith, and Justice

Note from Jeanne: I met Jonathan Assink last week in Seattle, when I had the delightful privilege of attending an organizational meeting Curtis and Grace hosted for local artists interested in working with Arts Aftercare. Jonathan is currently pursuing a masters degree in International Care and Community Development at Northwest University in Kirkland, and Arts Aftercare recently recruited him to research overseas shelters that use art therapy for victims of human trafficking. After chatting with Jonathan about his research and passion, I asked him to guest post for The Master's Artist.

Artistic mediums and styles are as varied as the people who identify themselves as artists. My goal here is to add to the existing discussion about the role of artists in the Church and greater society, rather than attempt a definitive statement on what is art and what is not. As Christians we are called to be creative beings; as artists our faith should inform our creations; the concept of justice is a central part of our faith; our art then should reflect the Biblical concept of justice.

Failure and Success

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, Susan Fish.

The year I turned 30, I signed up for a play-writing workshop with our local theatre company. There were about a dozen of us in the class. Most had creative experience of one sort or another, but none had ever written a play before. We met weekly from September to April and learned about the craft, about what must be conveyed by dialogue alone, about the amount of stage direction a writer can give.

In those days, the Internet was newish. The year before, when I was pregnant with my first child, I had joined a list serve of women expecting babies the same month as me. We stayed in touch. Many of them met, but I liked keeping them as pen pals, being able to confide things to them that I might not say to friends at hand. Then, in October, not long after the course started, my town played host to Oktoberfest. Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, in fact, hosts the largest Bavarian celebration in North America - effectively a beer drinking festival, with sausages, accordions and polka dancing thrown into the mix.

I had my play idea: what would I do if some of these mommies descended on my town for Oktoberfest?

Who do you want to be when you grow up?

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, Susan Fish.

Who do you want to be when you grow up? As a writer, I mean.

I can’t be the only person out there who looks up to certain writers for their ability and voice. I don’t go looking for these role models, but I always know when I find them because of the wistful feeling I get: I’d like to be able to do that. Strangely, the feeling is never one of jealousy. It’s pure admiration and gentle ambition.

My list includes Sue Monk Kidd because I’d like to achieve what she does in bringing Christian faith to a wider audience in the form of a beautiful story; Lucy Maud Montgomery because of the hopefulness of her writing; CS Lewis – well, just because of everything; Donald Miller for his honesty and wit; Sting because of his passion; George Herbert because of his melding of vocations; John Milton because of his vision; and a Canadian writer you might not have heard of: Stuart McLean.

My pal, Brad Pitt

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, Susan Fish.

So, I have this friend who's a homeless man. He sits every morning on the steps of a fancy bistro I've never gone to (because when I called them to ask their specials, a haughty voice said, "...and our liver of the day is..." and I decided to boycott). In a reedy voice he asks passersby, politely, for fifty cents. Never more. Never less.

The bistro is a few steps away from the Ten Thousand Villages store I work at on Thursdays, and not far from the gelato store where I meet friends on Mondays. I see this gentleman regularly, but I didn't know his name - nor he mine - for a long time. We would have our exchange about money and then, as I locked my bike up, we would talk about his health, the weather and other such matters. And then, I was off.

In my mind, I started to think of him as Brad Pitt because, like Pitt, he often has beads braided into his beard.

A Different Kind of Daughter

Today the Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, Susan Fish.

I wrote a short story once in which the narrator said of her mother, "She was ready for a different kind of daughter, I think."

That line came back to haunt me this week.

Casing the Joint

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster Heather Goodman

“This is the same daughter-in-law who stole your grandmother’s china right from your house?” a woman in the table behind mine says.

I dig my Nancy Drew notepad from my purse to jot down this tidbit.

A second voice chimes in. “Wait. She stole your china? Why?”

“To sell it on Craig’s list, if you can believe that.” This from the offended woman, apparently.

I consider asking my lunch partner to switch seats with me to better see the facial expressions and hand gestures. But I don’t think I could hear as well from her seat.

Write, like food, to bring to life

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, Mick Silva.

I'm not Episcopalian. Sometimes I wish I were. Or maybe Catholic--just one of these denominations that makes a really big deal about the "sacrament," the "host," communion. I enjoy every once in a while focusing on the original meaning of the metaphor—remembering Christ's sacrifice in the physical symbols of His love. That we can remember the most beautiful fact of human existence--restoration--through the elemental symbols--eating a flayed, disfigured body and drinking its spilled blood—it can easily feel to me like trying to think of eternity. It overwhelms us.

But at the heart of that metaphor, there's a deep truth: the experience of grace is shocking.

The Myth of Being in the Zone

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, K.M. Weiland

At one point or another, all authors have found that delicious groove called “being in the zone.” The Zone is that enchanted land, in which we can do no wrong. Our words flow from our fingertips onto our keyboards with lightning speed, every one of them singing with the perfect expression of our intent, every one of them beautiful and powerful and vibrant. We write for hours, our energy level so high it’s practically bouncing out of the top of our skulls. When we finally tear ourselves away from our story, we’re so pumped that we alternate between wanting to run around the block and resisting the urge to shove our newly minted words under the nose of anybody we can talk into reading them. Without doubt, The Zone is one awesome place.

Too bad we can’t stay there all the time.

Lens on Writing

Today the Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, Susan Fish.

September 11, 2001 was my oldest child’s first day of kindergarten and I was prepared to shed tears at this milestone. But his teacher was late. I watched the clock tick from 8:45 to 9:01 until finally – the bus had shown up – the teacher arrived. I went home and kindergarten was quickly put into perspective.

For us, like many, it was close to home. My sister and her husband had chosen to skip their dental appointments in the World Trade Centre that morning. It was one of the few weeks of the year my sister was not flying to California – on the very flight that crashed in Pennsylvania.

So maybe it was because they were safe and sound. Maybe that’s my excuse.

The World View of Christian Fiction

The Master's Artist welcomes guest poster, K.M. Weiland.

Every book you read is a tractate on the world view of the author. In some stories, the author’s viewpoint is immediately discernible; perhaps the book’s premise was even based on a view the author passionately wanted to share, such as Charles Dickens’s frequent crusades against the injustices of Victorian England (Oliver Twist, Bleak House, Little Dorrit). More often than not, however, the author’s world view is simply the de facto backdrop for a story intended for sheer entertainment value.

Don’t be mistaken, though. The fact that an author doesn’t necessarily intend to “preach” his world view, hardly diminishes the fact that his view is still presented to the public in a favorable and often convincing manner, simply because likable main characters share these beliefs. This very subtlety is what gives fictional stories tremendous sway in directing public morality. One need look no farther than Hollywood to recognize the phenomenal impact stories can have on those who participate in them.