Masterpieces Upon this Transient Earth

Sometimes things that I see or read just speak to me. I cannot say why at the moment. As my cousin, a photographer and independent filmmaker, would say, they come together “behind my head.” Without fully understanding it on a logical level, somehow something in my heart seizes upon it and says, “This is important. This is good.” I usually ask why, but the part of my mind that recognizes has little interest in explaining. It knows that this is important, or beautiful, or good, and that is that

This blog post about an artist who makes beautiful designs by walking back and forth for hours on freshly fallen snow was one such focal point. When I read the story, and

saw the pictures, all I could think was, “This is a work of love.”

I did not know why I thought that. I could not have explained it, but somehow it only makes sense in my mind to do something like that for love. The man spends hours trudging back and forth, and back and forth to create something that will be gone with the first new snow, vanished without a trace, as if it had never been. The only trace will be in the minds and hearts of those who have seen it. Without my thinking it through, this intuitively seemed to me to exemplify the purest form of art, to create something of beauty and rigor and rightness, and then to let it go so completely that, not only do you not care if it gets destroyed, you have designed it specifically to be wiped out. Perhaps, in a way, these snow designs are like the sand mandala’s of the Dalai Lama. 

One of the books I am currently reading is “The Story of a Soul,” The Autobiography of Saint Therese of Lisieux. A day or two ago I was reading Chapter 6 where she describes the pilgrimage she made to Rome with her father and sister. She speaks wonderingly about the beauty of Switzerland, “With its high mountains, their snowy peaks lost in the clouds, its rushing torrents, and its deep valleys filled with giant ferns and purple heather. Great good was wrought in my soul by these beauties of nature so abundantly scattered abroad. They lifted it to Him Who had been pleased to lavish such masterpieces upon this transient earth.”

It was the last half a sentence that caught my ear, “to lavish such masterpieces upon this transient earth.

One of the most ancient, most noble and most controversial of human undertakings has been the production of art. The question of what truly is and what is not art takes up a good deal of space in the writings of philosophers, along with subordinate questions such as its purpose, its use, its value to society, how or if it should be regulated or controlled, etc. (Another of my current reads is Plato’s “Republic” which is greatly concerned with such questions.) But it seemed to me, with a sudden clarity, and indeed a certainty, that both Simon Beck and the Dalai Lama had, perhaps intuitively or perhaps more cognitively, grasped the real purpose of art; that is, to imitate God in “lavishing masterpieces upon this transient earth.” Precisely by focusing their creativity into mediums of extreme impermanence, they see and escape one of the most dangerous snares of art, which is the illusion of permanence.

Every aspiring artist nobly and rightly wishes to create art that will outlast him. He or she looks to the immortality of Shakespeare, Dante, Michelangelo, Boticelli, and others whose creations of goodness, truth and beauty have kept their names alive long after their bones are dust. Even the painter of the cave paintings in Cro Magnon, France, though his name is lost, his paintings live on. We all aspire to that.

However, in the immortal words of Admiral Akbar, “It’s a trap.” The permanence of Shakespeare and Dante are illusions. The marbles of Michelangelo will crumble to dust. Even the prehistoric caves will one day be a charred lump, along with the rest of this planet, in the cosmic sink that used to be our sun. When that happens, however, the soul of the human who created it will still exist. Perhaps this was why Therese of Lisieux was able to explain the precise place of art in such a brief sentence, in the middle of a book that meditates pretty exclusively upon the impermanence of all created things. She saw that only God is eternal, and she loved Him, and desired Him before all else, and so everything else fell into place, including created beauty. God does lavish masterpieces upon this transient earth, and calls us to do the same. We are called to pour out our attention, our effort, our blood and sweat and tears in imitation of Him, creating beautiful things with full knowledge that they are destined for oblivion.

This idea is especially relevant to the internet generation. On the internet you have millions of people, all trying to create something. Some are trying to create art, some are trying to create noise. Some still believe and are trying to create something meaningful, others have given up and are just hoping for five minutes of fame and a few thousand hits, by any means necessary. Some try to create beauty and meaning, others are content to expose themselves in any tomfoolery imaginable, if it gets them a little attention. My blogging is the same way. Each blog post lives for a few days at most, and even that is only if it is unusually popular, and then it disappears, snowed under the constantly shifting heap of relevance that is the Internet. It reaches a few people, maybe a dozen, and at best one or two will read the whole thing. The rest scan the first sentence of each paragraph, agree or disagree, and then move on to the next link.

In cosmic terms, i.e. in terms of eternity, the complete works of Shakespeare will fair no better, which is not to put myself even remotely in the same class as Shakespeare. It is only to point out that all things pass away, except God.

Once, in a discussion about art with my cousin (the same cousin mentioned above) I tried to describe art as “drawing my best picture with crayons and hoping God will hang it on His refrigerator.” Only in God’s eyes is the art that I create eternal. That is an amazing thing, if you think about it. God and I together create "memories" that exist in God's eyes for all eternity?
Whoah! Mind Blown!

I imitate God for the same reason that a two year old walks around with a plastic hammer hitting the furniture all day. That is what he sees Daddy doing. When I create a work of art, God sees it, He sees me creating it, He loves me. I give that work of art to Him with the same delight and trust with which a three year old gives his scribbles to his Mommy. Then I go on to the next one. The greatest masterpiece I will ever create is nothing more than another memory of my childhood for God to hang on His refrigerator. When I am fully grown, I will look back upon my worldly Magnum Opus and laugh at the squiggly lines and juice stains and dirty fingerprints. Only love makes anything permanent, because only love is of God. 

That is the only worthwhile reason to create art, as a work of love, knowing that while the work may pass away, the love will outlast the universe. 

The Thangka School

In lieu of writing something new (Internet is intermittent around here) I am borrowing something I wrote in an email to my Uncle. Since it seemed like a good story I thought I would share it on the blog as well.

Uncle Chris,

I was visiting an ancient Hindu temple complex in Bhaktapur last week and let me tell you, it was well worth seeing. One of the temples was the temple of Shiva dedicated to the Kama Sutra, complete with xxx rated sculptures in bas-relief all over it. Unbelievably ugly and comically awkward at the same time.

Of much more interest, there is a school there where they teach Thangka painting, which is an ancient Buddhist method of instruction and worship, originating in monastaries in Tibet. I did not see any of the students painting because it was a holy day (saturday is the Hindu holy day) and also Buddhas birthday.

Why would a school of Buddhist art be housed in Hindu temple you ask? Well, from what I have seen in my travels and in reading, comparing the pure Buddhism of, say the Dalai Lama or other high level writers, to the popular Buddhism of Tibet, Nepal, India etc. I would have to say that pure Buddhism is extremely rare. One of the proprieters of the school was there explaining the history of Thangka painting and the meanings of it and we had quite a long talk about Buddhism and Hinduism. He was a little irate about it. He quite emphatically insisted that the Buddha never spoke about god or gods or any other independently existing spiritual entity. However, the vast majority of people cannot seem to handle a religion without gods, so wherever Buddhism went people simply grafted in the gods that they had always worshipped. So all the literally thousands of Hindu gods are no subjects of Buddhist philosophies and Buddha is one more god.

You wonder why the Catholic missionaries often freaked out about that sort of thing. "Oh, so you're bringing in another god? Whats his name? Jesus? Sure, bring him on! The more the merrier. He'll be in good company. So what is he the god of again?" I can see how that might be a bit disconcerting to someone who set out to convert the benighted pagans.

The painting, however, was amazing. Highly ornate, very stylized, and incredibly detailed. The proprieter explained that some of the paintings were for philosophical education, some were to tell stories, such as the life of the Buddha, some were mandalas, symbolic representations of temples with complex interpretations, and some were for medical purposes. It was a fascinating lecture. At the end of it he made sure to let us know that the paintings were for sale. There was a very large one, about 3' × 4', painted by one of the masters of the school, one of the lamas. It was unbelievable. The sheer detail was incredible. Some of the details had been painted in using a brush with only one hair, they were so tiny, and some of the paint was made with real gold. It took the lama four months to paint it. The price? 80,000 rupees.

That's about $940.00 U.S.

One of the guys was there with me and he said I should haggle about it if I was going to buy it. In all the markets in Thamel (the touristy strip in Kathmandu) haggling is the name of the game. I am terrible at it, by the way, and always end up paying twice or three times as much as the next guy. He thought 900 bucks for a painting was a ripoff, especially since he could go to Thamel and buy a copy of that exact paint for maybe 5,000 rupees.

I more or less ignored him and continued talking with the proprieter. He explained that this school was struggling to keep the heritage of painting alive and that the proceeds from the sales went to buy paints and pay for room and board for the students during their 10 year (!!!!!) stay at the school. He explained that selling the paintings was done in a co-op like that because most people, after spending every waking moment for four months working on that painting are going to have trouble parting with it or setting a reasonable price. I agreed.

I am beginning to realize that the habit of courtesy that my parents inculcated into me from an early age is far more than simply a grasp of a particular culture's ettiquette. In fact, that courtesy has stood me in good stead in every country I have visited to the extent that I often find myself getting along better with the natives than I do with the Americans. It is, primarily, a concern for the other person's comfort and sensibilities, and as such manifests itself in a willingness to listen to the other person. If you practice listening long enough you get used to it, and you develop the ability to see things from the other persons perspective, which in turn makes them more willing to try to see things from your perspective. There was a good deal of respect between that little proprieter and myself. I listened and I understood where he was coming from. I explained that I agreed that it was a fair price, but that I had a responsibility to use my money for other things. He offered to call the artist and see if he would lower the price, but I said no, I did not want him to. That price was more than fair and I did not want him to sell it short. I left a donation in the box, we bowed and shook hands and parted with, I think, a great deal of mutual respect.

Once outside I somewhat took my buddy to task over the whole thing. I recognize a true believer when I see one, and I respect that. The lama who painted that thangka and the man who was explaining and selling them had both dedicated their lives to that art. That painting had taken four months of a man's life to create, and more than that, was the product of an entire lifetime of study, practice and sacrifice to deepen and perfect his art. Whether or not I completely agree with the faith that inspired that art, I cannot help but respect the good that that faith does in the lives of its practitioners, and certainly I have to respect the sacrifice of an entire life to the pursuit of that faith and its art.

There is a story told of Picasso, to the effect that one day as he was walking down the street, an art aficionado came up to him and asked if he would sketch his portrait. Picasso obliged and in about thirty seconds sketched up an amazing likeness on a sheet of notebook paper. He offered it back to the man saying, "That will be $5,000 dollars."

The man was flabbergasted and said, "But it took you less than a minute to draw that. Surely your time is not that valuable."

The artist replied, "Sir, you are wrong. It has taken me my entire life to draw that."

While there is an element of arrogance to that, there is also an element of truth, in that the work of a human life is quite literally priceless. Where Picasso went wrong was in assuming that his life's work was any more valuable than, say, a ditch digger's life's work, done with the same level of dedication.

Whether my buddy was impressed with this argument or not I cannot say, but I followed it up by breaking down "four months" into familiar terms. Say our artist monk worked from 9-5 every day. That is an eight hour day, times the typical Nepali 6-day work week, times 16 weeks, for a grand total of approximately 768 man hours. When you factor in the price of materials and a commission for the seller (who, small as he is, also needs to eat), that monk is not even making a dollar an hour. No worker in America, not even a burger flipper at McDonalds, puts in 768 man hours and only makes $940. You yourself would certainly not paint a portrait for four months straight and sell it for less than $1000.

(My uncle is a professional artist and graphic designer. I remember him saying once, "Customers always want fast, cheap, and good quality. I tell them pick two. You can't have all three.)

That argument impressed my buddy enough that he acknowledged that it "definitely was not a racket."

I meant also to cover some thoughts in this email about that evangelization of manhood idea, as I have had some new thoughts (bringing in Brad Miner's Compleat Gentleman) but this email has become much longer than I thought it would so that will have to wait. As a matter of fact, I might recycle this email as a blogpost, if you do not mind. It would save me some time.

Hope you are well.
Ryan