MLitt in Theology, Imagination and the Arts
This exciting new masters programme will be launched in September 2008. Students will take three modules taught by ITIA staff (see details below) and write a 15000 word dissertation on a topic to be agreed in consultation with their appointed supervisor. The programme is designed to provide a broad based introduction to postgraduate work in the field of theology and the arts. As well as constituting a convenient self-contained programme of study, this MLitt is intended as a natural preparation for those intending to pursue doctoral research in this field.
The three taught modules will provide an appropriate grounding in broad questions of rationale and method (why bring Christian theology and the arts together at all, and how might it helpfully be done?), as well as an opportunity to earth methodology in the exploration of more focused and concrete issues. The dissertation is a piece of independent research, conducted under the guidance of a supervisor, and providing a chance to explore a particular topic or question in greater depth and in a sustained fashion.
The modules for the coming academic year (2008-9) are as follows:
- Theological Engagements with the Arts: Rationales, Methods and Texts (Prof. Trevor Hart, Semester 1)
- Christian Doctrine and the Arts (Prof. David Brown, Semester 1)
- Religious Experience and Aesthetic Theory (Prof. David Brown, Semester 2)
(The dissertation is supervised and written during Semester 2, and must be completed by the end of August 2009.)
The modules in more detail:
Module 1 – Theological Engagements with the Arts: Rationales, Methods and Texts
The arts are central to most human cultures, and are widely valued as an important and enriching part of our existence together as creatures in God’s world. But what exactly are ‘the arts’ anyway? What precisely is it that they do? and (crucially) what merit might there be in engaging with them theologically? Protestant Christians in particular have, typically, been somewhat reticent about the usefulness of such engagement, and have found it difficult to articulate a positive theological perspective on human artistry, or (sometimes) a place for artists in the life of the community of faith. Today there is a burgeoning interest in the arts among theologians and biblical scholars across the denominational and theological spectrum. But this takes many different forms and proceeds in some rather divergent directions, some of which may turn out to be more promising and fruitful than others. So, discernment must certainly be exercised.
This module will begin to open up some of the issues at stake in a distinctly theological approach to artistry and the arts. We will explore some common reasons for theological suspicion of the arts, consider some different ways in which an engagement between the two spheres may be approached, and enquire whether or not Christian theology properly affords a generous environment for the flourishing of artistry. Through engagement with texts, lecture materials and the views of others in the class, students will be encouraged to form their own distinct perspective on these questions.
- What are ‘the arts’? – a conversation with modernity
- Art and ‘the spiritual’: the proper objects of art and theology
- Is there a need for a distinctly Christian aesthetic?
- Art and the new sacramentalism
- Art, liturgy and discipleship
- Works of art as texts of theology
- Works of art as ‘texts for’ theology
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Modelling Christian doctrine – examples from the arts - Can Prometheus be redeemed?
- Putting the arts in their place
Some things are so familiar to us that it never occurs to us to stop and ask questions about them. Because it is likely that most members of the class will already have an informed grasp of the nature of theology and its peculiar concerns, our opening session will concentrate primarily on our habitual (but possibly unconsidered) uses of the terms ‘art’ and ‘the arts’. Philosopher Nicholas Wolterstorff (drawing on works by Oskar Kristeller and André Malraux) draws attention helpfully to some ways in which much popular talk about ‘the arts’ today is bound up with peculiarly modern (Western) conceptions about what the arts are and are for. We shall reckon with these conceptions, evaluate their appropriateness, and take stock of the risks involved in reading them into other historical and cultural contexts where they do not belong.
Why do we seem to want to attach the label ‘art’ to some things while insisting that others are ‘not-art’? There’s little doubt that we draw this distinction in one way or another on a regular basis; but is there any basis for drawing it in reality, or are we simply expressing judgements of value based on personal or communal taste? In answering this question, it has been common for appeal to be made to some sort of ‘power’ which works of art are held to possess, a power which equally commonly attracts language of a pseudo- or semi-religious sort. The arts, we may be told, put us directly in touch with the deeper reality of things, transport us into a transcendent realm, generate a sense of the spiritual, and so on. Theologians have sometimes been uncertain what to make of such claims. Sometimes they have been hostile and dismissive in their approach to them. There are certainly important questions of discernment to be asked and answered here, for it seems that for many in the ‘Godless’ and ‘disenchanted’ eras of modernity and post-modernity, the arts are to be acclaimed as a worthy heir to faith’s erstwhile role as the furnisher of a vision and values in accordance with which human life may be lived. What should Christian theology make of this, and how might it respond? . Critic John Carey provides a probing and often humorous challenge to confident talk about the ‘power’ of the arts, as well as posing an interesting question about the need for a properly theological basis for human talk about art and aesthetic values.
In her essay ‘Towards a Christian Aesthetic’ (1944), Dorothy L. Sayers (author of the Lord Peter Wimsey murder mysteries, as well as a critic and a commentator on religious themes and current affairs) complained that despite Christian theology’s careful and sustained engagement with such intellectual disciplines as philosophy, economics, history and the natural sciences, no consistent attempt had ever been made to relate an aesthetic to ‘the central Christian dogmas’. So far as a reasoned account of human artistry and the arts was concerned, she suggested, ‘one feels that it would probably have developed along precisely the same lines had there never been an Incarnation to reveal the nature of God – that is to say, the nature of all truth’. Sayers herself had a stab at the task, with mixed results as we shall see. But why should there be a distinctly Christian aesthetic at all? And if there is, what shape might such an aesthetic take?
As we have already noted, people will often insist that the arts have some close and perhaps essential link to things ‘spiritual’. This term and its cognates are generally used in a fairly vague way in this connection, but the basic idea is that through participation in the arts (whether as artists or those who receive what artists have made) we are in touch with something more than merely fleshly; some sphere of values or meanings or truths that elevate us above the materiality of daily life. Thus, some artists speak of a ‘spirituality’ or ‘sacrality’ attendant upon what they do. And consumers of art regularly refer to some communication of ‘transcendence’ or ‘presence’. Art, some have claimed, has finally to do with the same realities as religious faith. Exposure to or participation in the arts, therefore, might even be held to be a route to encounter with God. The arts are, of course, thoroughly earthed in the senses, the world of the ‘flesh’. This ‘amphibious’ quality of the arts has led some to apply to them the theological category of ‘sacrament’, albeit now in a revised and generalised version. Nonetheless, the claim is made that through our bodily engagement with the arts, we may reasonably expect to find ourselves in a place where God may be encountered. In this session we shall consider this claim as it arises in the recent work of David Brown and Frank Burch Brown, and explore its relationship to the classic Christian doctrines of creation, the incarnation and redemption.
If the arts do indeed have some particular capacity or quality which lends itself to God’s engagement with us, then it should not surprise us to find art of one sort or another at the centre of acts of worship, and prominent in the spaces we set aside for worship. That we need to tread very carefully indeed at this point, though, is indicated by the furore which erupted at the Reformation, resulting in some excessive and aesthetically regrettable acts of vandalism to be sure, but rooted in serious theological concerns about particular artistic practices and uses of art in the late Medieval church. In this session we shall begin to get to grips with what it was that drove this broad Protestant drift in the direction of ‘iconoclasm’, and ask whether it went too far. What justification, if any, might there be for restoring the arts at the heart of worship? And how might the arts be involved more broadly in providing part of the ‘habitus’ within which Christian faith and discipleship are nurtured?
In this session we shall be reckoning with some claims that may be unfamiliar. First, we shall consider Richard Viladesau’s claim that works of art may themselves be ‘texts of’ theology; viz, that certain works might be considered to ‘do’ theology in some identifiable sense. This doesn’t fit with our habitual use of the term ‘theology’, perhaps, but it is an important claim and we must take it seriously. It may help us to think differently about what counts as ‘theology’. We shall certainly want to discuss what it is, if anything, that the arts may have to offer theologically which may not be available in other ways. In that context we shall approach the arts as furnishing one important stream of a living Christian tradition, a form of life in which the Gospel is interpreted, represented and ‘performed’ in practices of one sort or another. Central to this tradition, of course, is the interpretation of Scripture, and we shall be thinking in particular about the ways in which the arts might be shaped by and in turn duly shape readings of biblical texts.
Great artists always do more than reflect the spirit of their age, but they never do less. Despite its aspirations to transcend the merely mundane and the given in one way or another, art cannot escape the ties that bind it to history. Like the rest of us, it remains earthed solidly in the particularities and contingencies of time and space, and the modifications of human sensibility that correspond to those. According to Richard Viladesau, works of art can serve not only as ‘texts of’ theology, but equally as ‘texts for’ theology, precisely inasmuch as they furnish concrete ‘expressions of the human situation’ in different times and places. In this session we shall link this claim to Erwin Panofsky’s notion of an ‘iconological’ approach to art, and – considering some examples together – ask just what Christian theology may have to gain from such an approach.
According to Jeremy Begbie, careful engagement with the arts (in his own case, chiefly music) can ‘serve to enrich and advance theology, extending our wisdom about God, God’s relation to us and to the world at large’. The way in which Begbie himself does this invites the reader, in his own words, ‘to engage with music in such a way that central doctrinal loci are explored, interpreted, re-conceived and articulated. … (U)nfamiliar themes are opened up, familiar topics exposed and negotiated in fresh and telling ways, obscure matters – resistant to some modes of understanding – are clarified, and distortions of theological truths avoided and even corrected’ (Theology, Music and Time, 5). In this session we shall look at some ways in which Begbie uses musicological material to benefit constructive theology in this way, and consider a parallel in the recent work of Kevin Vanhoozer, appealing to models from drama.
In this session we shall reflect on three ways of thinking about art’s relation to the world: as mimetic, as symbolic, and as creative. We shall reckon in particular with ‘strong’ readings of the notion of art as creativity, where the parallel is traced in some manner with God’s own creative relation to the world. J. R. R. Tolkien, for instance, developed an account of artistry as ‘sub-creation’, a category designed both to differentiate artistic creativity from God’s, but equally to insist on ‘creation’ as an appropriate metaphor for what the artist does. Others have been less sanguine, wanting to avoid any suggestion that the divine copyright on the cosmos might be breached by acts of human ‘counter-creativity’, a description coined by George Steiner to refer to the Promethean spirit of many of modernism’s artistic engagements with the given world. Again, we shall ask what the theologian might have to say in this conversation. What is ‘creation’ in theological terms, and can an account of art as ‘creativity’ be accommodated within a Christian account of our place as creatures in God’s world?
There’s no doubt that many people get a lot of enjoyment from participation in the arts. But is there anything more to artistry than the provision of pleasure for those fortunate enough to have access to it, whether as practitioners or as consumers? Just how important are the arts when set in the context of the Gospel? Could art be a matter of indulgent fiddling while Rome burns, or should it be viewed as part and parcel of God’s redemptive engagement with the world through human action? Do the arts matter to God, and if so how? In this session we shall consider three distinct views of the matter (those of Abraham Kuyper, C. S. Lewis and Rowan Williams) and attempt to sketch the broad contours of a Christian ‘theological aesthetic’ – viz, one which not only takes fully into account but is itself an outworking of core Christian doctrines about trinity, creation, incarnation and redemption.
Module 2 - Christian Doctrine and the Arts
In this module various Christian doctrines will be explored both in their own right and in relation to their presentation by one or more of the arts, more especially painting. Although some background knowledge would be an advantage, no formal training or qualifications in either theology or the arts will be assumed, not least because it is unlikely that entrants will be qualified in both disciplines. In considering each topic, some background material to the various ways in which the issue has been, and is being, explored in theology will be provided and evaluated, before attention turns to various alternative presentations in the history of the arts. Art will be taken seriously as a theological exercise in its own right, rather than merely illustrative of what has been resolved elsewhere. Attention will also be given to the various ways in which artists seek to engage the viewer. Teaching will be in small seminar classes, and there will be ample opportunity for lively debate and discussion. By the end of the module students should have a good outline understanding of the history of Christian art in certain key areas.
Indication of the type of issues to be explored each week is provided by the list below. But note that not all topics will necessarily be on offer each year.
Part A
The first half of the semester will be devoted to exploring how some major christological doctrines have been presented in the history of art and in more recent times.
- Christ’s divinity in art:
- Christ as divine Child
- Crucifixion and Atonement
- Resurrection and Ascension
- The Trinity
Christianity claims that Christ was both human and divine. How can this be asserted in a way that does not undermine the unity of his person? Is art able to present such a claim to divinity without undermining the sense of a fully human individual? A range of twentieth century artists will be used to explore such dilemmas.
One difficult area for christology has been admitting vulnerability in Christ. Traditional approaches have assumed an infused knowledge that exempted Christ’s childhood from any uncertainties. An extreme version of this is found in some of the apocryphal gospels. The notion of kenosis or self-emptying (cf. Phil.2.8) has increasingly been used as an alternative way of dealing with the problem. The history of treatments of the Christ Child in art will be used as a measure of such changes in emphasis, with examples drawn from the first millennium, from the medieval period, from the Renaissance and from modern times.
Various theories of the significance of Christ’s death have assumed prominence at different periods over the course of the Church’s history. This has resulted in different emphases in the way in which his death has been portrayed in art (as well as in poetry and music). Too exclusive an emphasis on suffering could, however, distort as well as inform. So we shall explore first millennium resistance to over-explicit presentations of Jesus’ suffering, as well as Renaissance and Eastern Orthodox objections.
In Christian theology sometimes a sharp distinction has been drawn between resurrection and ascension, and sometimes not. After exploring what might be at stake theologically, we shall look at the sharp contrast drawn in most Christian art but also at the tendency towards fusion in much Renaissance art. More pedestrian artistic representations will introduce consideration of how mystery might best be preserved in different media (the literary and the visual).
For most of the history of western Christian theology the unity of God has taken priority over the three persons, whereas in much twentieth century theology a more social understanding found favour. This dispute is also reflected in the history of artistic representations. One area artists have found especially difficult is the order of the persons. To preserve the dignity of the Holy Spirit, they have sometimes found it necessary to place the Spirit centrally rather than ‘proceeding from the Father and the Son.’ Is anything significant at stake here?
Part B
The second half of the semester will then examine some of the techniques employed by artists to encourage engagement with the Christian position. In particular, attention will be paid to the treatment accorded other figures in the biblical narrative.
- Mary Magdalene
- The Virgin Mary
- Christmas celebrations
Baptism and Eucharist- Peter, Paul, and John
Largely thanks to Pope Gregory the Great (d. 604), a composite figure was made out of various women in the New Testament narrative. The result was that she became the most popular saint after the Virgin Mary. Modern feminist critics often see the result as fundamentally derogatory of women, with the fallen woman now the typical penitent sinner. In some paintings this is clearly so, but predominantly a number of more positive roles are given her: disciple, preacher, contemplative, and confidante. These will be explored not just through art but also in story and film.
If Catholics and Protestants are ever to reach a better understanding of one another, the status of the Virgin Mary needs to be explored. The Immaculate Conception and the Assumption both appeared in art long before they were formally made dogmas of the Roman Catholic Church (in 1854 and 1950), and so raise interesting questions about the relation between popular piety and the Church’s official theology. Numerous titles, however, had already accrued to Mary long before this. Many (such as Seat of Wisdom or Burning Bush) reflect a symbolic reading of Scripture that is now largely lost. The cult of Joseph and of Anne her mother also raise interesting issues about changing attitudes to family life. But most relevant to the course is where Mary is used to mediate Christ (in Nativity scenes and in Pietàs) and where she assumes a gentler role than Christ himself.
Preachers sometimes rail against the importation of non-historical or pagan aspects into the way in which the modern Christmas is celebrated. Some, such as Santa Claus and the Christmas tree, date only from the nineteenth century. Others, such as the wise men as kings or a key role for animals, have a very much longer history. Do art and story merely reflect these traditions, or is there sometimes a real attempt to harness the legends to religious goals?
Although portrayals of Christ’s baptism and the Last Supper have sometimes a largely historical focus (eg in Poussin), more commonly the attempt is made to connect with current forms of piety and celebration. Sometimes highly complex symbolism is in play. Such a pattern raises interesting questions about realist and non-realist interpretations, and the extent to which parallel issues might be raised in respect of metaphor in literary contexts. The contrast between approaches is not as simple as it might seem at first sight, in that many a Protestant poet (e.g. George Herbert) is quite prepared to use apparently very literal language, in order to drive the force of the metaphor fully home.
Issues of authority have long plagued the Christian Church, and these have often been reflected in treatments of these three apostles. The Reformation naturally sought a new focus in Paul, but it was in fact returning a significance to him that he had once enjoyed in the early history of Christian art. Although the most common image of Peter is of him receiving the keys, at various times much prominence has been given to his various failings, and it is intriguing to ask why. The femininity attributed to the beloved disciple also tells us much not just about attitudes between the sexes but also about underlying conceptions of authority.
Module 3 - Religious Experience and Aesthetic Theory
Unsurprisingly, in the long history of Christianity different ways of facilitating human experience of God have assumed prominence at different times, and with these different ways has gone stress on different aspects of the same underlying divine reality. The object of this module is to understand better the wider historical context that makes now one, now another, feature come to prominence in various historical epochs, and in particular the kind of rationale given by the aesthetic theory under-girding particular types of approach. The consideration of numerous specific examples alongside the general theories should make the latter considerably easier to comprehend than might otherwise have been the case. Class seminars will also provide plenty of opportunity for exchange of views and discussion.
The topics indicated below are intended only to provide a general idea of the type of material covered. Not all topics will be covered in any one year, the choice being determined by preferences expressed by members of the class.
A. Through Architecture
- Gothic architecture
- Renaissance, Baroque and Modernism
- In dialogue with Hindu and Muslim architecture
It makes sense to give a central place to Gothic because in the nineteenth century this became the dominant form of architecture for churches of whatever denomination, even where it seemed least suited – among those whose worship was most orientated towards preaching. Why this was so needs to be examined, as well as the foundational justifications offered by Pugin and in the medieval period by Abbot Suger and others. Its applications to secular buildings such as railway stations will also be explored.
There is, however, no shortage of texts justifying alternative approaches. These need to be set against wider intellectual currents of the time, as well as aspirations elsewhere in the arts e.g. in painting and/or music. Of the three listed at most two will be explored, unless topic 3 is dropped.
Dialogue across the religions often quickly reaches a doctrinal impasse. Looking at what is expressed through their buildings about the nature of God may offer a more fruitful approach. Muslim architecture, for instance, is much more immanent in its architecture (cf. ‘incarnational’) than its authorised texts might lead one to expect. Again, despite their allusion to a plurality of gods, Hindu temples nonetheless contain elements that seem to speak of a single, ultimate mystery. Again, to avoid superficiality, only one of these two religions will be examined in appropriate detail.
B. Through Painting
- Landscape Painting
- Abstract Painting
- In dialogue with contemporary art
Many landscape painters have seen their role as helping to bring out more effectively features of the landscape that speak of God. Sometimes, their work has witnessed to God’s presence within nature (Samuel Palmer, Van Gogh), sometimes to a transcendence of that world (e.g. Caspar David Friedrich, the Hudson River School). The relative merits of the two types of approach need to be considered, as well as various other possibilities, such as the attempt to convey an ordered world.
European and American Abstract Art saw their rationale somewhat differently, but artists in both camps often sought justification in spiritual if not explicitly religious terms e.g. Mondrian and Kandinsky in Europe, Barnett Newman in the USA. The reasons for the retreat from representative art need to be explored both in their own writings and in that of their advocates.
It is quite untrue that there is no interest in religion in contemporary art, though it is true that very little of such interest comes from the conventionally religious. Some examples from video, relational and environmental art will be considered, as well as as the sort of art currently making its way into churches.
C. Through Action
- Ritual
- Drama
- Ballet and Dance
From a sociological perspective ritual is not just something that goes on in Catholic churches, it is also an inescapable feature of daily life. That claim can be used to throw interesting light on how everything in daily life from fashion to food could be used to mediate certain values, including those that might under appropriate circumstances be interpreted as religious.
The stage has had a long association with religion. Even in the modern world some theorists have sought to revive that connection. There is much talk in theology of the ‘drama’ or ‘narrative’ of salvation, but little discussion of what light might be thrown on such talk from the source of the metaphor itself.
The explicit connections between religion and dance were historically once strong, but are now at most nominal. Nonetheless, quite a few twentieth century dancers and choreographers saw themselves as building on such connections and so their own role as being, at least in part, to bring to consciousness important religious or spiritual themes. Some video extracts will be used to highlight some of the issues.
D Through Music
- Plainsong and Gregorian Chant
- In dialogue with the world of pop
Mainly in the nineteenth century (but also in the sixteenth) claims were made that only certain types of music were appropriate for worship. The grounds for such claims and their relative plausibility will be explored, not only in their own right but also in relation to what was condemned, the elaborate polyphony of the later middle ages and the masses of composers such as Haydn and Schubert.
Following on in some ways from 1), certain forms of popular music have always been treated as dangerously seductive. Although the objection is as old as Plato, in the modern world jazz and certain forms of rock have been the most common targets. Nonetheless, some have defended at length the possibility of a religious dimension to works in such genres, and so the case needs to be heard.
Further information
For further information contact Professor Trevor Hart on tah@st-andrews.ac.uk.
Apply now to secure your place for September 2008!!