Seven Functions of Art | Thoughts on Spiritual Formation through Art

Sometimes I write more from my heart, but today I'm writing from my head and my heart. I've been ears deep in an academic essay on sacred space and iconography and my mind is on fire with thoughts about how art shapes our soul. 

One of the sources I'm siting in this essay is Alain de Botton. He's a philosopher who writes on life and art. While I don't agree with all his conclusions about life, I find myself drawn to his thoughts on how art shapes us, as many of them resonate with what I've studied in Scripture and in the history of Church. Here are his 7-primary functions of art:

• Remembering: I love this one because it reminds me of the relationship between God and the Israelites. So many times in the Old Testament God tells the person to build an alter, to remember, not to forget. Art is a way of marking our lives, our stories in God, with a tangible reminder because as humans we have a tendency to be forward thinking and forget what God has done, where we have come from. Art can be a helpful aid in that process of recollection.
  
• Hope: How much better is your day when you get a glimpse of the light at the end of the tunnel? When despair is present, hope feels long off and sometimes impossible. Art can draw our attention to the beauty of life, can help us process the deliverance in the lives of others, and remind us of where our hope lies, particularly in religious art.
  
• Sorrow: As humans we are woefully novice when it comes to embracing our pain and suffering. Many of us try to avoid it, or push it down or away; others of us feel stuck in grief. Art can help hold for us the pain of our present circumstances, or can help facilitate us through our grief, by depicting our human condition before us and bearing witness to our pain.
  
• Rebalancing: What we are drawn to aesthetically reveals something about our inner, soul workings. If we favor one piece or style of art, but react negatively to another, it can help show us perhaps where God is inviting us to explore. For example, maybe a Renaissance portrait of a wealthy man makes us cringe. We can use this to prayerfully consider what we are reacting to: the wealth, an expression on the man's face, even a similarity to a relative we may struggle with. Or if we are drawn to an impressionist landscape, perhaps we are being called to rest and in need of refreshment in our lives.
  
• Self-understanding: Acting as a tool to bring awareness, art, as described above, can lead us to better understand ourselves--seeing our vices and virtues, our strengths and weaknesses--we can, once aware, bring these parts of ourselves before God in prayer and allow his love to wash and renew us.
  
• Growth: With its ability to draw us in or leave us feeling uncomfortable, art can give us the psychological distance needed to begin to process and address and surrender these areas of ourselves that God is inviting us to release to him.
  
• Appreciation: I'll leave this final description to the author, "One of our major flaws, and causes of unhappiness, is that we find it hard to take note of what is always around us...[in this way art] is teaching us a lesson: how to look with kinder and more alert eyes at the world around us." 

If you'd like to get a copy of the book, Art as Therapy, you can purchase it on Amazon here.

I'm curious, what do you think about the potential of art to form us spiritually? Share in the comments or on our Facebook page.