The Imitation of Art Mediocrity as the Way of Worship Or Give Me My Plastic Jesus

A friend of mine was visiting a church with her children and saw what appeared to be a rather large beautiful wood carving of Jesus hanging on the wall over the alter. Her children were quite taken with it and pointed out Mommy, Jesus. My friend made mention to someone about this striking piece of art work to which she was informed, Its only plastic. What was perceived to be a crafted piece of art work depicting the risen Lord now was revealed to be in truth, the .resin. Lord. Poured, molded, mass produced kitsch. kitsch - : something that appeals to popular or lowbrow taste and is often of poor quality paintings of Elvis on black velvet plaster lawn ornaments, vacation souvenirs purchased in "tourist traps," and "cute" knickknacks on the mantle. Kitsch is art of poor quality, which nevertheless manages to be enormously popular by appealing to some sentiment or association. Kitsch is a parody or perversion of true art.. Calvin Seerveld has written "It is hard to talk with Christian care about kitsch because those who love it are naive about it, unaware that they are identifying with something fake and inferior, and those people deserve supportive help, not a sophisticated putdown". A taste for kitsch is not a moral or spiritual failing.Kitsch never enlarges experience; it blandly affects a show to stimulate feelings of exquisiteness or a mood of supernal tenderness, but it flops into bathos simply because it is ersatz, like a seven-inch high, silver-plated Statue of Liberty trying to be the real thing. Kitsch is like a deodorant next to good perfume. During the sixties there was a contemporary folk song that began to gain popularity. It can easily be described as irreverent and even sacrilegious. The song is Plastic Jesus and authorship is generally attributed to Ernie Mears although so many additional verses have been added, distinct authorship and copyright claims are questionable. The primary verse follows: Well, I don't care if it rains or freezes, Long as I have my plastic Jesus Riding on the dashboard of my car Through all trials and tribulations, We will travel every nation, With my plastic Jesus I'll go far. I will not quote more than this as most of the song seems to degenerate from here. The point is the perception, and the question of the validity of the perception. This is a question that reverberates around multiple areas of Christian experience and

unfortunately only seems to be reinforced by our own image self consciousness and tendency to put on a front and seek to impress. Business promotion and advertising would have us believe that image is everything. What is important is the icing on the cake, the sugar coating, the part that is seen. Substantive content is a non-consideration or at best treated as all is fundamentally equal. I am an artist, a musician, a guitar player. I aspire to and apply myself to master my craft. I study and practice to learn the different rules applied to varying styles and genre, and experiment to seek for development and expansion of the rules envelope and the creation of a new artistic expression, unique to myself as an artist and expressive of my particular generation and peers. To do less, is not to be an artist. I may or may not qualify as a musician, that would depend on how low or high the standards are set. But an artist must go beyond the normally accepted standards and push the envelope, at the same time understand the bounds and experiment and create expression within the envelope. The creation of that which is new and unique yet subject to accepted standards and still pressing beyond and stretching the norms is the goal of the artist. Learning to work, within and without. The church as an organizational, institutional entity is not an artistic friendly environment. Our religious worship services have become our most controlled, guarded time frames, virtually void of live creativity. Religious schmaltz has become our safe bounds for artistic worship expression. There is a fear of the creative as there is a fear of the unknown. Christians, I believe most, do recognize the artistic talents and accomplishments of secular artists beyond the occasional objectionable content that may be subject of a work. The craftsmanship and level of talent development are undeniable. A few years ago, after packing up equipment from a church outreach worship service in a local park, my pastor sat in his car listening to Dire Straits Sultan of Swing on the radio. The part of the song played with Mark Knopfler doing what can be considered legendary lead work. My pastor turned to me and said, Thats what Im looking for. I jokingly said, Were working on it. That was not my full thoughts. It is now that I can take issue with that pastors statement. Thats what Im looking for. Bull!!! No apologies. Where do you think talent like that comes from? Do you think some guy just sits in their bedroom for a few years, sweating and bleeding over a guitar and pops out finding fame and fortune? Granted, that bedroom time was most assuredly invested. Besides practice time there are years of practical experience working clubs and bars that go into that product that found its way onto a CD. The Beatles spent two years playing the clubs in the red-light district of Hamburg Germany, eight to ten hours a night, playing twenty minute songs that turned out to be three minutes on a recording. By the time they came to America and turned our musical worlds upside down it was because they were that good, they had invested the time and worked for it. What has the church to offer in the way of the equivalent? Coffee Houses. I dont think so. Most Christian

coffee houses are nearly as restrictive as Sunday morning worship services. Artistic creativity is deemed acceptable only as it fulfils the religious mandate to evangelize as perceived by the powers that be, or fits a contemporary religious worship framework which may at one time have been cutting edge in the church but now has become artistic religious schmaltz. If the Christian community and I believe pastoral leadership in particular, are not willing to loosen up, provide the opportunity and creative open environments to see gifted, talents develop their crafts, the notion that we in the church are looking for Mark Knopfler lead guitar solos is just so much Bull. Schmaltz - 1: sentimental or florid music or art 2: sentimentality. I know I am stepping on a lot of toes and offending vast numbers of brothers and sisters in Christ who are quite happy and content with their Integrity, Vineyard and Hillsong worship CDs, and are quite content to continue worshiping using this tried and true material and have no desire to change what-so-ever, Thank You Very Much. Well, OK, that is every man and womans privilege in Christ. But to offer this worship as an artistic creation is an oxymoron. Copying and playing the chords and singing the words of a song, written and composed by someone else with little or no attention to creative arrangement and artistic development is not art. It is merely mimicking the original. Not a whole lot more then Monkey see, Monkey do. There may be a certain amount of sentimental and emotional release that is accomplished, but that in itself is not art. Art involves ability or talent, the aptitude. Art involves intelligence, understanding or reason. Art involves knowledge of the media involved, in this case, musical knowledge. Art involves craftsmanship, a mastery of technique. And for the Christian artist, art involves the life and inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Art may well use the compositions of other composers, but will always apply creative energies through talent, intelligence, knowledge, and craftsmanship to recreate the original work in the artists image. The original will always bear the mark of the artist. With no creative enhancement we are left with schmaltz, kitsch, the imitation of art. Our worship is little more than a Plastic Jesus on the dashboard of my car, At least for an artist. Bob Couchenour