The Sistine Chapel

By way of sending good wishes for a wonderful day today to all my friends, I thought I would add a link sent to me that is amazing in its beauty and technological wonder as well.

It is views of the Sistine Chapel that none of us would really have, in today's crowded world, if we were physically craning our necks to see Michelangelo's masterpieces above.

Go to the Sistine Chapel. To view every part of the Chapel, simply click and drag your mouse arrow slowly in any direction you want. You can see every nook and cranny of the place. To zoom in very close, use the plus sign at the bottom left of the screen, and of course, the minus sign to zoom out. The music is a lovely bonus.

Happy viewing and happy holidays to all!

Visual Communication

As I yield to the siren calls of spring bursting forth in the garden, I find myself thinking about how plants communicate their needs. They grow lustily if they like where they are and have all their needs met. If they are in the wrong place in terms of light or moisture, the gardener soon knows that they are not happy - leaves yellow or droop - or worse! The same visual communications often leave me laughing when you watch a cat or do tell you, the "subservient" human, what they want, or don't want.

In the same way, visual communication in art is vital. Every artist realises, sooner or later, that it is not just enough to be able to execute technically perfect paintings, drawings or other works. Pretty pictures are ten a penny in the world. But, just as in the advertising world, visual images need to carry weight and impact. In advertising, the messages are deliberate, planned and directed at certain audiences.

Usually in art, the situation is more diffuse. For a start, the communications are dependent on the times in which the artist lives. In early Christian times, for instance, there was an extensive vocabulary of symbols used to convey specific messages. In just one arbitrary example, take an anchor. It could symbolise hope in Jesus Christ, and represent sanctuary and commitment. It could convey safe arrival of a ship to harbour and thus mean faithfulness, shelter and hope. It also symbolised St. Clement, the poor unfortunate martyred 4th Bishop of Rome who was tossed into the sea with an anchor around his neck, one hundred years after Christ's death. (My thanks to the History of Painting website for this information.)

By extension, the anchor was a sign used for the hidden Christian burial chambers, the Catacombs in Rome, possibly because Hebrews 6 19-20 says, "We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure." It was frequently used in conjunction with fishes, an obvious reference to Jesus telling Peter he would make them "fishers of men".

Anchor, Catacomb of Priscilla, Rome

Two fish and anchor in the catacomb of Domitilla

This image, courtesy of Heather, a moderator on art subjects in Good Reads is found in the St. Domitillia catacomb in Rome, the epitaph for one Antonia.  Sts. Domitillia, Priscilla, Calixtus and Coemetarium majus catacomb cemeteries are full of images of anchors.

Christian Roman epitaph of Atimetus from the catacombs of St. Sebastian on the Via Appia, Rome. Inscription flanked by Christian symbols, an anchor and a fish.

Again, fishes and anchors are simple, powerful visual communications.

As the Renaissance artists developed an increasingly sophisticated vocabulary of symbols for their visual communication, their public understood the messages. Today, we might need to learn the interpretations of those works of art to understand fully what the artists were communicating.

One of the most wondrous examples of that time is Michelangelo's paintings in the Sistine Chapel

The whole work is a visual metaphor for mankind's need - and desire - for a covenant with God. Michelangelo uses images and symbols from the Book of Genesis as the main vehicles to convey man's need for salvation; every part of the work is as eloquent to us today as it was to the contemporary viewers. However, his contemporaries would probably have understood nuances more readily than many viewers of the ceiling do today.

Ssistine Chapel ceiling, Rome

Each era has developed a specific set of symbols to communicate messages visually, but in today's world, the vocabulary is more diffuse, in that we all have different optics on things, our belief systems are more diverse and the world is a much more universal and complex place. For an artist, it becomes perhaps a much more personal affair: what to communicate as a human being, tapping - hopefully - into universal values and beliefs that can resonate with others.

As Robert Henri observed, "Art cannot be separated from life. We value art not because of the skilled product, but because of its revelation of a life's experience."  

As artists, we need to live life in awareness and thoughtfulness. Ultimately, I believe, we need to have enough self-confidence and honesty to try to draw on our own souls and innermost core, to understand who we are and what we are trying to do and say. Only then can we develop a clear voice that is our way to communicate visually to others. Some people may hear that voice, others won't. That is the beauty of our diversity. But at least, an artist who dares to reveal his or her life experiences in artwork will be a unique person, conveying images that ring true. That is quite an ambitious goal.

The Pope and his invocation of "beauty"

I am sure that a considerable number of members of the general art community around the world must have read with interest about the Pope's invitation to artists to a gathering at the Sistine Chapel this past 21st Nov. Whatever one's thoughts about such a invitation, the mere fact that one could sit, peacefully, and look at Michelangelo's ceiling in its brilliantly coloured restoration would make the invitation worth accepting, I suspect. About 250 artists of all disciplines did accept, apparently - from Placido Domingo to Santiago Calatrava and Zaha Hadid.

The Sistine Chapel

Since the Pope and the Vatican have quite a lot of fence-mending to do with the art world, in many ways, this was an interesting development. (Check out Edward Winkleman's comments too on the Pope's speech.) Whilst the Pope's announcement that the Vatican will participate in the 2011 Venice Biennale is a clear signal of involvement in the contemporary art scene, his speech seemed to dwell more on "beauty" and its potential pathway to the "transcendent". In some ways, his words resonate when he said, "In a world lacking in hope, with increasing signs of aggression and despair, there is an ever greater need for a return to spirituality in art."

Benedict XVI also said, "What is capable of restoring enthusiasm and confidence, what can encourage the human spirit to rediscover its path, to raise its eyes to the horizon, to dream of a life worthy of its vocation - if not beauty?" Moreover, "the experience of beauty does not remove us from reality, on the contrary, it leads to a direct encounter with the daily reality of our lives, liberating it from darkness, transfiguring it, making it radiant and beautiful."

Wonderful words, hard to define really, let alone put into practice. Especially when the Pope also talked of "the beauty thrust on us is (too often) illusory and deceitful. It imprisons man within himself and further enslaves him, depriving him of hope and joy." Frankly, that is a passage that leaves me wondering who defines the Vatican's version of beauty. I don't know enough of present Vatican cultural politics. Does anyone else who is reading this ?

Nonetheless, I find it refreshing to see such a figure as the Pope talking of beauty and its central role in life, spiritually and culturally. Not so very long ago, particularly in the United States, the word, "beauty" was very much out of fashion in the art world. We are all impoverished when beauty, in its many, many forms and versions, is not part of our daily lives.