Imaging God Anew: A Theological Aesthetics: Volume 69 (Studies in Philosophical Theology) [1 ed.] 904294563X, 9789042945630

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STUDIES IN PHILOSOPHICAL THEOLOGY

IMAGING GOD ANEW A THEOLOGICAL AESTHETICS

BY

WESSEL STOKER

PEETERS

IMAGING GOD ANEW

STUDIES IN PHILOSOPHICAL THEOLOGY 69

SERIES EDITORS Stephan van Erp (Leuven), Douglas Hedley (Cambridge), Marcel Sarot (Tilburg)

ADVISORY BOARD L. Boeve (Leuven), V. Brümmer (Utrecht), I.U. Dalferth (Zürich & Claremont, CA), Willem B. Drees (Tilburg), J. Greisch (Paris), M.T. Mjaaland (Oslo), C. Richter (Bonn), C. Schwöbel (St Andrews), S. Sorrentino (Salerno), J. Soskice (Cambridge), M. Stenmark (Uppsala), C. Taliaferro (Northfield, MN).

EDITORIAL PROFILE Philosophical theology is the study of philosophical problems which arise in reflection upon religion, religious beliefs and theological doctrines.

IMAGING GOD ANEW A THEOLOGICAL AESTHETICS

by

WESSEL STOKER

PEETERS LEUVEN – PARIS – BRISTOL, CT 2021

Translated by Henry Jansen from the Dutch edition, God opnieuw verbeeld: een theologische kunstbeschouwing, published by Uitgeverij Parthenon: Almere 2019.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

© 2021 – Peeters, Bondgenotenlaan 153, 3000 Leuven, Belgium. ISBN 978-90-429-4563-0 eISBN 978-90-429-4564-7 D/2021/0602/37 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

XI

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1. The Theme of this Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2. Structure of the Book. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Part I: Is Art, God, or the Image the Problem? . . . . . . . . . . . Part II: Images of God in Modern and Contemporary Art. . . . Part III: Art as a Place to Encounter God . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1 1 4 4 5 6

PART I IS ART, GOD, OR THE IMAGE THE PROBLEM? 1. IS ART THE PROBLEM? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2. The Holy Portrait and the Narrative Image . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.3. Hans Belting: Art as the Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.3.1. The Power of the Medieval Cult Image . . . . . . . . . . 1.3.2. Conflict with the Art Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Theological Critique of Images . . . . . . . . . . – The New Art Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – An Icon Is Not a Western Religious Painting . . . 1.4. The Religious Image in and after the Middle Ages . . . . . . 1.5. The Contemporary Concept(s) of Art and the Religious Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.5.1. The ‘Grand Narrative’ of Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Formalistic-Aesthetic View. . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Clive Bell’s Formalism as a Religion of Art . . . . 1.5.2. The Decline of the ‘Grand Narrative’ of Art . . . . . . – Modern Art: Modern Medieval . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.5.3. The Functional-Aesthetic Art Image . . . . . . . . . . . .

26 27 28 30 31 34 35

2. IS GOD THE PROBLEM? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2. The Problem of God: An Exhibition in Düsseldorf (2015)

37 37 37

9 9 10 12 12 16 16 17 20 21

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2.3. Jean-Luc Nancy: The End of Christian Art . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3.1. The Deconstruction of Christianity . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Creation as Opening . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Incarnation: Self-Emptying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Disappearance of Divine Presence . . . . . . . . 2.3.2. The Materiality of the Presence of the Image . . . . . 2.3.3. Pontormo’s Visitation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Image as Materiality and Presence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Is God the Problem? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

40 41 42 44 45 46 48 50 50 51

3. IS THE IMAGE THE PROBLEM? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2. The Image Crisis as the Crisis of the Visible . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.1. TV Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.2. The Human Being: Image as Imago . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.3. Painting: Making the Unseen Visible . . . . . . . . . . . – Courbet’s Realism Contra the Crisis of the Visible 3.3. The Icon as an Alternative for the Image Crisis. . . . . . . . . – The Invisible Gaze and the Icon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.4. Art and Christianity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Painting: Glory versus an Art of Poverty . . . . . . . . – The Image of God: God as Personal and Suprapersonal

55 55 57 57 58 59 62 63 65 66 67 69

PART II IMAGES OF GOD IN MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY ART 4. HOW CAN WE IMAGE GOD? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1. Can God be Imaged? Moses in Schönberg’s Opera Moses und Aron . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2. Christianity and the Image of God . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.1. Rublev’s The Holy Trinity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.2. Masaccio’s Trinity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.3. God as Pope or Jupiter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – An Impasse? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3. God in Creation: Vincent van Gogh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3.1. The Sower with Setting Sun (June 1888) . . . . . . . . . 4.3.2. Starry Night Over the Rhône (September 1988) . . .

75 75 77 80 83 85 86 88 90 92

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– Van Gogh’s View of Nature During his Illness . . – Imaging God in his Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4. The Abstract Imaging of God: The Black Paintings of Ad Reinhardt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.5. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Two Objections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Interpretation of a Work of Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Imaging God as Theme or Motif . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

VII 95 96 97 101 101 102 103

5. THE FACE OF CHRIST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2. An Argument for the True Likeness of the Mandylion . . . – The Mandylion Icon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Lossky on the Holy Face ‘Not Made by Human Hands’ 5.3. The ‘True Image’ Questioned . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Image of Christ in the New Testament . . . . . . . . . . 5.4. Contemporary Depictions of the Holy Face . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.4.1. Alexej von Jawlensky: The Face as Interiorised Meditation Image. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Jawlensky’s Faces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Synthesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Original Form of the Mystical Face . . . . . . . – Jawlensky’s Faces and the Eastern Orthodox Icon 5.4.2. Georges Rouault: Christ Among Us . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Suffering Christ in Miserere . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The View of Christ à la Dostoyevsky . . . . . . . . . 5.4.3. Lefteris Olympios: A Political Veronica . . . . . . . . . 5.5. Continuity or Discontinuity in the Holy Face? . . . . . . . . . – A Fusion of Horizons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Holy Face of Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios . .

110 111 112 114 116 118 119 122 122 123 123 126

6. CHRIST AS A HUMAN BEING OF FLESH AND BLOOD . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2. Christmas as a Cosmic Event: Paul Thek. . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Die Krippe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Medieval Modern. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3. Deeds of Love and Justice: Rosemberg Sandoval . . . . . . . – Baby Street and Dirt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Art and the (Re)presentation of Violence . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4. The Cross: Humiliation and Exaltation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

127 127 128 129 132 133 133 135 136

105 105 105 105 106 107 109 110

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6.4.1. Paintings of Flesh and Blood: Marc Mulders . . . . . 6.4.2. A Comparison with Paul Thek’s Technological Reliquaries and Francis Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) . . . – Paul Thek: Technological Reliquaries . . . . . . . . . – Francis Bacon: Crucifixion (1965). . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4.3. The Deconstruction of the Beauty of the Cross: Marc Mulders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4.4. The Descent from the Cross: The Messenger by Lefteris Olympios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.5. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

138

7. THE SPIRIT, FUTURE AND COMPLETION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Anselm Kiefer, Sende Deinen Geist aus (1974) . . . . . . . – An Outline of this Chapter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.2. Gijs Frieling: The Easter Mystery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.3. Alfred Manessier: ‘Ode to Light’ (The Triune God) . . . . . – The Holy Spirit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – A Narrative Trinity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Liturgical Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.4. Graham Sutherland: Christ in Glory. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – A Renewed Visual Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Suffering and Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.5. Marc Mulders: Het Laatste Oordeel (The Last Judgment) 7.6. Marlene Dumas: Jesus Serene and the (Future) Human Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Art and Reality: Realism. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Constructed Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Jesus Serene: A Constructed Representation . . . . . . . . . – Image and Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.7. Max Beckmann: A New Heaven and Earth . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.8. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

151 151 151 152 153 155 156 157 157 158 159 161 162

139 139 141 145 148 149

165 166 168 169 171 172 173

PART III ART AS A PLACE TO ENCOUNTER GOD 8. RELIGIOUS ART AS SYMBOL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.2. Paint Marks or a Painting? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.3. Religious Art as Symbol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

177 177 177 179

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8.4. Symbol as Representational . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.5. Symbol as Presentational . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Reality as Potentially Sacramental . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8.6. Representation or Presence? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

180 182 185 188

9. THEORIES OF THE RELIGIOUS IMAGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.2. The Icon as Relic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – John of Damascus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Paul Moyaert . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.3. The Icon as Person-to-Person Relationship . . . . . . . . . . . . – Theodore the Studite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Can Wolterstorff’s Action Theory Clarify Theodore’s Position? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Jean-Luc Marion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.4. The Image as Religious Depth: Paul Tillich . . . . . . . . . . . – ‘Secular’ Art and the Courage to Be. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Tillich’s Theory in Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.5. Intermezzo: The Image as a Place of Becoming Present . . – God’s Presence in the Image: An Open Possibility . . . . 9.6. Interaction and Disclosure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Disclosure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Hints and ‘Odd Discernment’ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Excursus: Interaction, Disclosure, and Seventeenth-Century Dutch Landscape Painting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.7. Conclusion: Religious Art is Sacred Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

191 191 192 194 195 197 197

10. RELIGIOUS ART: THE AESTHETIC AND THE MUSEUM . . . . . . . . . 10.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.2. The Aesthetic: Art and the Religious Image . . . . . . . . . 10.2.1. A Theological Reflection on Beauty . . . . . . . . . – Beauty, the Aesthetic, and Art . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.2.2. The Beautiful Form in Service to Truth: HansGeorg Gadamer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.2.3. Aesthetic Concepts: Unity, Complexity, and Intensity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.3. The Museum as a Place of Visual Piety . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Reservations about Organised Religion . . . . . . . . . . . – The Museum and the Church: More Openness . . . . . – Exhibitions on Religious Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Seeing Salvation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

201 202 203 205 207 208 208 210 211 212 213 216 219 219 220 220 222 223 227 230 232 233 234 235

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11. What Purpose Does the Religious Image Serve? . . . . . . . . . . . 11.1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.2. Word and Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – No Essential Difference between Word and Image . . – The Uniqueness of the Image in Distinction from the Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.3. Visual Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.3.1. Dialogue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – An Environment by Derk Thijs and Chris Brans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – The Sacred and the Profane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.3.2. Communication with God or Christ . . . . . . . . . – Nicholas of Cusa on the Vision of God . . . . 11.3.3. Memory and Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.3.4. Prophetic Protest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.3.5. Thanksgiving and Praise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Beauty in Henk Helmantel’s Work . . . . . . . . – Beauty as a Religious Experience of Art . . . – Beauty and Evil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – Beauty and the Good . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.4. Visual Practice as Play . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

237 237 238 239 241 243 244 244 246 247 248 250 252 255 255 257 258 259 259

BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265 LIST OF ARTWORKS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281 INDEX OF NAMES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291 INDEX OF SUBJECTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295 ARTWORKS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297

PREFACE

This work is the counterpart to my Where Heaven and Earth Meet (2012), which discussed the spirituality of the so-called secular art of Kandinsky, Rothko, Warhol, and Kiefer. This present study is on modern and contemporary art with Christian themes. Traditional, impactful Christian art became hackneyed in the eighteenth century. The thesis of this book is that God is being re-imaged, imaged anew, in modern and contemporary art, in the art of people like Vincent van Gogh, Graham Sutherland, Marlene Dumas, and others. This art is found in museums or incorporated into a church, such as the impressive stained glass window installation by Alfred Manessier in the restored Gothic Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Abbeville (France). This art with Christian themes demands a different approach than the one I used in Where Heaven and Earth Meet. In that book my intention was to show the nature of the spirituality found in works of art that had their source in different religions or esoteric traditions. I explored that via ‘types of transcendence’. This present study looks at art from one source: the Christian tradition. The problem here is that God cannot be imaged because he is invisible. He has, however, become visible in Christ: ‘for the Father is the invisible of the Son, but the Son the visible of the Father’ is the striking way in which Irenaeus, the bishop of Lyon (130-200) put it. I show how the visible of God is depicted anew in modern and contemporary art. I also emphasise that art that depicts Christian themes can play an important role in the spirituality of people both within and outside the church – precisely in a secular culture. A religious art image acquires its function only in one’s interaction with the image. I presented my interpretations of their work to the artists Marlene Dumas, Gijs Frieling, Henk Helmantel, Marc Mulders, Lefteris Olympios, Annemiek Punt, and Derk Thijs, to see if they felt I had done justice to their work. Colleagues have read and commented on various parts of the book: Frank Bosman (Tilburg University), Martien Brinkman (em. Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam), and Conrad Wethmar (em. University of Pretoria) did so with respect to theology; Marc De Kesel (Radboud University) and Willie van der Merwe (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) from the perspective

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of philosophy. I am grateful to these artists and my colleagues for their comments. In September 2018 I gave a series of class lectures and a public lecture at North-West University in Potchefstroom (South Africa), and I drew from this (not yet completed at the time) study for those lectures. I am grateful to my colleagues, especially Anné Verhoef, and students of philosophy and art history there for their response. I would like to thank Peeters Booksellers and Publishers, and especially Elisabeth Hernitscheck, for their willingness to publish this work. I am also grateful to my translator, Henry Jansen. Adrienne Dengerink Chaplin (Cambridge), a scholar in aesthetics, was willing to read the translation. This book is a translation of God opnieuw verbeeld: Een theologische kunstbeschouwing (Almere: Parthenon 2019). Aside from some corrections, clarifications, and added sources, this English translation also includes additional comments on art history with respect to religious art (chapter 1) and an excursus on the religious character of seventeenth-century Dutch painting (chapter 9). All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc. The reader will find a list below of earlier publications that I used for this study (see the bibliography for more complete information). Het schone en het sublieme: de kunst van religieuze kunst; Een esthetische reflectie over Where time has lost its relevance; Hedendaagse religieuze glaskunst; Beeldverbod en mystiek: Ad Reinhardt; Over het kijken naar schilderijen: Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) en Francis Bacons Crucifixon (1965); De kunsttheologie van Gerardus van der Leeuw en Paul Tillich. I wrote short preliminary studies on art by Gijs Frieling, Anselm Kiefer, Lefteris Olympios, Ad Reinhardt, Andrei Roebljov, and Georges Rouault in Christelijk Weekblad.

INTRODUCTION

1. THE THEME OF THIS BOOK Art and religion are intrinsically related because both deal with questions of human existence. Human life in its existential depths is represented in paintings, given sound in musical compositions, and articulated in poems. Religion provides insights gleaned from its holy scriptures about human beings and the world. This book looks at Western visual art and Christianity in a secular age. After the Baroque period (ca. beginning of the seventeenth century to the middle of the eighteenth), the Christian image tradition became less compelling. The traditional Christian symbolic language in art was exhausted, and after 1750 art and the church parted ways. There were movements in the nineteenth century to restore the bond between art and religion, such as that of the Nazarene Movement in Germany, the pre-Raphaelites in England, and the Symbolist Movement of, among others, Maurice Denis in France and Jan Toorop in the Netherlands. In the twentieth century, the priest and art expert Marie-Alain Couturier in France took the initiative in having major artists like Le Corbusier and Henri Matisse make art for various churches. There were similar projects in England. The tapestry Christ in Glory (1962) [Fig. 7.63] by Graham Sutherland hangs in Coventry Cathedral. Works by Antony Gormley and Bill Viola can be found in other cathedrals. After the Second World War, there were also a number of projects in Germany that were intended to give art a place in churches again.1 A contemporary example of such an art project in 2017 is the altarpiece in St. Anne’s Church in Dresden, made by Marlene Dumas with Jan Andriesse and Bert Boogaard [Fig. 1.1]. Since the 1980s, artists in the Netherlands have once again been receiving commissions from churches, not only from the Catholic Church but Protestant ones as well. Examples are projects by artists like Jan Dibbets, Gijs Frieling, Janpeter Muilwijk, Marc Mulders, and Annemiek Punt.2 These examples of art projects do not detract in any way from the fact that art and Christianity often exist in a tense relationship with each other 1 2

H. Schwebel, Die Kunst und das Christentum, 123-130. J. de Wal (ed.). Hedendaagse kunst in Nederlandse kerken 1990-2015.

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in our secular age. This holds true for art historians and philosophers of art who have a dismissive attitude about art and religion3 as well as for church and theology insofar as they respond negatively to modern and contemporary art. The French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy argues that God has disappeared from our world, and thus he speaks of the end of Christian art. The Protestant theologian Karl Barth opined that images and symbols have no place in a building meant for Protestant worship.4 A new tone was set by Pope John Paul II in 1980 when he recognised the independence of art and pointed emphatically to the importance of a dialogue between church and art.5 The Vatican even had ten chapels built at the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2018. Imaging God Anew is a theological reflection on religious art in which modern and contemporary visual art is our starting point. The art that will be discussed here exists in a close relationship with Christianity or emerges out of it and can be found in churches or museums. It can be an aquarelle by Marlene Dumas or a stained glass window by Alfred Manessier, but it can also be Paul Thek’s Christmas installation or a performance by Rosemberg Sandoval. We will see that such religious art can affect the viewer – regardless of whether he or she is a believer – in an existential way. The symbolism of traditional Christian art is often no longer convincing because the visual language has lost its power. That is why it is exciting to show how God is being re-imaged in modern and contemporary art. The works chosen for this book are, namely, modern and contemporary works of art with Christian themes that show different ways of representing God. Such works can include art in general, such as art in which God is an implicit theme – for example, an abstract black painting by Ad Reinhardt or indirectly in a landscape painting by Vincent van Gogh. What name can we give to this art that will be explored in this book? For various reasons, I do not wish to speak of Christian art. For some, this term has the negative connotation of church ‘ghetto art’,6 art of mediocre quality whose commissioners find the artist’s worldview more important than the quality of the work. That is not the art we will be looking at. The reader will see why it is precisely the aesthetic quality of 3 4 5 6

139.

J. Elkins and D. Morgan, Re-enchantment. K. Barth, Kirchliche Dogmatik, IV/3.2, 995. John Paul II, Partnerschaft von Kirche und Kunst, 301-307. See, for example, W. Schmied, cited by Schwebel, Die Kunst und das Christentum,

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a work that contributes to its power as religious. It is best to speak of ‘Christian themes in modern and contemporary art’. Such art with Christian themes is, however, not always religiously inspired. The exhibition The Problem of God in Düsseldorf (2015) was intended to show that contemporary artists sometimes make use of traditional Christian visual language while at the same time viewing their work as purely secular. I will look explicitly at the religious character of the art with Christian themes I discuss in this work. I reflect on these works theologically, from the perspective of aesthetics, which can be understood as theology of art. In these reflections, I make as much use as possible of other disciplines like art history, the study of visual culture, and philosophy of art. My theory of art and my theological theory of the image will be explicitly presented below (1.5 and 9.6). Let it suffice now to indicate the view of art that informs this study: art, as I see it, plays a role in social practices, and the religious visual practice is such a practice. The religious image has its function in that practice. With respect to my theological starting point, I hold that God is as broad as all of reality. The philosopher Merleau-Ponty points in his theory of perception to the sacramental power of the sensory. I will make that point concrete in this book via works of art. Art that is seen as secular can also be fundamentally religious in character. That was the theme of my Where Heaven and Earth Meet. This present study, Imaging God Anew, is concerned with modern and contemporary art with Christian themes, a delimitation of its subject matter that is open to art in which the religious aspect is more implicit. I will give examples of a renewed continuation of the Christian tradition in modern and contemporary art. The phrase ‘Christian themes in modern and contemporary art’ is too long, and so I will therefore, for the sake of brevity, use the term ‘religious art’. The term is admittedly too vague; I use the term as a stand-in for ‘religious-transcendental art’. The religious aspect of art consists in its being open to Transcendence. The term ‘image’ also requires some explanation here. The word has many different meanings. It can refer to a mental image: an idea we have of something. Or it can refer to a linguistic image: comparisons, parables, or metaphors. It can also be a material image, as in the visual arts. Sometimes, such a work of art is three-dimensional, such as a bronze statue by Henry Moore, or two-dimensional, such as a painting. In this study, image refers to an art image, which I often abbreviate as simply image: a fresco, a painting, a tapestry, a stained glass window, a sculpture, an installation, a photograph, or a video image.

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As I stated above, this theological reflection on art makes use of various approaches to art: in philosophy, theory of the image, and art history. Understanding the philosophical approach of Jean-Luc Nancy and JeanLuc Marion requires some knowledge of philosophy (2.3 and chapter 3). This study is structured in such a way that the three parts can also be read independently of each other if the reader so wishes. 2. STRUCTURE OF THE BOOK In our secular age, it is not obvious or accepted that art can be religious. That is why I will discuss the question of the ambivalence of such art first (Part I). Then I will look at a number of modern and contemporary works of art (Part II). Finally, I will give a theological reflection on art (Part III). Thus, I do not begin with reflecting on art as such but with discussing a number of artworks, although some theoretical issues will also be discussed there as well. Starting with theory can, namely, suppress what is unique about a work of art and one’s existential-affective experience of it. And the (theological) theory of art loses its persuasiveness if it does not take its starting point in the art image itself. If it did not, it would run the risk of becoming too abstract. That obtains all the more for an analysis of religious art that assumes that art of this kind only acquires its function in how people interact with it. The works of art that we show and discuss in Part II are (along with others) the starting point for a theological reflection on art.

Part I: Is Art, God, or the Image the Problem? Artists who want to produce art with a religious theme are often reluctant because of a possibly negative response to the religious aspect of their art. This negative critique sometimes comes from the church and sometimes from society. The difficult place of religious art in our secular age is understood in very different ways. Art itself can be the problem. The art historian Hans Belting holds that art already became secular at the time of the Renaissance and that the sacred image of the Middle Ages conflicts with the view of art in the Renaissance – and thus, I will add, with the later Western view of art. The view of God can be the problem. In the view of the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy, Christianity itself has become secular and therefore no

INTRODUCTION

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longer has any function as an organised religion; God is absent from our culture, and that also means the end of Christian art. The image in secular culture can be problematic for religious art, according to the philosopher Jean-Luc Marion. There is no longer any reference to anything outside the image, and because of that we refer endlessly to other images. In his view, it is precisely the religious view of the image that provides the means to break out of this vicious circle. I will be constantly commenting on the views of the problem of religious art in our secular age that I have presented here. The central question of religious art is whether it is open to religious transcendence – that is its distinctive feature.

Part II: Images of God in Modern and Contemporary Art Great artists no longer produce obvious works of art with Christian themes, as was the case during the Renaissance and the Baroque period. Though such art is now less seen in Western society, it is certainly still present. Part II shows modern and contemporary art with Christian themes. Impressive modern and contemporary art in Christianity can be found.7 The Christian tradition speaks about God as the triune God: God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit (Father, Son, and Spirit) – in other words, God as creator, redeemer, and completer. That determines the structure of this part. I will not go into the depictions of Mary or the saints, however interesting they might be. I begin with the problem of the (im)possibility of depicting the invisible God. We will then look at the images of God as redeemer (Christ) and images of the Holy Spirit, of the renewal of life and of a future. The works of art I will discuss are selected in such as way that the reader will see why and how the Christian tradition traditionally chose to use (art) images of the triune God and how undeniable transformations also occurred there, both through the use of new media in the visual arts – installations, photographs, videos, performance – and as a result of new theological developments. That is the reason for the title of this book: Imaging God Anew. I understand that I could have chosen other works of art as well as examples of the new depictions of God. I was not striving for completeness. 7 Schwebel also points to this. In this context, he mentions Chagall, Matisse, Warhol, and Beuys, among others (Schwebel, Die Kunst und das Christentum, 172). I will expand on this group in this study with the artists discussed in Parts II and III.

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This book is not a history of modern and contemporary art with Christian themes but, as the subtitle clearly states: a theological aesthetics (for the term aesthetics, see 1.5.3).8

Part III: Art as a Place to Encounter God Part III is devoted to theological reflection. Based on Parts I and II, I will discuss a number of central questions for this theological reflection. The contemporary Western world is now less modern than is sometimes thought, as we will see. Scholars like Paul Moyaert and Jean-Luc Marion reformulated classical theories of the religious image and made them common currency again. Other theories of art, such as Tillich’s and my own proposal, are inspired by a theology of secular culture. Different views of presence, of the divine presence in the image – already a core point in medieval popular religiosity and of the Eastern theology of icons – will be explored. The focus is always on art as a place to encounter God. Another question is the place of aesthetics with respect to religious art. Christianity considered the value of beauty important (10.2.1). I will pay special attention to aesthetic quality as the aesthetic form of a work. For me, the aesthetic aspect of a visual work of art is that it gives us joy when we look at it or arouses our admiration because the form of the work fits its subject. I will show that a well-chosen form can make the content of the religious art image more convincing. Much religious art hangs in museums. The museum can also be a place of visual piety, as I will claim. In that case, I will look more closely at the changed museum culture. Because religious art serves the visual practice of those who are more or less believers, people within or outside of a faith community, we will explore various ways of dealing with the religious image. In short, this study on modern and contemporary religious art proposes the following: such art is not obvious (Part I). It is still present, though in a modest way but nonetheless convincingly so (Part II). Finally, what can we say about it theologically (Part III)?

8 The references to other sections of this work always list the chapter first and then the appropriate section; thus, 1.5.3 refers to chapter 1, section 5.3.

Part I

Is Art, God, or the Image the Problem?

1. IS ART THE PROBLEM?

1.1 Introduction In this part, I will look at the ambivalence of religious art in a secular age. Can the religious image and the art image be reconciled with each other? The answer to this question is no if the artistic image requires or arouses nothing more than aesthetic attention. The art historian Hans Belting holds that, with respect to the function it had in the Middle Ages, the sacred image is at odds with art and the view of art as it arose in the Renaissance. He provides a historical argument for that in his classic work Likeness and Presence: A History of the Image before the Era of Art (1994), which had been published in German four years earlier.1 This work provides a masterful panoramic view of the history of the sacred image in Eastern and Western Christianity up until the time of the rise of ‘art’ during the Renaissance. To support his thesis, Belting points to: 1. The historical development of the sacred image ‘before the era of art’, the time of the Renaissance. 2. The crisis in which the sacred image ended up because of the Reformation and the view of art in the Renaissance. While Belting points here to the beginning of art (and art theory), in a later study he writes about the end of the history of art: Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte: Eine Revision nach zehn Jahren (1995). There he describes how the view of art that began in the Renaissance continued to develop from the eighteenth century on until it came to an end in the twentieth century. In this view of art, the primary object of interest in art was style and the aesthetic character of the work of art. Art became art for it’s own sake, separate from social contexts like religion. In this chapter I will look at how Belting develops his thesis on the conflict between the sacred image and the art image in the Renaissance (1.3). Then I will comment on Belting’s view (1.4). The reader will then see how the view of art for art’s sake radically changes and sometimes shifts to a view of art as social practice. One of those practices is religious 1 Published in German as Bild und Kult: eine Geschichte des Bildes vor dem Zeitalter der Kunst (1990).

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practice (1.5). I will first look at two important genres of religious images that there were initially present in the West: the holy portrait and the narrative image (1.2).

1.2 The Holy Portrait and the Narrative Image At the end of the second century already, there were goblets in North Africa depicting Christ as a shepherd with a sheep.2 The Catacomb of Callixtus contains a fresco from the beginning of the third century that shows The Good Shepherd [Fig. 1.2]. The visual language changed when Christianity was given a privileged position under Emperor Constantine the Great and became the state religion under Emperor Theodosius in 380. Whereas Christ was originally depicted as a shepherd, he was now primarily portrayed as sitting on a throne as the ‘heavenly emperor’ – even more, as the apse mosaic in the Santa Pudenziana (ca. 390) in Rome portrays him, with ‘the features of the god Zeus’.3 Alongside the image of the crucified, the image of Christ as ruler (Revelation 4 and 20) became popular. The church of the East had the icon Christ Pantocrator (almighty ruler, ruler of all) [Fig. 7.61]. This view of Christ was given a popular depiction in the West as Christ in Majesty [Fig. 7.62]. Limiting myself to the Western history of the image, I will point to two kinds of image in the medieval image culture: the holy portrait and the narrative image.4 They differ with respect to form. The former depicts a figure: it is an imago, an image that portrays Christ, Mary, or a saint. The latter illustrates a narrative scene, a historia: a Bible story or the life of a saint. These two kinds or genres of the religious image, the holy portrait and the narrative image, have different functions in religious practice. The portrait often serves as a cult image. The church in the East attaches great value to the veneration of these images, called icons, and established that practice at the Second Council of Nicea in 787. The portrait icons are cult images par excellence. They were blessed and incensed, and the 2

Schwebel, Die Kunst und das Christentum, 20. Schwebel, Die Kunst und das Christentum, 20-23. Belting cites the comparison with Zeus from a sixth-century work by Theodoros Anagnostes who disapproved of the mosaic for that reason (H. Belting, Das echte Bild, 57-58). 4 I use the term ‘holy portrait’, but it should be remembered that it is not a question of physical similarity when speaking of a portrait-like icon of Christ. In that sense, the word portrait can lead to misunderstanding. 3

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believer touched them, kissed them, and kneeled before them. The church in the West, on the other hand, was reserved in its attitude toward the cult image, which had a strong influence in popular religiosity, even in an extreme form in the late Middle Ages. The Western church placed more emphasis on the narrative image, a development that Pope Gregory the Great (ca. 540-604) had already set in motion.5 The portals, walls and altars in churches usually contained scenes next to each other that formed a coherent whole. Aside from this Bible for the poor, we find narrative depictions in breviaries and prayer books in the late Middle Ages. The narrative image was not only intended as a means of education for the unschooled and as a Bible for the poor but also helped in recollection, remembrance, and pious reflection on the salvific mysteries. An image with this function was called a devotional image.6 The narrative image is also known in Eastern Orthodoxy. The icons for the high holidays form a pictorial catechism that narrates the story of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection by depicting them. Portrait icons are also sometimes framed by scenes from the life of Christ or a saint.

Religious art continued to develop, however, and genres other than the holy portrait and the narrative image developed. These included landscapes and still lifes and, since the twentieth century, abstract art. Other media are also now being used, such as photography, video, film, computer art, and games. The function changed as well. In modern and contemporary religious art, the portrait of Christ, the Holy Face, functions not only as a cult image but also as a devotional image for the purpose of memory or contemplation (chapter 5).7

5 H.L. Kessler, Gregory the Great and Image Theory, 151-172. A sentence in one of Gregory’s letters reads: ‘For what writing presents to readers, this a picture presents to the unlearned who behold, since in it even the ignorant see what they ought to follow; in it the illiterate read’ (G.E. Thiessen, Theological Aesthetics, 47). 6 F.O. Büttner illustrates this devotional practice in Europe by means of images from the period 1250-1530. Through attentive viewing of images, the believer strove for veneration and to become like Christ, Mary, and other biblical figures. This imitatio pietatis involves the story of Christ’s nativity (the worship of the magi and the shepherds), the pietas Christi (the footwashing, his praying on the Mount of Olives, and his bearing of the cross), various forms of the pietas Mariae and models of piety, such as Mary Magdalene and Thomas (F.O. Büttner, Imitatio Pietatis). For the distinction between the cult image (Kultbild) and the devotional image (Andachtsbild), see R. Guardini, Kultbild und Andachtsbild, 5-23. 7 In the misuse of these images, one can still detect a difference between the cult image and the devotional image: the cult image can become an idol and the devotional image can be reduced to an aesthetic art object (Guardini, Kultbild und Andachtsbild, 19-21).

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1.3 Hans Belting: Art as the Problem For a proper understanding of the nature and power of the cult image, let me provide a short sketch of that (1.3.1), and then I will show how, according to Belting, the sacred image conflicts with the image of art that arose in the Renaissance (1.3.2). 1.3.1 The Power of the Medieval Cult Image In Likeness and Presence, Belting’s primary purpose is to describe people’s interaction with images in processions and pilgrimages. He has little to say on the view of the image in church and theology (2-9).8 In popular medieval piety, the portrait is central as a cult image, and Belting views the narrative image as less important.9 The religious image par excellence in the East was the Mandylion [Fig. 5.28], and in the West the Veronica [Fig. 1.5]. Such cult images are not just representations of people like Christ but are also treated as persons (xxi). The image was revered; people knelt before it, or it was reverently carried in a procession (xxi). Such holy images act like living beings who weep and perform miracles. The Mandylion and the Veronica are images par excellence that have the power to perform miracles like Jesus himself. According to the tradition, after all, they are the mechanical imprint of Jesus’ face.10 The status of these images goes back to the legendary story of their supernatural origin, different versions of which can be found in the sources. I will limit my comments to the main lines of the discussion. The oldest example of such an image of Jesus not made by human hands dates from the sixth century. The Mandylion (derived from mandil, an Arabic word for ‘piece of cloth’) is a painting with the ‘true portrait’ of Christ. It had saved the Syrian city of Edessa from the Persians and was preserved as an imperial palladium in Constantinople (53). The legend relates the story of King Abgar who lived at the same time as Jesus and wanted to have a portrait of him. One version says that Abgar commissioned a painter to make an accurate portrait of Jesus, and the other that the image came into existence miraculously through Jesus himself pressing his face into a cloth, thus leaving an imprint of his face behind 8

The references in the text are to the English version: Likeness and Presence. Belting writes about the narrative image in H. Belting and D. Blume, Stadtkultur und Malerei der Dantezeit, 1989. 10 For the Shroud of Turin, see Belting, Das echte Bild, 63-67. 9

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(208). The intention behind both explanations is clear. A portrait made from the living model of Jesus is evidence that he really did exist and had human nature. The latter was a subject of theological discussion at the time. The Abgar legend – especially the second version of it that recounts the mechanical imprint of Jesus’ face – has become influential in the tradition. The mechanical imprint meant that it was not an idol, not an image ‘made by human hands’, like those of the heathens (Acts 19:26) (208). Because it was not made by human hands, the image had an authenticity that was independent of the talents of the artist.11

The Veronica had been venerated in Rome since around 1200 and disappeared when Rome was sacked in 1527 (215-224).12 The legend of the veil’s origin is similar to that of the Mandylion. We do not know who Veronica was. She has been identified with the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years and was healed when she touched the hem of Jesus’ clothing (Mark 5). According to an old tradition, she was called Berenike.13 Others hold that the only reason she exists is to provide a means to join the two words vera icon, the ‘true likeness’ of Jesus, into the name Veronica. The Golden Legend (Legenda Aurea) (thirteenth century) relates that Veronica went to Jesus with a linen cloth with the request that he pose for her. Jesus took the cloth from her and imprinted his face on it. Other versions of the legend report that Jesus – on the Mount of Olives or on the way of suffering (the road to the cross) – dried his face with a cloth offered to him by Veronica, leaving an imprint of his face behind (220).

The legends of both cloths with the imprint of Jesus’ face amount to the same thing. With them, Christianity was given a cult image of a supernatural origin, as Belting writes: But the idea of the authentic portrait as an impression on a cloth remained a common feature of the Byzantine Abgar image and the Western Veronica image. Different legends circulated in East and West, but for a long time the images were virtually interchangeable because they expressed the same idea. In late antiquity the cloth with the ‘true’ imprint of Christ’s features for the first time met the requirements for a Christian cult image .… Unlike the heathen images, it was no mere invention but the likeness of a real person and so could bear witness to Christ’s incarnation against the doubts of the heretics (222-224).

Let me briefly summarise how the church justified the veneration of images. There was an undeniable tension between church doctrine and the role of the image in popular piety. 11

On the Mandylion, see also G. Wolf, Vera Icon, 422-425, and below, 5.2. For the historical documents concerning the Veronica, see Belting, Likeness and Presence, 541-544, 537-539. 13 Wolf, Vera Icon, 425-428. 12

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At the Second Council of Nicaea in 787, the church in the East did not refer to the origin story of the Mandylion but used another argument for the veneration of images like the icon of Christ and those of Mary and the saints. Some distance was even taken from the idea of images not made by hands, which were considered exceptions. The council permitted the use of images because God became incarnate in Jesus, and Christ is called the ‘image of God’ (Colossians 1:15). That was how the veneration of images was legitimated. A distinction was made on the one hand between the veneration of the cross and images and adoration on the other, which belonged only to God. The council held that what was venerated was not the image itself but what it referred to – Christ or a saint.14 The Western part of the church did not participate in the Second Council of Nicaea. As a response to the Council, a theological report was issued at Charlemagne’s command against the council’s decision, the so-called Libri Carolini. Regarding the image, the report followed the didactic line of Gregory the Great and other popes and even forbade the veneration of images. It had little influence, however, because the pope at the time did not support an offensive against the Greek theologians.15 In the end, the church in the West adopted the decision of Nicaea II but placed the emphasis on a certain part of it. In addition to venerating images, Nicaea II had also spoken of remembrance in connection with images. Portrait-like images invoke the memory (memoria) of Christ or the saint who was depicted. It was precisely this aspect that the West highlighted. The images of the saints served not so much for veneration as – just like the narrative image – for teaching. They were not viewed as cult images but as devotional images. The depictions called the believers to remember the saints’ virtues and to imitate their venerated predecessors.16

Doctrine is different from life. Popular piety consisted primarily of the veneration of images. An important goal in pilgrimages to Rome was to view the Veronica, which was available for public view for only a short time (215-224). People were driven to this by a desire to see the ‘face of God’. By viewing the Holy Face, the pilgrim could anticipate the vision of God face to face in a future eternal life. ‘In the “genuine image” the earthly features of Jesus, which could be seen by human eyes, merged with the divine features of God – visible reality with an invisible mystery’ (209). 14 ‘Indeed the honour paid to an image traverses it, reaching the model; and who venerates the image, venerates the person represented in that image.’ From the Second Council of Nicaea (787) in: Thiessen, Theological Aesthetics, 65. 15 See also the text from Libri Carolini (ca. 790) in Belting, Likeness and Presence, 533-534. 16 E. Honée, Beeld en verbeelding in de middeleeuwse gebedscultuur, 158.

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An extra stimulus to undertake the journey was to be granted an indulgence, the remission of temporary punishments for sins.17 Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) wrote about this desire to see the face of God in his Vita Nuova, dedicating this work to his beloved Beatrice who had died. In Florence, he saw pilgrims who had travelled to Rome where they wanted to see ‘that blessed image … that Christ left us as a reminder of his beautiful form’. The Veronica shows the face ‘that my mistress [Beatrice] now contemplates in eternal glory’.18 In the third part (Paradiso) of his Divine Comedy Dante returns to the Veronica in the Canto 31: Like someone coming from Croatia, say to view our Veil – the Saint Veronica – who still can’t satisfy the age-old ache and while the image is displayed to him, will murmur in his thoughts: ‘My Lord, Christ Jesus, was this the way, true God, you looked on earth?’19

Because of its status, the Holy Face was often reproduced (209) and can still be seen in many churches as a fresco or an icon, such as the wellknown Holy Face in Laon (France) [Fig. 1.3]. Hymns like the Salve sancta facies or the Ave facies praeclara were sung before the Holy Face.20 These images had power because of their aura of the holy. People thought they saw a ‘true’ depiction – like a photograph – of the earthly Jesus in these wonderworking images. Moreover, by touching these images, one came into direct contact with Jesus’ body, which allowed miracles to happen. Such wonderworking images proved that the historical existence of the person who, while still alive, had left the impression of his body behind. They proved his continuing presence, given that the images continued to perform miracles (57).21 Thus, the images functioned as relics that made Christ physically present to the believer (53, 301-303).22 Belting emphasises this presence, the direct contact that the sacred image would provide with Christ or a saint. There are no relics of Jesus or Mary in the sense of bodily remains (299, 302), but the Veronica functioned also as a relic in addition to being a source 17

Wolf, Vera Icon, 437-438; N. MacGregor and E. Langmuir, Seeing Salvation, 92. Belting, Das echte Bild, 118 (117-119). For the stories and legends about Veronica in Rome, see Belting, Likeness and Presence, 541-543. 19 Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, Canto 31, 103-108. 20 For the text of the hymns, see Belting, Likeness and Presence, 543-544. 21 See also Belting, Das echte Bild, 56-62. 22 See the text by Bernard of Angers (eleventh century) on relics and miracles in Belting, Likeness and Presence, 536-537. 18

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for pious meditation (221). There was a report at that time that drops of blood could also be seen in the imprint of Christ’s face on the Veronica in St. Peter’s in Rome.23 In a later explanation of his book, Belting says that the English title of his Likeness and Presence refers to the ‘performative capacity and iconic presence’ of particular material pictures in the Christian tradition of these pictures.24 But the image loses this power when it becomes art! 1.3.2 Conflict with the Art Image A new concept of image arose during the Renaissance. Aside from the change in the conception of the image as art, the Reformation was also important in this. The cult image lost the power it had as a result of the theological criticism of images by the (Protestant) Reformation and by the media revolution. These developments occurred in the same period and were interconnected. The transition from the old practice of the image to the new conception of the art image led to a conflict, according to Belting: a conflict between the old practice and the new view of the image (410). Luther played an important role in this. The Theological Critique of Images Humanists and Reformers criticised how images and relics were treated, practices that were often accompanied by magic and commerce. The Reformation meant the end of an economy of salvation in which the cult image played a prominent role (458-470). Because of Luther’s thesis of ‘justification by faith’, donations in connection with the practice of images became superfluous and the practice of granting indulgences lapsed. Luther rejected the church as an institution that granted grace and privileges on the basis of its authority over relics and images. He rejected the cult image by appealing to the biblical prohibition against images. According to Luther, this prohibition in the Ten Commandments was not directed at all images but only at images that took the place of God. That is why he rejected only the veneration of the image, not the image as such. In itself, the image is viewed no longer as a religious but as a secular phenomenon. The images in art meet the new secular – removed 23 Petrus Mallus, History of St. Peter’s (circa 1160), text 37A in Belting, Likeness and Presence, 541. 24 Belting, Iconic Presence, 235.

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from the control of the church – requirements of culture and aesthetic experience (458). In Luther’s time, there were two kinds of images: the idolatrous cult images of the Catholics and the art images that citizens usually had at home: But the crowded walls of the picture cabinets in private houses … testified to the presence of painting, of which key works (of genres and artists) where then being collected. The resulting collections were unaffected by the verdict against images in churches. Images, which had lost their function in the church, took on a new role in representing art …. (458)

In the Lutheran tradition, the image continues to play a role in the communication of faith and acquires a didactic function (466-470). The most prominent example of this is the Wittenberg Altarpiece (1547) by Lucas Cranach the Elder [Fig. 1.4] in the (Lutheran) church in Wittenberg.25 The Lutheran Reformation did indeed cause a shift from image to word. Its criticism of the image had great influence, supported as it was by the media revolution. Because of that, the image lost power in two ways. The printing press made it possible for images to be duplicated on a major scale, which led to the loss of their power to enchant. Also, the printing of books caused the image to lose ground to the word.26 The New Art Image According to Belting, the theological critique of images by the Reformation promoted the rise of art, which developed its own view of the image (470-478). Though the image lost its religious authority, it could be viewed aesthetically and be valued for its artistic value. Images made by artists were given a separate status. Leon Battista Alberti penned his theory on the art image in 1435. In his manual for painters, Dürer pointed to the pleasure a painting gave if it was made according to the rules of art (470-471).27 The new image is a construction of the artist, characterised by the central perspective. It is a product of the imagination of the artist who works with an illusory perception, the trompe-l’oeil, and the painting 25 For this altarpiece of the Reformation, see J.L. Koerner, The Reformation of the Image, chapter 5. 26 Belting, Das echte Bild, 162-167. 27 For texts on a few theories of art in the Renaissance, see Belting, Likeness and Presence, 551-554.

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becomes a window in which someone appears as a portrait. Belting sketches its contrast with the cult image acutely: the image formerly had been assigned a special reality and taken literally as a visible manifestation of the sacred person. Now the image was, in the first place, made subject to the general laws of nature, including optics, and so was assigned wholly to the realm of sense perception. Now the same laws were to apply to the image as to the natural perception of the outside world. It became a simulated window in which either a saint or a family member would appear in a portrait. (471)

The social position of the maker of the image changed as well. The painter was no longer a craftsman but a poet with poetic freedom. That freedom also characterises the interpretation of religious truth: the religious subject matter was no longer visible to the physical eye like something from the empirically observable world. Given that, we have to conclude, according to Belting, that the artist invents that subject matter: the artist has to rely on his or her imagination (fantasy) (471, 484). Because of that, the image became subjective and lost its objective character, with the consequence that the sacramental presence of the one to whom the image refers, Christ, Mary, or a saint, was threatened: The new presence of the work succeeds the former presence of the sacred in the work. But what could this presence mean? It is the presence of an idea that is made visible in the work: the idea of art, as the artist had it in mind. (459)

For Catholics, the image became ambiguous: it could be seen as a holy image or as art (458). Theologians and art theorists thus contributed to the crisis of the old image and the genesis of the secular image in the transition from the ‘age of the image’ to ‘the age of art’. Theologians wanted to strip the old cult image of its sacred aura, and art theorists worked at establishing the new image in art. Belting sketches the difference between the old and the new image by an allusion to Walter Benjamin’s statement about the loss of aura. The old image lost its divine power and aura; now the originality of the image became a question of the idea or imagination of the artist (484). Belting is aware that his description of the transition from the old to the new image gives the impression that religion had disappeared from art. At the time of the Renaissance, the world seemed to have become disenchanted. Although Belting emphasises the secular aspect of the art that arose at that time, he does not think that religion disappeared from

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art. Years later, he cleared up the misunderstanding: ‘Religion does not disappear from art, but undergoes a transformation by virtue of its incorporation into the domain of art, which in turn transforms the history of pictures.’28 Belting’s thesis is that the transformation of the image affects the character of the religious image. As we saw, his starting point is the image as it functioned in popular piety and not the tone set in the church and theology by Gregory the Great. It is not difficult to understand why Belting also criticises the devotional image that arose among citizens at the end of the Middle Ages. He finds it too subjective. He considers this religious art to be in conflict with the former practice as well (410, 419-457). The citizenry that emerged at the end of the Middle Ages, alongside the nobility and the clergy, wanted their own devotional image at home. A different religious image practice thus arose as a result. For the individual citizen, it was a dialogical piety, a dialogue between the image and the citizen. The individual expected that the image addressed him or her in person in precisely the same way that the saints had experienced images speaking miraculously to them. Instead of waiting for a miracle, the individual citizen wanted to carry on the dialogue in his imagination with the help of the image. Belting views this negatively and also sees here (not only in making the image but also in one’s attitude towards it) a shift from the objective cult image to a more subjectively viewed devotional image. He shows how ambivalent the new art is via a work by Hans Memling. Various artists – Memling, Van Eyck, Van der Weyden, Dürer, and many others – engaged in making artworks of the Holy Face. If we look at Memling’s Saint Veronica (ca. 1470-1475) [Fig. 1.5], we see Veronica with a veil sitting in an idyllic landscape. This is difficult, in Belting’s view, to reconcile with the suffering of Christ from which the Veronica (in all of its versions) was derived. The diptych evokes a pre-Romantic atmosphere (428). The objective character of the old religious image disappeared, and was replaced by a subjective work of art, invented by the artist. According to Belting, Memling puts the old icon in the new painting ‘like a precious memory’ (430).29 In short, in Belting’s view, the new art made the religious image a problem as an expression of visual piety. 28

Belting, Iconic Presence, 237 (2016). For the development in (the treatment of) the Veronica, see Belting, Likeness and Presence, 221-222. 29

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An Icon Is Not a Western Religious Painting A similar critique of Western Christian art can be found in Paul Evdokimov from the perspective of his Eastern Orthodox theology of the icon. He holds that religious transcendence is threatened if, according to the Western view of religious painting, a religious scene takes place in the empirical world. In Evdokimov’s view, such art loses the ability to represent religious transcendence: But starting in the 13th century, Giotto, Duccio, and Cimabue introduced into their works optical illusion, perspective, depth, chiaroscuro and trompel’oeil. Such art, though more refined and more reflective of the natural world, lost the ability to directly grasp and portray the transcendent.30

Evdokimov also pointed to Fra Angelico, whose Christian art, he felt, could no longer be an element of the liturgical mystery. It had abandoned its heavenly environment and became more and more autonomous and subjective.31 From the perspective of the Orthodox view of icons – which is directed at the other, heavenly reality – this criticism is understandable. The likeness between the depiction on an icon and that which is depicted is not like a natural likeness. In the latter, the concern is that the depiction be lifelike. But the depiction on the icon, however, concerns the sacred person and his or her heavenly body, according to Evdokimov. Thus, it is impossible to have an icon of a living person, and any carnal, earthly likeness is excluded. ‘The heavenly face of the person assumes the transfigured body which is represented in the icon.’32 An icon is therefore not intended to provide a representation of the world; rather, it is concerned with the relationship of the believer with the heavenly figure of Christ or a saint. That is why the landscape and buildings are not painted in a realistic way on icons but turned into something unimportant. This is to emphasise that the beauty of the supernatural is of a different order than a human art object or even natural beauty. I do not agree with Evdokimov’s critique. Just like Belting, he does not sufficiently take into account the fact that the concept of religious 30

P. Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 73. Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 74. This assessment of Fra Angelico is convincingly countered by the analysis of Fra Angelico’s work by G. Didi-Huberman. Huberman shows that, in his work in the San Marco monastery in Florence, Fra Angelico works on the basis of the medieval method of fourfold exegesis. Fra Angelico allows the invisible of religious transcendence to come into its own in his works in a fascinating way (G. Didi-Huberman, Fra Angelico). 32 Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 87, 210-211. 31

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images has undergone historical developments. These can indeed be negatively evaluated, but they are also positive, as we shall see.

1.4 The Religious Image in and after the Middle Ages Belting’s Likeness and Presence gives insight into the religious function of the cult image as a wonderworking relic. In what follows I will show that there are other views as well about the religious image and of its uses (chapters 9 and 11). I will now comment on Belting’s description of the holy image, the attitude people had toward it, and his thesis of the conflict between the holy image and the aesthetic art image in the Renaissance. In doing so, I will point to developments in the religious image after the Middle Ages. 1. Belting points to presence in the image of the one to whom the image refers – Christ, Mary, or a saint (xxi, 7). Has that been lost in the modern period, as he claims? Is it indeed so that the medieval person had direct contact with the transcendent world via the cult image and that this was no longer the case after 1500 (15-16)? The image that was made in the time of the Renaissance according to the rules of art became more of an object for reflection for the viewer, according to Belting. Art is reflective in nature: ‘Form and content renounce their unmediated meaning in favor of the mediated meaning of aesthetic experience and concealed argumentation’ (16). J. Hamburger argues that Belting’s book expresses a nostalgia for immediacy and presence.33 In my view, people can experience something of the presence of Christ now as well and in different ways. This was never something that only the medieval person had access to. Marion points to another kind of presence in connection with icons, i.e., to the crossing of the gazes of Christ and the viewer (chapter 3). Presence is an important aspect of the contemporary religious image as well. 2. Belting contrasts the objective medieval cult image with the subjective religious image that arose in the Renaissance. The artisan became an artist who created a reality through his or her imagination. Belting sees that as being at odds with the ‘objective’ character of the sacred image. He formulates this contrast sharply when he asserts that the presence of the holy 33 J. Hamburger, Art History Reviewed XI: Hans Belting’s Bild und Kult, 42. See also Belting himself in Likeness and Presence, 16.

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(Christ, Mary, a saint) in the medieval cult image has been replaced in the later religious art image by the ‘the presence of an idea that is made visible in the work: the idea of art, as the artist has it in mind’ (459). The religious image is indeed ‘objective’, when it is viewed as a relic, as an imprint of Christ. But not every material religious image in the Middle Ages was a relic. Narrative images did exist in the Middle Ages as well, and there were images that functioned as devotional images in the late Middle Ages but are evaluated by Belting as too ‘subjective’, as we saw above. Belting speaks of the dissolution of the material image in a fantasy image that was ‘subjective’, such as the religious art image of the Renaissance (471, 484). I view this subjective/objective distinction with respect to the image unfortunate. It is too oriented to an outdated epistemology that claims that our knowledge – and thus our attitude towards the image – should be objective, separate from any human mediation. Instead of distinguishing between ‘objective’ and ‘subjective’, I would like, with respect to the religious image, to distinguish between the image as indexical sign and the image as iconic sign. The former has to do with a sign that is physically connected with or caused by its referent. The religious example here is the relic. The image as iconic sign has to do with the image as made by an artisan or artist as a representation of reality, such as a portrait, a narrative image, or a landscape. That is the image that was strongly developed in art since the Renaissance with its emphasis on visuality. Here the aesthetic aspect of the image, the form, plays an important role. Dismissing this view of the image as iconic sign as ‘subjective’ does not do any justice to the painter. Merleau-Ponty and Marion show that convincingly: the painter can display a reality that usually remains unseen in its depth – secularly or religiously. And the artist does that from an attitude of perception that goes beyond the subjective/objective distinction (8.5 and 3.2.3; see also 11.4). That is different with respect to the image as indexical sign: this image is, after all, an imprint (the Mandylion or the Veronica) or a relic of a saint. In connection with the relic of a person, the aesthetic aspect is present but is transferred to the shrine of the relic, which is often constructed from expensive material and has a beautiful form. In contemporary religious art we usually encounter the image as iconic sign, as we will see in Part II. In the twentieth century, interest in the indexical image has once again grown, such as Duchamp’s readymade – the indexical image viewed as a sample – and Paul Thek’s Technological Reliquaries, the indexical image as relic. Thek’s work and a number of

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other works will be discussed as examples of the image as indexical signs (6.3 and 6.4.2). I am borrowing this distinction between the indexical and the iconic sign from semiotics: an index is a sign that is connected with its meaning through adjacency or contiguousness. There is a physical or material relationship between sign and meaning. A footprint is an index of a person, smoke an index of fire, and a relic is an index of a saint. The Veronica is also an index. An icon is a sign that resembles its meaning with respect to form, structure or, for example, colour. A map, for example, is iconic because the form resembles the country in question. In this study, the iconic sign concerns visual art: the art image that has its power in its visuality and resembles what it wants to depict. Index and icon are signs that are connected for understandable reasons with their meanings and are therefore called motivated signs.34

Belting reduces the holy image to a cult image and views it as a relic, as an indexical sign. He judges all devotional images (the image as iconic sign) as ‘subjective’. In my opinion, that is too narrow a view of religious art. Both images – the indexical and the iconic – have their respective functions in visual piety. What characterises religious art is not that an image is objective, like a relic, but whether the invisible can appear in the visible, or whether an image is able to convey or refer to religious transcendence, as I will show below (chapters 8 and 9). Transformations, new forms, or a new use of religious art emerged from the Renaissance on and especially in the twentieth century. Such developments point to the vitality of a religious tradition. At the end of the Middle Ages, the portrait-like image began to function as a devotional image – the image as iconic sign – for the individual citizen. The rise of the devotional image is connected with the change in the perception of the human being from a collective being to an individual. The citizen sought to deepen his or her inner life and sought contemplation, and that was done in each time and place in its own way. We will discuss an example of that, and we will see how the Holy Face was expressed in new ways in modern and contemporary art, not as a cult image but as a devotional image (chapter 5). Traditionally, the narrative image always existed alongside the holy portrait. Gregory the Great promoted that, but that topic hardly comes up in Belting’s Likeness and Presence because of his choice to describe the 34 M. Bal, Verf en Verderf, 14-15, 242-243 (English: M. Bal, Reading ‘Rembrandt’); A. Nagel, Medieval Modern, 18-19; 210-211. For the use of the concept of symbol, see below (8.3).

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cult image of popular piety. It was precisely developments in the religious use of the narrative image that occurred during the Renaissance, as Baxandall and Lubbock show. This shows how important this religious genre is for visual piety.35 The religious image – or better, religious art – continued to change over the course of history. Ringbom, for example, refers to the development of the icon into the narrative image.36 3. Landscape gradually became important in religious painting, and I would like to comment on this development. Belting questions the appropriateness of Memling placing his Saint Veronica against the background of a landscape [Fig. 1.5]. In this way the old icon of the Holy Face was tucked away in the new painting. That negative judgment is understandable insofar as it has to do with the contrast between Jesus’ suffering (the Veronica) and a beautiful landscape. Aside from that issue, painters were taking an increased interest in landscapes. And how should that be evaluated from the perspective of the history of the religious image? As stated above, Evdokimov has criticised this setting of the religious in the earthly context of everyday life from the perspective of his Eastern Orthodox view of the image. Is this shift in worldview in the Renaissance not an enrichment? The Anglican theologian David Brown correctly argues that Evdokimov’s critique of Western art does not do justice to God’s creation and God’s activity in the world. Brown shows that a very different Platonism was operative in the Renaissance than the Platonism that played a role in the Eastern Orthodox view of the image. In the latter, it is Plato’s view of idea and imitation that is operative. The icon refers to the sacred in heavenly glory. In contrast, the Platonism of Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499) from Florence was directed at the world and thus supported the concept of creation. Ficino is full of praise of God and his creation: ‘God “pregnant with all things” creating an eternal cosmos that deserved our unstinted praise.’37 It would take us too far afield to properly explore this Renaissance Platonism that is oriented to the world. What is important here is what Evdokimov views as negative: more reflective art of the natural world in Western art, according to Brown (and myself) that can be judged in a positive way because God’s creation then receives all attention. The order in nature discovered by the natural sciences in the Renaissance was 35 M. Baxandall, Painting and Experience in Fifteenth-Century Italy; J. Lubbock, Storytelling in Christian Art from Giotto to Donatello. 36 S. Ringbom, Icon to Narrative. 37 D. Brown, God and Enchantment of Place, 73.

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taken over in painting. Art was seen ‘as emulating God’s own handiwork, both alike immanent in our world’.38 In short, another view of the religious image arose that was different from the view of the icon (Evdokimov) or the sacred image (Belting) as directed purely at heavenly transcendence. A different view of transcendence thus began to play a role: that of the involvement of God in his creation, i.e., the view of a transcendence inhabiting the world, an immanent transcendence. The religious painting thus depicts creation as well. Alongside the genres of the portrait and narrative image, landscape painting also arose in the Renaissance that was often religious in character as well. We will see an example of that in modern art in Van Gogh (4.3). 4. Belting is very reserved in his discussion of the religious image in the Middle Ages with respect to the aesthetic aspect. The ‘aesthetic’ goes back to the Greek word aisthēsis, which means sensory perception or sensation. Belting is aware of course that the aesthetic aspect of the religious image was already a topic of discussion in the Middle Ages between Sugar of Saint Denis and Bernard of Clairvaux (303-304).39 The religious image could have different functions at that time, such as veneration, teaching, memory, and contemplation. The function that preceded these and forms the basis for them is their use as decoration in churches.40 That concerns the aesthetic aspect here in the sense of what is pleasant to look at. Beauty was already important in the illustration of manuscripts in the thirteenth century. In the Oxford Psalter (twelfth century), for example, it was used to stimulate piety in the viewer. Beauty viewed as beautiful form was an important aspect of objects – breviaries, frescoes, paintings, sculptures, etc. – that had a function in visual pious practice. Various traditions of images within Christianity, such as the Eastern Orthodox, the Catholic, and the Anglican, see beauty as an important value for religious art.41 The problem that Belting rightly indicates is 38

Brown, God and Enchantment of Place, 74. See the text by Sugar in D. Menozzi, Les images, 121-125. J. Margolis limits himself primarily to the aesthetics of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas (J. Margolis, Medieval Aesthetics). 40 ‘All images that were mentioned in the church documents served primarily to decorate God’s house’, according to Honée, Beeld en verbeelding in de middeleeuwse gebedscultuur, 158. 41 Evdokimov gave his book The Art of the Icon the subtitle A Theology of Beauty; cf. R. Viladesau, The Beauty of the Cross; D. Brown, God and Enchantment of Place, passim; D. Brown, God & Grace of Body. B. Forte gives a general survey in his The Portal of Beauty. 39

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that the beauty of an art object in the Western history of art became increasingly autonomous, and the artwork became viewed as an aesthetic object in itself. It was thus a question of the pure form separate from the content and its reference to God. Artists in the Renaissance began to present their work as the result of ‘an aesthetic concept’, according to Belting (472). The concept of imagination also arose in connection with the making of art. That falls under aesthetics as well. ‘The material image dissolves into a fantasy image that is justified by the artist’s imagination …’ (484). My relativisation above of Belting’s thesis about a conflict between the sacred image and the religious art image in the Renaissance in no way alters the fact that the Western view of art developed into the autonomous view of art for art’s sake. In connection with modern and contemporary religious art, the question is important as to whether the current view of art also has that one-sided emphasis on the aesthetic at the cost of its religious character. Because of that, I will, by way of conclusion, look at the gradually changing understanding of art.

1.5 The Contemporary Concept(s) of Art and the Religious Image The concept of art that arose in the Renaissance was very influential afterwards, especially in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, before gradually losing credibility in the twentieth. Belting speaks in this context of the end of the history of art. He sketches this development in his Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte: Eine Revision nach zehn Jahren (1995). Nicholas Wolterstorff makes use of Belting’s insights in his Art Rethought (2015) and argues that, for a long time, this now implausible view of art looked at the work of art solely as an aesthetic object, thereby neglecting the social and cultural functions of art.42 And that also obtains of course for the religious function of art, as I will now demonstrate. I will now summarise the situation of the changing concept of art in two theses and finally pose a question. (1) The view of art for art’s sake held sway for a long time. The only way to view art was to approach works of art as aesthetic objects. The aesthetic aspect was viewed in the nineteenth century and far into the twentieth in a formalistic way. It was a matter of looking at the work in terms of its pure form. In this view, the history of art is seen as a description of the development of style, of the aesthetic form. 42

N. Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 120.

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(2) Because of new developments in art and in art theory, this view of art was no longer considered convincing in the early twentieth century. New forms of visual art arose, and, in connection with that, room for other ways of viewing artworks than merely as aesthetic objects opened up. Alongside the religious image of ‘iconic’ sign, there was again room for the image as an ‘indexical’ sign; there was room for the relic. (3) The concept of art as autonomous is no longer the dominant view. Insofar as there is interest in the aesthetic in art or in the viewing of art – and that is especially the case with the religious image as an iconic sign – the formalistic-aesthetic view needs to be rejected. How can the aesthetic aspect function in modern and contemporary art with Christian themes if the formalistic-aesthetic view of art is rejected? I will elaborate on the two theses above and answer the question just posed in the following three subsections. 1.5.1 The ‘Grand Narrative’ of Art With respect to the first thesis, the Western view of art has, since the Renaissance, gradually developed into a concept of art as autonomous. Art is viewed in terms of its history, as Belting shows.43 That began in the Renaissance with Giorgio Vasari, in whose Lives of the Artists (1550/ 1568), he wanted to understand ‘the sources and origins of various styles, and the reasons for the improvement or decline of the arts …’.44 A historiography of art arose among Vasari’s followers in which a work of art was judged in terms of its place in the general development of the dominant style. Winckelmann’s Geschichte der Kunst der Alterthums (1764) was a trendsetter in this regard. He described the art of antiquity as a story of a rise, flourishing, and decline. And thus arose a view of art and the history of art with the focus on the history of style.45 In Alois Riegl’s Stilfragen (1893), the pure form of the artwork is central and the question of its content or meaning ignored.46 The subtitle of Heinrich Wölfflin’s famous Kunstgeschichtliche Grundbegriffe (1915) was: Das Problem der Stilentwicklung in der neueren Kunst. Art was seen as something autonomous, as something that would develop without any relation to any history outside of it; its meaning was self-contained.47 43

For this and what follows, see H. Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 128-134. G. Vasari, Lives of the Artists, 84; for a critical assessment of Vasari, see G. DidiHuberman, Devant l’Image, chapter 2. 45 Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 38, 144, 147. 46 Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 38. 47 Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 23, 44, 121. 44

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Wolterstorff calls this view of art for art’s sake, of the beauty or pure form of the art object as the be-all and end-all of art, the ‘Grand Narrative’ of art in the modern world. This view is characterised by, in addition to the emphasis on the development of style, a disinterested attention for or contemplation of the work of art as an aesthetic object. Wolterstorff sees this reaching its apex in Romanticism. Wilhelm Wackenroder (17731798) – whom Wolterstorff cites – spoke of art galleries as ‘temples’ where we can admire the great artists ‘in still and silent humility and in heart-lifting solitude’. He compares the joy derived from such works of art to ‘prayer’.48 It is apparent from this quote that art has become a religion outside of organised religion. This conception of art developed into formalism, a view of art as pure form. This development occurred in England through, among others, Walter Pater, Roger Fry and Clive Bell, and in the United States through Clement Greenberg. What precisely does a formalistic-aesthetic view of art entail? The Formalistic-Aesthetic View Immanuel Kant gave the impetus to formalism in his Critique of Judgment (1790), where he argued that only the pure form of something can serve as an orientation point for making an aesthetic judgment of what is beautiful. The aesthetic judgment concerns every judgment about the beautiful: what is beautiful in art, nature, or everyday reality. What kind of thing it is, what purpose or use it has, and whether its existence has meaning for us or someone else – all of that is irrelevant with respect to our aesthetic judgment.49 The delight of the judgment of taste is completely disinterested (ohne alles Interesse) (§ 2): Taste is the faculty of estimating an object or a mode of representation by means of a delight or aversion apart from any interest. The object of such a delight is called beautiful. (§ 5)

To judge whether something is beautiful, we do not even need to form a concept of it, for it concerns nothing more than the pure form (§ 6): Flowers, free patterns, lines aimlessly intertwining – technically termed foliage – have no signification, depend upon no definite concept, and yet please. (§ 4)

48

Cited by Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 35. I. Kant, Critique of Judgement, §§ 2, 11, and 16. I refer in the text to the paragraphs of Kant’s work. 49

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Kant calls this free beauty, in distinction from dependent beauty (§ 16). With dependent beauty, we form a concept of the object. Dependent beauty coheres with non-aesthetic issues of interests. A city hall or church building can be beautiful but is so as a function of its purpose. If looking at art is viewed formally as purely a question of taste, as a judgment of free beauty, art is then separated from morality, politics, and religion. Free beauty is, namely, simply a question of the pure form (§ 11). ‘The beautiful is that which, apart from a concept, pleases universally’ (§ 9). Although Kant himself says that something can be judged to be beautiful only if it concerns the pure form, I do not see his own conception of art as formalistic. From § 43 on of the Critique of Judgement, he writes separately about art. There – surprisingly, given how his book begins – the idea, the content, of a work of art appears to be important. He calls this the ‘aesthetic idea’: art has to do with matters that cannot be captured in a concept but transcend the concept, and that is why the aesthetic idea gives rise to thought (§ 49). Thus, art is not just a matter of form but of form and content. That goes against viewing art only in terms of pure form, as formalism does and as Kant also seems to do in his argument on aesthetic judgment in general (§§ 1-16).50

With his discourse on pure beauty, Kant (unintentionally, given his own view of art) laid the foundation for the formalistic-aesthetic approach to art. This view can be found especially in England,51 a good example of which is given by the painter James McNeill Whistler. In 1871-1872, Whistler painted a portrait of his mother [Fig. 1.6]. According to him, however, this work is not to be viewed as a portrait but as pure form. It is to be seen as An Arrangement in Grey and Black.52 If we look at the painting from a formalistic point of view, we see the diagonal of the black figure in a window of horizontal and vertical lines that are repeated in miniature in the figuration in the background. The forms are simple, just like the colours: black and white in the centre, grey and black in the background, black in the centre and in the foreground, and black mottled with off-white on the left in the background. Robert Frye viewed Giotto’s Pietà in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua in the same way. He writes: 50 This incorrect understanding of Kant’s view is found in A.A. van den Braembussche, Thinking Art, 2007, 131 (E-book) in his otherwise excellent introduction to the philosophy of art. For Kant’s non-formalistic view of art, see P. Guyer, Kant’s Conception of Fine Art, 275-285. 51 For England, see E. Prettejohn, Beauty and Art, 124-155. The ‘art for art’s sake’ school was less strict in France than in England (Prettejohn, Beauty and Art, 98, 89-101). 52 Prettejohn, Beauty and Art, 148.

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‘It now seems to me possible … in front of a work of art to disentangle our reaction to pure form from our reaction to its implied associated ideas.’53 The advantage of looking at art that way is that those who have no knowledge of the content of the religious ‘idea’ can experience pleasure when seeing Giotto’s fresco. It is a question here of lines and colours; it is the design that is important, and whatever ‘idea’ it may represent is inconsequential. The influential American art critic Clement Greenberg (1909-1994) was the most consistent in his formalism. If it is a question of pure form, then abstract art is the most suited medium for that. This was Greenberg’s view in his formalistic commentary on American Abstract Expressionism after the Second World War.54 Clive Bell’s Formalism as a Religion of Art We can see how formalism merges with a religion of art in one of the English formalists, Clive Bell in his classic Art (1913).55 Bell considers the significant form the common quality of all works of art: viewing a work of art has to do with seeing its significant form. In each work of art, ‘lines and colours combined in a particular way, certain forms and relations of forms, stir our aesthetic emotions’ (5). Paintings with an almost photographic reproduction of the world meet the demand of significant form the least. Given his theory, Bell cannot view them as art. In contrast, primitive art and the work of Cézanne, Picasso, and Matisse do meet Bell’s view of art as significant form (18; 94-95; 102-103). The artist does not look at things as objects (a chair as something to sit on) but as ‘pure forms’, ‘as ends in themselves’ (23). With Kant, Bell holds that art entails disinterestedness: It is the form of a work of art that arouses our disinterested interest and gives us joy in our aesthetic emotion. If art is viewed formalistically, it can itself become a religion. The pure form, beauty viewed in itself, becomes the highest value. In this view, the aesthetic experience when looking at art thus coincides in a certain way with religious experience. Bell argues for art as a religion (30, 35, 38, 41). According to this view, art is not inspired by existing religions nor is it an element of one (61) – that would be in conflict with this aesthetic view of art, with art for art’s sake. It would entail mixing two separate spheres: that of autonomous art and that of organised religion. 53 54

R. Frye, Vision and Design, note 92, cited by Prettejohn, Beauty and Art, chapter 4. Prettejohn, Beauty and Art, 184 (180-191); A.C. Danto, After the End of Art, chap-

ter 4. 55

The references in the text are to this edition of Bell, Art.

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Contemplation of the pure form is a separate world and exists detached ‘from the concerns of life’ (30). Thus, one looks at a work of art for its pure form. It is the formal characteristics that bring about an aestheticreligious emotion in us. Bell’s religion of art as part of the ‘Grand Narrative’ of modern art can still play a role for some even now, especially for those who are looking for an alternative to organised religion.56 1.5.2 The Decline of the ‘Grand Narrative’ of Art Belting speaks of ‘the end of the history of art’. By that he means that this view of art – the ‘Grand Narrative’ of art – had already become implausible early in the twentieth century. And that happened first of all through developments in the field of art itself. Allow me to point out in passing that art history as a historical discipline also gradually changed over the course of the twentieth century. It was also in reaction to the very influential style analysis approach that iconology arose. Iconology studies the content of a work by means of contemporary literary products. In this way, Erwin Panofsky (1892-1962) studied not only Italian Renaissance art but also early Dutch painting.57 Despite the fact that he had many followers, he came under severe criticism.58 Panofsky saw visual arts as part of culture, and he also wanted to talk about the content of a work of art. He viewed the work of art as a vehicle for worldviews and political views.59 Nevertheless, Panofsky’s approach to art history leaves no room for the uniqueness of art with Christian themes: the invisible that does not show itself in a visual way in the visible.60 The relic (the indexical sign) is usually not an object of research in art history. In religious art, in addition to the image as iconic sign, the image as indexical sign is important, as we will see (6.4.2; 9.2; 10.3).61

Something revolutionary was happening in art itself. Marcel Duchamp came on the scene with his readymades like his Fountain (1917). This is 56 Former evangelical Christians who see art as a replacement for the faith they have left behind are an example of this (F.S. Francis, When Art Disrupts Religion). 57 E. Panofsky, Studies in Iconology; E. Panofsky Meaning in the Visual Arts. E. Panofsky, Early Netherlandisch Painting. M.A. Holly, Panofsky and the Foundations of Art History. 58 B. Bakker, Landscape and Religion from Van Eyck to Rembrandt. I am citing from the Dutch edition, Landschap en Wereldbeeld, 90-91; 287f.; G. Didi-Huberman, Devant l’Image, chapter 3. 59 Panofsky, Early Netherlandisch Painting. 60 G. Didi-Huberman, Devant l’Image, chapter 3. 61 For the negligent treatment of the image as indexical sign (l’empreinte) in art history, see G. Didi-Huberman, La Ressemblance par contact. For art history in general, see D. Preziosi, The Art of Art History.

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a urinal of white porcelain, with ‘R. Mutt’ on it, which Duchamp submitted as a work of art for an exhibition. Exhibiting factory-made objects in a museum goes directly against the grain of the traditional view of art.62 The Dadaism of Tristan Tzara, Hans Arp, and Hugo Ball rebelled against a concept of art as such and strove for a renewed spirituality.63 Politically and culturally, Europe was changing, and Eurocentrism, of which the ‘Grand Narrative’ of (Western) art was an expression, came to an end. This ‘Grand Narrative’ saw itself as universally valid, thus also valid for other cultures. This ‘end of the history of art’ does not mean that the subject ‘art history’ no longer has anything to teach; rather, it has to do with the end of the view of art as the history of style detached from general history.64 The American philosopher Arthur Danto was writing in the United States about the end of art at the same time as Belting. He emphasised as well that the end of art did not entail that painting had been exhausted. For him and Belting, the ‘death of art’ meant that the ‘old narrative’ had ended. Contemporary art is not the next chapter in that narrative.65 The philosopher G.W.F. Hegel (1770-1831) already spoke of the end of art.66 Although there are points of contact with Belting’s view, Hegel’s is more radical. He sees art as ‘the pure appearance of the Idea to sense’.67 The high point of art was in Greek antiquity. That is, classical art is to be viewed as a reconciliation of the idea and its sensory appearance.68 Since then, according to Hegel, art has become a matter for philosophy; it is now a matter of reflection. While art once provided truth via sensory presentation, that means of conveying truth has now become outdated, and truth is now the concern of the mind and philosophy. In the process of the Mind’s becoming self-conscious, art goes beyond itself and becomes philosophy. Therefore, art now belongs to the past. That is how Hegel’s statement that ‘we have got beyond venerating works of art as divine and worshipping them’69 is to be understood. Religious art is also outdated. The core of Hegel’s view is that the question of truth can no longer be a concern for art because we are beyond the level of the representation (through art). That is debatable, as Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer have 62 Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 171. For Duchamp’s readymade as an indexical sign, see G. Didi-Huberman, La Ressemblance par contact, Part Three. 63 F. Bosman & T. Salemink, Avant-garde en religie. See also the texts of Duchamp and those of Ball, Tzara, and Huelsenbeck on Dada in C. Harrison and P. Wood, Art in Theory 1900-2000, 250-263. 64 Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 123, 121. 65 Danto, After the End of Art, 3-4. 66 G.W.F. Hegel, Hegel’s Aesthetics, 593, 611, 9-11. 67 ‘[D]as sinnliche Scheinen der Idee’, Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Ästhetik, I, 151; Hegel’s Aesthetics, 111. 68 Hegel, Hegel’s Aesthetics, 427-501. 69 Hegel, Hegel’s Aesthetics, 10.

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shown.70 As we will see below (10.2.2), truth certainly does remain a concern of art. Hegel, moreover, denies that the image has any unique status over against the word, over against language. Something will be lost if the image has to yield to the concept (see below, 11.2).

A certain history of art does end, but (the production of) art does not stop. Art does not end but takes different paths, as evident in Duchamp, Dadaism, and Andy Warhol. If we look at Duchamp’s Fountain, we are immediately aware that aesthetic plays no role here. To view this exhibited factory product as a work of art raises the question of what art is: ‘Is this a work of art?’ Art becomes reflection about art; it becomes ‘conceptual art’. One can also think here of Warhol’s Brillo Boxes. Years later, Duchamp said the following about works like his Fountain: ‘The choice of these “readymades” was never dictated by an aesthetic delectation. This choice was based on a reaction of visual indifference with at the same time a total absence of good or bad taste …’.71 This example makes clear that art history as a description of the development of style in the various art movements hardly applies to much of art that has been produced since the 1970s.72 An exhibition made that clear to me. In the spring of 2018 there was an exhibition called Être modern: le MoMA à Paris in the museum Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris. It exhibited nineteenth- and twentieth-century art from the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, whereby one could follow developments in style. Suddenly, in the last part of the twentieth century, there was a noticeable difference. The last rooms displayed modern and contemporary art in which it was no longer possible to point to a specific, recognisable style. The fact that the visual art exhibited had been expanded by new media like photography, film, videos or other forms of art like installation art, performance art, light art, and land art also played a role in this development. Current visual art shows quite different objects, depending on the medium or the arrangement in an exhibition area. Art can no longer be reduced one-sidedly to artistic form, as the contemplation of an aesthetic object. Monroe Beardsley’s aesthetic definition of a work of art – ‘An artwork is something produced with the intention of giving it the capacity to satisfy the aesthetic interest’ – is no longer convincing.73 Art now functions in many social practices with different interests, as Wolterstorff 70 71 72 73

M. Heidegger, Der Ursprung des Kunstwerkes; H.-G. Gadamer, Ende der Kunst?. Cited in Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 282. Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 58. M.C. Beardsley, An Aesthetic Definition of Art, 58.

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demonstrates in his Art Rethought. Art can be memorial art, such as Holocaust art, or protest art as an expression of social criticism, or conceptual art in which the idea is prominent. It can also be religious art.74 Modern Art: Modern Medieval This chapter started with the religious image before the beginning of art. In the rest of this study we will be looking at the religious image after the ‘end of the history of art’. Because of the changed concept of art, the relationship between art and the religious image of organised religions such as Christianity does not have to exhibit the type of conflict like the one that existed during the time of the ‘Grand Narrative’ of art. In his Medieval Modern, Alexander Nagel goes a step further than Belting and Wolterstorff and argues that, ‘after the end of the history of art’, the changed concept of art brings to the fore another history of art that goes back to the history of the image before the Renaissance.75 Since the 1960s, there has been a close connection with image forms that were widespread before the Renaissance. In addition to the renewed interest in the indexical sign in Duchamp and others, Nagel also points to installations, environments, collages, and serial works. Before the museum and the art gallery, it was not the easel painting but installation art that was the norm. In the Middle Ages, ‘genuine spaces’ like chapels were constructed. One can also point to tomb architecture and home decoration. Warhol put an end to the emphasis on the ‘unique’ in the ‘original’ work of art through his serial works like his Last Suppers. Repetition and the making of replicas were also done in the premodern history of religious images, and that still holds true for the Eastern Orthodox icon tradition. The image is seen as a replaceable vehicle that conveys content. In brief, modern and religious art as the practice of visual religiosity does not only have to do with paintings, with images as iconic signs. We also discuss images as indexical signs in this book in connection with Sandoval and Thek (6.3; 6.4.2). The following question is important, especially in connection with painting. Does our critique of the formalistic-aesthetic view entail that we are done with the aesthetic as such in art and in the viewing of art?

74 Wolterstorff speaks of ‘the arts as social practices’. He discusses ‘memorial art’, ‘art for veneration’, ‘social protest art’, ‘art that enhances (work songs)’, and the ‘art-reflexive art’ (Art Rethought, 123-303). 75 For this and what follows, see A. Nagel, Medieval Modern, 18-20.

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1.5.3 The Functional-Aesthetic Art Image Now that we have seen how the autonomous concept of art has been weakened and the notion of the aesthetic ‘as the beautiful form of the artwork in itself’ is no longer dominant, I will return to the question I posed above. How can the aesthetic have a function in modern and contemporary art with Christian themes? The Greek word aisthēsis means sensory perception or sensation. The term aesthetics was used for the first time by A.G. Baumgarten (1714-1762) to indicate a separate philosophical discipline that was concerned not only with the reflection on art but also on the beauty of nature and everyday reality. Kant’s classic work Critique of Judgement is an example of that. Although interest in the aesthetics of nature has increased once again since the 1960s,76 aesthetics is still viewed primarily as part of philosophy or theology, i.e., as in this study as philosophy or theology of art (1). Aesthetics is also a part of art history and the study of visual culture. As part of literary studies, aesthetics is directed at the study of style and elements of expression like composition, form, and transference (2). Aesthetics was viewed in Romanticism and by Kierkegaard (see Kierkegaard’s Either/Or) as existential aesthetics, giving expression to the ideal of living life poetically (3).

In what follows in this study, I will describe and discuss works of art from the perspective that they receive their meaning within a religious practice. In that context the aesthetic aspect of religious art is also important to the extent that the images function as iconic signs. This has to do, after all, not with pictograms or an illustration that takes the place of a text, but with works of art. A pictogram only gives the ‘what’ but not the ‘how’ of an event.77 The latter can be seen in a painting such as Pontormo’s Visitation [Fig. 2.11], which depicts expressively the story of the encounter of Mary and Elizabeth. It concerns art images that are iconic signs. In his description of the changed and now fragmented concept of art, Belting – who proclaims the end of the traditional view of art – has little to say about the beautiful and the question of aesthetic form. Wolterstorff, who speaks about the decreased influence of the ‘Grand Narrative’, considers beauty to be of no importance with respect to the art of a social practice.78 In contrast, others detect a return of beauty in art and 76 M. Budd, Aesthetics of Nature, 117-135; see also the articles on ‘Nature’ in M. Kelly (ed.), Encyclopedia of Aesthetics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 3, 338-349. 77 I do not hereby deny that pictograms also exist in the Christian tradition. In late antiquity and the early Christian tradition the pictographic style was used in the catacombs (E. Gombrich, The Image & the Eye, 88-89). 78 Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 321.

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the viewing of art in the last quarter of the previous century.79 The painter Henk Helmantel shows how beauty is a value in itself, as we will see [Fig. 11.83; 11.84]. The title of a small work by the philosopher Gadamer, Die Aktualität des Schönen (1977) (The Relevance of the Beautiful), is very telling in this context. If the aesthetic is an aspect of much religious art, it cannot then be viewed in a formalistic sense, as Clive Bell did. Following Gadamer, I will look at the aesthetic in a functional way, as the form of an artwork in connection with the content of such a work. I described the aesthetic in visual art in the Introduction as follows: how something looks can give us joy or arouse our admiration because the form fits the content. Paintings by Van Gogh [Fig. 4.22; 4.23] or Helmantel’s still lifes can give us joy through their beauty. That is not the case with Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) [Fig. 6.51] or Sutherland’s Crucifixion (1946) [Fig. 6.50]. One does not respond with ‘That’s beautiful.’ The aesthetic value they express is a different one than beauty. Both are fascinating paintings and evoke our admiration for the chosen form that fits well with the content of the work of art. In what follows in this study I will go deeper into the functional-aesthetic (10.2.2) and the aesthetic concepts (10.2.3). The depiction of human beings and the world requires more aesthetic concepts than just the beautiful. The sublime, the delicate, the surreal, the terrifyingexpressive are aesthetic concepts that are important for religious art. Is art a problem? Is there a conflict between the sacred image and art? The answer given in this chapter is that this depends on the concept of art that is used. Through the decline (or, according to Belting, even the end) of the concept of art as autonomous, there is room for art as a social practice. One such practice is the religious in which art with Christian themes is operative.

79

Prettejohn, Beauty and Art, 193-204.

2. IS GOD THE PROBLEM?

2.1 Introduction In addition to art possibly being a problem for religiously motivated art, God can be a problem for such art as well. Since 1999, there have been a number of exhibitions on art and religion, and the curators of these exhibitions often say that they themselves are not religious but do see religion as important for art.1 One of their intentions in having these exhibitions is to show the ongoing influence of religious art on contemporary secular art. An example of the latter is the exhibition The Problem of God (2015) in Düsseldorf that, according to the curator Isabelle Malz, did not display any religious art but non-religiously motivated art that uses religious themes.2 The exhibition contained many artworks that entered into a dialogue with the visual legacy of Christianity. To speak in terms of a visual legacy suggests that there is no longer any art that is inspired by the Christian faith. It is precisely that point that the French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy makes. He argues this on the grounds that God is absent from this world and the image can no longer refer to a God outside this world. I will first look at the exhibition The Problem of God and then at Nancy’s claim about the end of Christian art.

2.2 The Problem of God: An Exhibition in Düsseldorf (2015) In the early period of Christianity, as well as later, emerging Christian art made use of the visual language of Hellenistic art. Thus, the Hermes figure served as a model of the Christ figure as the good shepherd, and the god Jupiter lent his form to Christ as Pantocrator in the apses of old Christian churches in Italy and elsewhere. The exhibition in Düsseldorf shows a reverse movement: contemporary artists make use of the impressive old Christian visual language in their art for a non-religious purpose. 1 Alexandrova made this comment in her discussion of twelve exhibitions in the period from 1999 to 2010 (A. Alexandrova, Dis-Continuities, 287). 2 I. Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 311.

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Images have often been reused throughout the history of art. The art historian and culture theorist Aby Warburg (1866-1929) pointed out that images can outlive their times if their meanings are transformed. It should be remembered that artworks from antiquity were reused in the Renaissance, and their meanings changed as a result. Artworks are thus vehicles of a cultural memory, which entails transformations, shifts, and revisions. We can see a continuity of the visual image there, but at the same time there is also discontinuity because of change, because of a transformation of their meaning.3 That is also what we saw in Belting in the previous chapter, although the issue there was the sacred image in the Renaissance. The exhibition in Düsseldorf in 2015, The Problem of God, was organised by the art project of the German Bishops’ Conference on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Second Vatican Council. The title of the exhibition was borrowed from a work by Pavel Büchler, The Problem of God (2007), which shows an old theological book that Büchler had found. He had inserted a magnifying glass between the pages that magnified the word INVISIBLE in mirror-image. According to Malz, the curator of the exhibition, Büchler thus indicates the problem regarding metaphysics: ‘That which is invisible, that which cannot be represented resists ever being fundamentally present’.4 Here Malz refers to Jean-Luc Nancy’s ‘deconstruction of Christianity’. The works in this exhibition were selected to show ‘religious themes in non-religiously inspired art’. Contemporary artists apparently find the Christian image language of great value and use that language, even if their works are not religiously inspired. This is because the long tradition of art inspired by Christianity is determinative for the tradition of the image in the West. The image of Christ on the cross has become a paradigm for the visual expression of suffering by violence and the pietà for those suffering from grief at the loss of loved ones. Christian elements and rituals now function as universal symbols, separate from their original context. Malz writes in the exhibition catalogue: The exhibition shows how forms and symbols, derived from a Christian visual language and now part of our collective memory of images and texts, are found in the works of contemporary artists, albeit with a new complexity and ambiguity. None of these positions could be claimed as examples of religiously motivated art; on the contrary, they are representative of many

3 4

Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 312. Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 312.

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works in art today that draw on Christian elements and rituals … as universal symbols that are now detached from their original context.5

Alena Alexandrova explores this view both in her contribution to the catalogue and in her book Dis-Continuities: The Role of Religious Motifs in Contemporary Art. The ‘return of religion’ to our society does not, according to Alexandrova, entail a return of religion in its positive form.6 Contemporary artists are using religious iconography in their work, but it no longer serves a religious purpose. It is art as dialogue with the visual legacy of Christianity:7 The twentieth century saw the detachment of spiritual expressions from organised religion and their reintegration within art. Religious iconography did not disappear, but changed its role within art. Artists gradually reused it, but in a very different way compared to those who chose or were commissioned to create art for religious purposes or with a religious function.8

Alexandrova is ‘not so much interested in how the divine is expressed in art but in the re-mediation of religious motifs in contemporary artworks’.9 The concern in this view is the use of religious themes in secular, nonreligiously motivated art. Let us look at Corpse II (1999) and Lying Man (2014) [Fig. 2.7; 2.8] by Paloma Varga Weisz at the The Problem of God exhibition.10 Corpse II depicts a dead woman lying in a small niche in a wall; Lying Man shows a dead man, laid out on a cloth, with his arms and legs separated from his torso. The artist uses a technique here that makes the bodies of the man and woman shine. The colours of both works also remind us of Holbein’s painting, The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb (1521-1522). The first work, Corpse II, differs from Holbein’s in that the body of the woman shows no signs of torture. Her body is emaciated. The second, that of the man, does show signs of violence through the arms and legs being detached from the torso. Because the man is lying on a cloth, it seems as if he had only just died as a result of violence. The works raise questions: How do we frame death? Do we bring it into connection with the resurrection, as Holbein’s painting of the dead Christ does, or not? Both Corpse II and Lying Man focus our attention 5

Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 311. Alexandrova, Dis-Continuities, 263. 7 Alexandrova, Dis-Continuities, 286. 8 Alexandrova, Dis-Continuities, 263; Alexandrova, After Images, in Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 324. 9 Alexandrova, Dis-Continuities, 5-6. 10 Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 23-24, 118-121. 6

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on death. The theme of Christ in the grave, to which the niche in which the woman is lying also points, has been given a secular meaning and has been taken out of the original context of Holy Saturday in Holbein’s painting. Is death then to be seen as a sign of transience as in the case of the woman? Or is the death the result of violence that is deeply anchored in society, as seems to be the case with the man? Another example is Katharina Fritsch’s Display Stand with Madonnas (1987-1989) [Fig. 2.9].11 This work consists of plaster replicas of Madonna figures such as ‘Our Lady of Lourdes’. The colour chosen (canary yellow) and the context of the display stand clearly takes the recognisable Madonna figure out of its religious context. Reproductions are not a problem in the devotional image culture, given the many reproductions of ‘Our Lady of Lourdes’. A cult image or an icon differ in this respect from an art image, insofar as authenticity is considered indispensable for the latter. Fritsch seems to pose the question as to whether her work is indeed art. Can replicas be art? 2.3 Jean-Luc Nancy: The End of Christian Art The philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy believes that, as an organized religion, Christianity has had its day and, as a corollary to that, ‘Christian’ painting has come to the end of the road.12 He gives new meaning to traditional Christian art outside of its traditional meaning. Nancy’s philosophy gives his interpretation of what, since Nietzsche, has been called the ‘death of God’. He wants, however, to avoid nihilism – in his political philosophy as well – as a possible consequence of the death of God. What he wants to show instead is the essence of Christianity that, in his view, has been lost in Christianity itself. He thus critiques the traditional Christian view of God. Nancy’s view of the art image coheres closely with his ‘deconstruction’ of Christianity. His non-religious interpretation of religion also fits this deconstruction. He does that, for example, in his interpretation of Jacopo da Pontormo’s Visitation (ca. 1528) [Fig. 2.11]. Before we look at his discussion of this work, let me first say something more about the ‘deconstruction’ of Christianity. Because Nancy writes in a somewhat cryptic way, I will cite from his work as little as possible. 11

Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 213-217. He writes: ‘“Christian” painting, by ceasing to be properly religious and cultic (in the western part of Christianity …’ (Nancy, The Ground of the Image, 125). 12

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2.3.1 The Deconstruction of Christianity In Greek antiquity, the world of human beings and nature was inhabited by many gods. Their presence was direct and effective. Nancy comments on this as follows: ‘If the gods have withdrawn, their story can no longer simply be true and their truth can no longer be told. The presence is missing ….’13 That time of the presence of the gods is over. Polytheism (the belief in many gods) gives way to belief in one God, monotheism, which occurred first among the Jews and then also among Christians and Muslims. According to the three world religions, God transcends the world and is thus invisible. In that radical transcendence, in that difference between God and the world, is found already the seed of God’s absence from the world. The monotheism of especially Christianity has produced a trend towards a/theism. By that Nancy means that God’s presence is absent. What applies to the gods also applies to the biblical God: One day, the gods withdraw. They withdraw of themselves from their divinity, that is, from their presence. What remains of their presence is whatever remains of any presence that has become absent: what remains is what people can say about it.14

We can no longer refer to God as a person outside this world. Monotheism needs to be conceived strictly from within this world. This concerns an absent presence. ‘God’ represents an absence that lives in the heart of presence. That things are present for us is only possible because of the fact that, at the same time, that presence contains something hidden.15 Nancy works this out by means of the method of deconstruction, a method that his teacher Derrida and Heidegger before him had already used, each in his own way. By the deconstruction of monotheism – limiting himself here to Christianity – Nancy understands the dismantling of elements that make up Christianity in order to discover what made their construction possible. Nancy wants to find an element that lies beyond monotheism. Christianity, he holds, appears to contain a hidden atheism,16 and he wants to show that this deconstructing atheism is a structural element in the Christianity 13 Nancy, Op een dag trekken de goden zich terug, in: I. Devisch et al. (ed.) Jean-Luc Nancy: De kunst van het denken, 72-73 (J.-L. Nancy, ‘Un jour les dieux se retirent …’, Bordeaux: William Blake & Co, 2001). 14 Nancy, Op een dag trekken de goden zich terug, 72. 15 According to M. De Kesel in an explanation of ‘God’ as absent presence in an email to me (11-1-2019). 16 Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 32, 148.

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that is constantly constructing itself. Through his deconstruction he wants to show that God differs so radically from the world that the world has become empty of God. We can no longer speak of his presence in the world. Nancy relies on, among other things, an idea stemming from the French philosopher and historian Marcel Gauchet in his book Le désenchantement du monde (1985). Gauchet pointed to a certain theology in Western Christianity that viewed God as radically different from the world. It is precisely that aspect that advanced the secularisation, the disenchantment, of the world: Christianity as ‘the religion of the egress from religion’.17 Nancy gives an a/theistic interpretation of two core givens of the Christian faith: creation and incarnation (God becoming human in Jesus Christ).18 The heart of Nancy’s deconstruction is that God has withdrawn from his presence in the world. At the creation of the world, God converges with the world. With respect to the incarnation, he says that God empties himself radically and cannot be viewed as a ‘God in heaven’. This God that is seen as an ‘opposite’ to humans and the world, as Christianity (and also Judaism and Islam) speaks about God – this God is ‘dead’. Any reference to a reality beyond this reality is also excluded: the only reality is that of the world itself. This deconstruction entails that the world – in the phenomenological sense, as something that presents itself to us as the whole of phenomenality – is only possible because of the structural given that that phenomenality is not exhausted in its event, that something withdraws from its appearing. In other words, the appearing ‘itself’ remains hidden. Nancy’s deconstruction of Christianity is at the same time a deconstruction of classical metaphysics, the philosophical doctrine of being, with its view of another world (above or behind this one) and the argument for a first cause of the world. The rejection of Christianity also entails the rejection of this metaphysics. Because Nancy’s theory of the religious image is closely aligned with his view of creation and incarnation, I will now explore the latter two aspects in more depth. Creation as Opening Monotheism – the belief in one God – means that God is invisible. ‘No one has ever seen God’ (John 1:8). Nancy himself considers the word ‘invisible’ less suitable for the one God: God is ‘not so much 17

Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 146. For Nancy’s deconstruction of the resurrection, see his Noli me tangere: On the Raising of the Body. 18

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invisible (in the sense of hidden) as non-appearing’.19 In his view, therefore, there is no model by which a painter can depict God. Nancy typifies the Christian art of the icon (broadly viewed as painting up until Giotto) as follows: The art of the icon is the art of a negative and apophatic (saying no) theology. It is an art that denies that it represents what it presents. The icon displays the invisible. It is actually not visible, but the presence of the invisible …. The invisible god is not simply situated too far from our own eyes: he is invisible in and of himself (italics mine).

By way of example, let us look at Rublev’s The Holy Trinity, which we will discuss more extensively below (4.2.1). Rublev chose the story of the three strangers who visited Abraham (Genesis 18) as the model for his well-known icon of the Trinity. He portrays the three figures as three angels, as representatives of God. That is not possible, according to Nancy, not only because God is invisible but primarily because God could not have appeared to Abraham at all. This is because – as Nancy argues in his discourse on creation – God does not appear. Rather, he is the name for the non-appearing that is the condition of possibility for appearing.20 God does not precede creation; God empties himself in the act of creation. He withdraws in his act of creation, and this act of withdrawal enables the opening of the world.21 ‘God destroys himself as a “self”, as a separate being, in order to “withdraw” in his act, which makes the opening of the world possible’. Let me explain the notion of ‘creation as withdrawal’ and what Nancy means by ‘creation as opening’. Anselm Kiefer depicted the creation of the world in his work Zim Zum (1990), a rendering of the Jewish kabbalistic doctrine of zimzum. Mark Taylor explains Kiefer’s Zim Zum in the way that Nancy speaks of creation, as a ‘nonabsent absence … that is always a lack’. This lack is ‘shocking for all who desire presence of the fulfilment of the coming of salvation’.22 For Nancy, creation is not an act of a personal God but a 19

For this and the following quote see Nancy, Rappel (de blik van het portret), 19. I am borrowing this formulation from De Kesel (email to me, 11 January, 2019). 21 Nancy writes: ‘The unique God, whose unicity is the correlate of the creating act, cannot precede its creation any more that it can subsist above it or apart from it in some way. It merges with it: merging with it, it withdraws in it, and withdrawing there it empties itself there, emptying itself it is nothing other than the opening of this void. Only the opening is divine, but the divine is nothing more than the opening’ (Nancy, The Creation of the World, 70). 22 For Taylor’s explanation, see my Where Heaven and Earth Meet, 168-170. Nancy refers to the kabbalistic teaching of zimzum in his The Creation of the World, 70. 20

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dissolving of God into creation: ‘Only the opening is divine, but the divine is nothing more than the opening.’23 Nancy speaks of creation as the opening of the world. That word ‘opening’ refers to the fact that, as people, we can live in a world in which we are able to orient ourselves; the world has been disclosed for us. But that is a world without God’s presence or a backworld (Hinterwelt) behind this one.24 This world is everything there is. It appears because of what withdraws from what remains hidden in the appearing. The latter is the appearing ‘itself’. Christianity turned that into a substance, a God. Nancy rejects that: ‘God’ is the hidden facet of the appearing itself. It is in that sense that the truth of Christianity is not transcendent but immanent, not spiritual but material. The act of creation is an opening out of nothing, just a beginning and not the beginning that a creator would cause. This entails the rejection of thinking in terms of an origin, a first cause in the way that metaphysics and monotheistic religion conceive of God as creator. ‘The opening is neither the foundation nor the origin.’25 Nancy maintains therefore that the world appears without God as creator and without a model. He interprets the incarnation in a similar fashion. Incarnation: Self-Emptying In its view of the image, the Byzantine church always understood that God is invisible and that God can only be depicted because Christ is the image of the invisible God (Col. 1:15). Nancy explains the incarnation, God’s becoming human, similarly to how he views creation. He makes use of Paul’s statement about the emptying of Christ: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. (Philippians 2:6-7)

Nancy explains God’s emptying as a surrendering of himself. Just as God withdraws from his presence and does not appear, so he also empties himself in the incarnation. This means that the classical view of the icon of Christ as a (re)presentation of the God who became human is no longer valid. The incarnation concerns a God whose act consists in the 23 24 25

Nancy, The Creation of the World, 70. Nancy, The Creation of the World, 70; Dis-Enclosure, 2. Nancy, The Creation of the World, 70.

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alienation of himself, in emptying himself.26 God makes himself into a ‘body’ by emptying himself. ‘The “body” becomes the name of the a-theos in the sense of “not-of-god”. … The “body” of the “incarnation” is therefore the place, or rather the taking place, the event of that disappearance [of God]’ (83). In other words, through becoming a body, God disappears. For Nancy, that does not mean that the human being can now take the place of God; it means, rather, that the human being no longer has ‘any foundational presence’. At its core, monotheism is the disappearance of presence. If Paul spoke of Christ as the image of God, in Nancy’s explanation of the incarnation, the body, incarnates nothing else after the incarnation than the lack of a model for creation.27 The Disappearance of Divine Presence Nancy deconstructs monotheism by means of the Christian view of God. Monotheism entails the disappearance of divine presence from the world. It does not only entail an end to the presence of many gods, those of the Greeks and of all peoples who are polytheists. Rather, because monotheism dismantles itself, divine absence from the world also holds for the biblical God. Nancy calls his position absent-theism28 to distinguish it from atheism. He conceives of the divine as immanent. The human world has an ‘opening’: God empties himself as God in the incarnation. That coheres closely with Nancy’s search for the ‘other dimension’ of Christianity (‘not being of the world’). He understands this to mean that God is non-appearing. God is, after all, as stated above, the name for the non-appearing that is the condition for the possibility of appearing. Nancy considers his analysis to be the self-deconstruction of (Jewish and) Christian monotheism. Their self-deconstruction has, in his view, prepared ‘the simultaneous evaporation of all divine presences and powers, and the designation of a principle that no longer has as “divine” anything but the name …’.29 Given this ‘simultaneous evaporation of all divine presences and powers’, Christian art is no longer an option. Christian art presupposes a (re)presentation of God or Christ in an art image. 26

For this and the following, see Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 82-83. A. Alexandrova, The Auto-Deconstructive Image, 330. 28 Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 18 29 Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 21. For the demythologisation of prayer by Nancy, see; A. van Rooden, ‘My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?’ Demythologized Prayer; or, the Poetic Invocation of God, in: A. Alexandrova et al. (ed.), Re-treating Religion, 189-202. 27

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Most theological theories of the image speak of a presence of God or Christ in the image, as we shall see below (chapters 8 and 9). Nancy considers this to be wrong. His own theory of the image coheres closely with the deconstruction of creation and incarnation. 2.3.2 The Materiality of the Presence of the Image The image is always sacred, according to Nancy. This is what distinguishes it from religion as adhering to a set of religious customs that maintain a bond with God. ‘Sacred’ is not viewed here in a religious sense but in a secular sense. The etymological root of the word ‘distinct’ is important in this context: ‘distinct’ as something that is separated from other things by marks, that has been withdrawn and set apart.30 The image is distinct, set apart, in three ways: The image is distinct from things and from living beings.31 It is set apart by a line or brushstroke. That is what distinguishes it from what is present in our everyday world of things. It is distinguished from the imageless ground from which it has been separated. That differentiates it from the background against which the image emerges.32 The image makes something present, shows something. What is the relation between the image and what it images? One can think here of René Magritte’s statement about a painting he had made of a pipe on which he wrote, ‘Ceci n’est pas une pipe’ (This is not a pipe). Nancy interprets this as follows: the thing (such as the painted pipe) is presented on the painting only insofar as it resembles itself and says about itself: ‘I am this thing.’33 With this, Nancy already says something about the image in relation to what it depicts. That is apparent from the following point. Nancy formulates his specific view of the image as a third means of distinction. By showing something, the image at the same time shows itself. Nancy puts all the emphasis on that showing of itself: [The image] distinguishes itself insofar itself as it designates itself as an image. It always says, simultaneously, ‘I am this, a flower’, and ‘I am an imaged flower, or a flower-image.’ I am not, it says, the image of this or that, as if I were its substitute or copy, but I image this or that, I present its absence, that is, its sense.34 30 31 32 33 34

Nancy, The Nancy, The Nancy, The Nancy, The Nancy, The

Ground Ground Ground Ground Ground

of of of of of

the the the the the

Image, Image, Image, Image, Image,

2. 70. 7. 8-9. 70.

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The image does not only present something like a flower but also the absence of what it depicts. The image is everything.35 We usually understand (re)presentation in such a way that the image refers to what it depicts. It is an image of this or that. Nancy disputes this: ‘I am not, [the image] … says, the image of this or that … I present its absence …’.36 Alexandrova clarifies how this view of the image as the presence of absence is an effect of the withdrawal of the monotheistic God and of the view of the world without God as creator: If representation is to be understood as a presentation of an open absence that is informed by the motif of the withdrawal of God, then the image, or the ‘distinct’, as he calls it, is related to the Christian motif of a God who withdraws from all religion, a God whose incarnation, becoming a body, in fact marks the disappearance of God, giving way to images. Then the ‘religious’ image figures not a transcendent invisibility but the body of a man and the world as it is … it is the world itself, without model or origin.37

The image presents itself in its materiality. That obtains not only for religious art such as an icon of Christ. It also holds true for portraiture in general. A portrait always contains the fundamental feature of the icon in that it shows the presence of the absence of what is portrayed. It is the trace of the absent person. Every portrait, Nancy says, ‘plays in a singular way the impossible portrait of God, his withdrawal and attraction’.38 I understand this in the following way: the portrait does not make the absent present but shows the presence of its absence. For Nancy, all the emphasis comes to lie on the image in its materiality and thus on presence as such, separate from representation, from reference to something or someone. An example can be found in the video work of Bill Viola who often uses Christian visual language. His The Quintet of the Astonished (2000) shows four men and one woman with their intense emotions for 15 minutes [Fig. 2.10].39 The slow-motion technique he uses allows him to show this very intensely. Each displays a strong emotion using a gesture and facial expression. Viola freely uses, among others, Hieronymus Bosch’s Christ Crowned with Thorns (ca. 1510) in which Jesus and his mockers are portrayed with their suggestive facial 35 ‘And there is nothing − just the open space from which the image might come, from which it promised to come. But when the image comes, it is everything, it takes up the whole place, it is wholly there’ (Nancy, The Birth to Presence, 358). 36 See note 34; for representation, see also Nancy, The Ground of the Image, 36 (27-50). 37 Alexandrova, Distinct Art, 287. 38 Nancy, Rappel, 18. 39 Malz (ed.), The Problem of God, 146-147.

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expressions. Bosch provides a narrative image of the soldiers who mocked Jesus prior to his crucifixion. This kind of reference is lacking in Viola’s work. We are not shown the reason for the intense emotions of these five people. All emphasis is placed on the materiality of the video image: Viola produces an image of human emotions as such. This video image can say about itself – to paraphrase Nancy: ‘I am not, [the image] … says, the emotion image of this or that as if I were its substitute or copy, but I image this or that, I present its absence’. 2.3.3 Pontormo’s Visitation Pontormo’s Visitation (ca. 1528) [Fig. 2.11] is a devotional painting of the pregnant Mary’s visit to Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist. The biblical story of their greeting has become famous (as the Visitation) through Elizabeth’s words directed at Mary: ‘Blessed are you among woman, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!’(Luke 1:41-42) and even more by Mary’s answer, which later became known as the Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55). Pontormo’s painting shows us the greeting of both women. They look intensely at each other, Mary with her hand on Elizabeth’s shoulder and Elizabeth’s on Mary’s hip. Their pregnant bellies almost touch. The two women behind, supposedly servants, look out at the viewer of the painting. The buildings in the background show that Pontormo has placed the scene in Florence. The painting portrays movement not only through the fact that Elizabeth is standing on her toes but also through the wrinkles in their clothing. I will skip Nancy’s description of the various interpretations of this painting and will only discuss his own non-religious interpretation of it. Nancy points to a scarcely visible detail on the painting. Far back, on the left side of the painting, are two men, one with a knife and a piece of bread and the other with a bottle. He claims that this painting thus shows the incarnation in a double way: first through the pregnant Mary and then, no less hidden, in the bread and wine of the two men in the background, referring to Jesus’ last supper, where he speaks of bread and wine as his body and blood.40 Referring to this image of bread and wine deeper in the painting, Nancy separates the painting from its reference to the greeting scene between Mary and Elizabeth. The painting presents itself in its 40

Nancy, The Ground of the Image, 113.

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materiality. Nancy writes: ‘Pontormo seems to be withdrawing bread and wine into the shadows, a bread and wine that would here become the cipher of a presence at once hidden and exposed.’ According to Nancy’s absent-theism, however, it is a withdrawal by God from his presence, a presence of absence. Here the presence is ‘hidden in its exposure’. Nancy thus continues his interpretation of this painting ‘whose only reality would be, in the end, nothing other than the painting’.41 The painting is a presence of absence; it reveals itself by showing something. In this interpretation, this painting is an example of self-deconstruction. This does away with the traditional interpretation of it as a narrative presentation, as a representation of the greeting scene from the Gospel. Referring to a fresco of the pregnant Mary by Piero dello Francesca, Madonna del Parto (1455-1465) [Fig. 2.12], Nancy comments: This painting proffers a this is my body: this is the exposure of the skin or the veil beneath which no presence is hidden and no god is waiting except to place itself, here ….42

These paintings present themselves in their materiality. They present a presence ‘in’ the painting itself, in its composition.43 With a reference to the Catholic view of Christ’s presence in the bread and wine in the Eucharist, Nancy asserts that ‘“real presence” becomes the presence that is par excellence not present: the one that is not there’.44 What is present are the lines (in the painting), in this place, though there is nothing visible or invisible elsewhere; what is present is only identical with the canvas. By figuring the image-less God, the Christian painting figures the transfiguration from the invisible divine to the power of a place, the presence of absence in this painting. We can see how, in Nancy’s interpretation of these works of art, attention shifts from what the painting refers to – the painting as a narrative representation of an event – to the painting itself, the material place. What Nancy states about the image is a recurring motif in his work: ‘I am not, [the image] says, the image of this or that as if I were its substitute or copy, but I image this or that, I present its absence ….’45 Religious art is thus interpreted as the testimony of the presence of absence.

41 42 43 44 45

Nancy, Nancy, Nancy, Nancy, Nancy,

The The The The The

Ground Ground Ground Ground Ground

of of of of of

the the the the the

Image, Image, Image, Image, Image,

116. 123. 116. 123. 70.

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2.4 Conclusion The decisive question concerning the religious image is whether ‘the invisible’ of divine reality can appear in an image. Can material images show religious transcendence? Nancy denies that on the basis of his ‘absent-theistic’ view of God. His view of the image is connected to his view of God. I will first comment on his view of the image and then on the ‘problem of God’ in connection with religious art. Image as Materiality and Presence Nancy’s view of the image, the materiality of the image and the ‘intense’ presence of the image is important. Various versions of such a view of the image as materiality and presence can be found both in theologically oriented philosophers like George Steiner and Paul Moyaert and in philosophers like Martin Seels and in literary theorists like Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht. Materiality and presence also play an important role in religious art, albeit differently than in Nancy, as we shall see below (chapters 8 and 9). Gumbrecht presents his understanding of the image as presence as an alternative for a view of the image that, according to him, placed too much emphasis on the content and the meaning of the image. Such a view does not do justice to the material character of the work of art. There is a search for a meaning, a content behind the materiality, the sensually observable aspects of the artwork. The cognitive aspect of the image suppresses the material aspect and the presence character, according to his critique. He refers approvingly to Nancy for the view that presence eludes the dimension of meaning. He cites Nancy: ‘Presence does not come without effacing the presence that representation would like to designate (its fundament, its origin, its subject)’.46 The view of image as presence has theological roots (8.5 and 9.2-6). My question concerning Nancy’s view of the image is whether this does not too easily overlook the content and meaning of the image. Nancy begins his article on Pontormo’s Visitation in an apodictic way with the assertion that art is not made to preserve a memory: ‘Art never commemorates.’47 That cuts off the possibility that, according to the usual interpretation, this painting refers to something else, something outside of it. Does this only apply to religious paintings or all paintings 46 47

H.U. Gumbrecht, Production of Presence, 57. Nancy, The Ground of the Image, 108.

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with a historical or narrative theme? Does this interpretation of painting not pay too high a price by deconstructing the representation into the image in its materiality, to a material place? Is God the Problem? Nancy summarises what is unique about Christianity when he remarks that, at heart, Christianity points to the assertion that it discloses an alterity or unconditional alienation in this world.48 That is a variation on the saying to be ‘in the world but not of the world’ (John 17:14-16). This attitude of ‘not being of the world’ presupposes an attitude of self-criticism that is found in the prophets of the Old Testament, a self-criticism that Christianity has always practised over the course of history through reform movements. Nancy’s (self-)deconstruction of Christianity is part of this tradition. He wants to identify elements within the Christian tradition that were never noticed before, such as viewing God as a name for the non-appearance that is the condition for the possibility of appearing. According to Nancy, God represents absence that dwells in the heart of presence. Nancy confirms his deconstruction of the creator-God to creation as the opening of the world over against the God of religious representation and states this dilemma: Either God empties himself of himself in the opening of the world, or God sustains himself as being, by himself, subject and substance of the world … the God of religious representation.49

Starting from a God who differs radically from this world, it is possible to imagine a world that God is absent from. That was how deism viewed God in the eighteenth century. But it did nonetheless view God as a subject and a being. Nancy rejects that. He interprets God as absent presence. There is another conceptual possibility. Nancy’s view of God is related to that of his Parisian colleague Jean-Luc Marion, who also emphasises the radical difference between God and the world, the view of radical transcendence. Marion starts from the radical difference between God and human beings and sees precisely how God is related to human beings and the world as a person and as a critical counter for the human being who has become stuck in his subjectivity and his image culture. Marion also points to the loss of presence in current Western image culture. As an 48 49

Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 10. Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 70.

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alternative for that, he presents – as we shall see in the next chapter – his view of the icon as the presence of the depicted Christ via a crossing of gazes. He thus, in my view, provides a view of the image in which presence and the content or meaning of the image are balanced. Nancy criticises the theological and philosophical language of God as a being. Is Nancy’s deconstruction not a destructive criticism?50 It is a matter of debate whether the biblical God is the same as the God of the philosophers. That is not the case in Nancy. For him, the view of God becomes a phenomenological insight that there is always something hidden in what appears as a phenomenon. Marion also points to that insight but does so precisely to clarify the way in which the invisible God shows himself (3.3). Nancy overlooks the fact that the Christian language about God relies, at its core, on testimonies to Transcendence, testimonies to the ‘presence’ of the triune God. These are the testimonies from Abraham to Paul and also from believers in the later Christian tradition. Testimonies have authority, not only in historical research but also in theology. Experiences of the triune God, also acquired in contemporary life, cannot simply be written off, provided that the testimonies to such experiences can be considered reliable.51 In Part II we will see images of God as creator, redeemer, and completer. Nancy gives us a one-sided image of religion in contemporary Western society as if it is purely secular. Charles Taylor shows in his A Secular Age that we in the West now live in an immanent framework: neither science in its research nor government in its policy appeal to supernatural intervention (whatever precisely is understood by that). But does that prevent (organised) religion from having a legitimate place in a secular age? That is the conclusion that Nancy draws. Taylor demonstrates why this is not convincing. The ascription of meaning has become pluralistic: meaning can be drawn from transcendent or secular sources. That we live in a secular time in no way entails that (organised) religion should not have a legitimate place. That is why a non-religious interpretation of religious art, although possible, is not the only possibility in a secular culture – as not only Nancy but Malz as well, the curator of the exhibition The Problem of God, seem to assert. The field of religious art has become fragmented in the secular age. There are artists who use those Christians themes for secular ends, as in Paloma Varga Weisz’ Corpse II and Lying Man or Katharina Fritsch’s 50 51

M. De Kesel, Deconstruction or Destruction?, 63-79. See my Is Faith Rational?, chapter 3.

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Display Stand with Madonnas. There are also numerous artists who provide spiritual art in the broad sense of the term, often drawing from various sources. Joseph Beuys has set the tone here, but Matthew Barney, James Turrell, Andy Goldsworthy, and many others can be mentioned here as well.52 A third stream consists of artists whose religious art is closely associated with a specific organised religion, such as Judaism (Marc Chagall), Buddhism (Antony Gormley, Anish Kapoor), or Christianity, as discussed in this book.

52 See G. Rombold, Der Streit um das Bild; M.C. Taylor, Refiguring the Spiritual; T. McEvilley, Sculpture in the Age of Doubt; A. Rosen, Art & Religion in the 21st Century.

3. IS THE IMAGE THE PROBLEM?

3.1 Introduction It is not only art or God that can constitute a problem for religious art. The image itself can also be a problem. The French philosopher Jean-Luc Marion views the image as problematic for religious art. Here he is thinking not only of the type of image that dominates TV culture but also of Western culture as whole. ‘Image’ is conceived here more broadly than image as art image and concerns any image of whatever kind. Our society is dominated by a culture of audio-visual images. The image has become detached from its origin as the representation of something. Images no longer refer to something original outside of themselves but to each other as an endless stream of images.1 Even humans seem to have turned into images to the extent that they are pre-occupied with their ‘image’, the impression that people have of them. Marion points to that crisis of the image in some modern painting as well. This crisis makes religious art impossible. If the image no longer refers to something or someone outside of the image, then it is no longer possible to produce religious art. After all, religious art is referential in nature: it refers to something in the world or to God. But is it not a problem as well for the visual arts in general, which usually refer to human beings and the world? Jean-Luc Nancy also points to the loss of the origin of the religious image and speaks of the presence of absence (2.3). Marion’s view of that is very different from Nancy’s. From Marion’s perspective, Nancy’s deconstruction of the religious image is precisely part of the image crisis. Marion provides an alternative for that crisis, for the loss of an original by means of which the image and reality coincide. He wants to show that the reality is more than images that, having no original, refer only to each other. The very different evaluations given by both philosophers of the image in the secular age rest on their different concepts of God. For Marion, it is precisely God who is the starting point; for Nancy, God is the subject of deconstruction.

1

J.-L. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, chapter 3.

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As a philosophical phenomenologist in the tradition of Edmund Husserl, Marion refers to a difference in our perception. There is often a deficiency in our perception, a limitation, and sometimes there is an excess. Our normal perception of things, what we can see of them, is usually limited. We never see all six sides of the book lying on a table before us but at most three, depending on our angle of vision. We then fill in the other sides on the basis of what we have repeatedly observed of that same book.2 Our view of the book is thus characterised by the limitation of our perception. There are, however, other phenomena that have an excess of sensory perception. They surprise and overwhelm us.3 These are very divergent phenomena. It can be as a complex historical event like the French Revolution, but it can also be a painting. Because of the intense visibility that the painter gives to the landscape, looking at a painting by Cézanne or Van Gogh teaches us to look more closely at nature than we usually do. Such an ‘excessive’ phenomenon can also occur on the personal level. One can think here of a friendship or love relationship that surprisingly gives us a great deal – the face of another in which I see ‘something’ that transcends the sensory and leads to deep contact.4 Someone can be overcome by a similar sensation if he or she looks intensely at a painted icon of Christ or a saint. An intense gaze can then be crossed with that of Christ or a saint via the icon. The icon – as the face of the other or as a sacred portrait – shows an image with an origin, with an original, the o/Other. It puts an end to my gaze that wants to control the world because I, as a viewer, am looked at by an invisible gaze. These are examples of phenomena that, each in their own way, contain a surplus (surcroît) of perception. That is why Marion speaks of ‘saturated phenomena’ (phénomènes saturés). They are given, not by but to the consciousness. They are a gift of appearing. Marion looks to the icon for the solution to the image crisis in the West. He views the term icon more broadly than as a reference to the icon as conceived in Eastern Orthodoxy. It is a concept that indicates a certain phenomenon:5 it can refer to both the face of the other that cannot be turned into an object and to the painted icon, the sacred portrait of 2

Marion, In Excess, 62-63, 104-109. For the notion of saturated phenomenon, see Marion, Being Given: Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness, chapter 1.4 and chapters 3 and 4. The Crossing of the Visible, chapter 2; In Excess, chapters 2-5. 4 Marion discusses the face of the other as a saturated phenomenon under the section ‘Icon as Saturated Phenomenon’ in In Excess, 113-123. 5 Marion, Seeing, or Seeing Oneself Seen, 317, 330. 3

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Christ, which cannot be turned into an object either. The latter is the starting point for him. Concerning the interpretation the Second Council of Nicaea (787) gave of the painted icon, he writes: The image-affirming doctrine of the Second Council of Nicaea … formulates above all an – perhaps the only – alternative to the contemporary disaster of the image.6

One can ask why he seeks a way out of the image crisis via the icon and not, for example, via a painting by Van Gogh, which, after all, also shows that reality is more than a manipulable image. We will see that Marion makes a distinction between the painting viewed as a portrait-like icon and other genres of paintings, like landscape paintings or abstract paintings. That distinction is also why he limits art with Christian themes to the portrait-like icon. I will explore the crisis in the image (3.2) and the icon as alternative (3.3). Then we will discuss the reasons why Marion sees the answer to the image crisis to lie primarily in the icon as holy portrait and not in the authentic painting in general. As we will see, his view of religiously inspired art with Christian themes will also be discussed (3.4).

3.2 The Image Crisis as the Crisis of the Visible 3.2.1 TV Culture The current audio-visual image culture has, in Marion’s view, become glutted. The image – here taken in a general sense, as is apparent from what follows – has become (the) reality itself. It has no other original or model than itself.7 TV culture shows how image and reality merge: the TV image is separated from reality as that is usually experienced, as something that does not coincide with the people themselves (or with the TV image).8 For us, reality is a matter of time and space; we live in time and space. We view time as a flow: days become weeks and weeks become months, etc. The unceasing flow of time is considered to be characteristic of the factual, actual world we live in. That view of things 6

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 87. For this and what follows, see Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, chapter 3. See also J. Baudrillard’s analysis of the contemporary image as ‘simulation’ (Baudrillard, Simulations). 8 The relation between the image and the original does continue to exist in fiction, drama, and film (Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 48). 7

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changes if the image has become the reality, and the reality has shrivelled to the image. If image and reality coincide with each other, the flow then shifts to the images we see on TV, for example. A similar kind of blurring of the distinction between the world and the flow of images applies to space as well. The images on TV come from everywhere, from places so geographically scattered that they have no connection at all with the world in which we live. We can no longer turn away from the images and go back to something outside of them to which they refer. The only reality is that of the TV screen. The image is thus identical with the screen. The screen – Marion argues – ‘produces the image according to an uninterrupted time and by covering an unlimited space that imitates that of the world, nevertheless without belonging to the world.’9 Because image and reality coincide and there is no distinction between image and thing as origin, we can no longer speak of an original that we make an image or representation of. Because there is no original outside the image, the viewer himself determines what the image is, through the requirement of his desire to look purely for the sake of looking. He does not open himself up to the gaze of the other. Here Marion outlines in a few sentences what Kierkegaard described in his Either/Or as the aesthetic stage of life, the human being without responsibility towards his or her neighbour, including love relationships.10 Marion takes up this theme of a libido vivendi again in his description of the human being. 3.2.2 The Human Being: Image as Imago The image crisis can also be found in the image that the human being makes of himself. The human being himself becomes an image when we speak about someone’s image or status. My own desire to be seen requires that I lower myself to the status of an idol, the image of my own desire and the image that others have of me. The self-as-image is conformed to the idol of the viewer, and the image is thus characterised by idolatry. Allow me to point here to the contemporary phenomenon of making selfies and sharing them with others via Facebook or Instagram. Does that not 9

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 49-50. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 50. S. Kierkegaard, Either/Or. See my The Place of Art in Kierkegaard’s Existential Aesthetics, 180-196. 10

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testify to a desire to be seen? Selfies have no embedding in a larger whole other than displaying oneself – and to whom? Marjan Slob, a philosopher and columnist for the Dutch daily, de Volkskrant, connects this phenomenon with the notion in our society that ‘God is dead’. God’s gaze of love has disappeared (Psalm 139). All the surveillance cameras in the public space notwithstanding, there is a spiritual deficiency in that no one is really looking at us (Volkskrant 17 December, 2018, p. 19).

The image becomes a screen that does not open to any world but rather closes it off.11 Everything happens on the screen where everything is seen and can be communicated, but nothing can be given or received. This human being misses any communication with whatever is outside him. Thus, there is no room any more for love, the gaze from the face of the other, no room for what is ‘invisible and real’. Marion writes: We desire to see or to be seen by only what is proportionate to our desire. Henceforth all can pass – through the screen; there on the screen is all to see and to communicate, but nothing to give or receive, since nothing persists outside the screen. The libido vivendi, which satisfies itself with the solitary pleasure of the screen, does away with the love by forbidding sight of the other face – invisible and real.12

Marion’s critique of the image in TV culture and his critique of the selfimage of the human being merge here. There is a crisis of the visible. The TV image does not refer to something beyond itself. Wherever the human being turns herself into an imago, into an image in public, everything happens on the screen that does not allow any reality beyond itself. Thus, nothing can be given or received. Marion makes it clear, primarily in his analysis of painting, that the image crisis is a crisis of the visible. 3.2.3 Painting: Making the Unseen Visible The image crisis can also be seen in painting insofar as painting can no longer perform its task of showing the unforeseen or the unseen, according to Marion. How can a painting show the unseen? Pascal states this about painting: ‘What vanity art has that draws admiration by the resemblance to things that one scarcely admires as originals!’13 That raises the question of how the painting differs from what it represents. The painter makes something visible from the world around us that no one had ever 11

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 49. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 54. 13 Cited by Marion, In Excess, 57; Courbet, 135 (Pascal, Pensées, Lafuma text edition no. 116; Brunschvicg text edition no. 340). 12

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seen before. He makes the unseen (l’invu) visible. A painting is not a reproduction, not a copy of the reality it depicts, but a likeness. That is the reason – Pascal is therefore wrong when he speaks of the vanity of painting – why we admire the painting and not the original. The painting shines so brilliantly that it goes beyond the original (in the way we usually look at it).14 To achieve that, the painter uses techniques to organise the space of the canvas. That happens in very different ways in Piero della Francesca’s Legend of the True Cross (1452-1466) [Fig. 3.13], Monet’s Water Lilies (Nymphéas) (1914-1926) [Fig. 3.14], or Malevich’s White on White (1918) [Fig. 3.15]. Each painting shows something of reality in its own way; the visible shown on the canvas also shows something invisible. The painter who wants to paint a situation from reality on a flat canvas is confronted with the relationship between the visible and the invisible.15 Renaissance painters like Piero della Francesca used perspective that – itself invisible – magnified the visibility of what was shown on the painting. Thus, in his Legend of the True Cross in Arezzo we see how perspective organises the whole into a world as visible as possible by bringing depth to it. Aside from perspective, there are also other painting techniques to make reality visible on the flat canvas. The impressionist Claude Monet places all the emphasis on the lived experience. His Water Lilies are no longer about an object the painter is aiming at but a merging of the lived experience (the observation of the water lilies in various seasons) with the visible. That is the purpose of this painting: ‘The Nymphéas inundates the eye, to the point of saturating every perception ….’16 Malevich’s suprematism, in contrast, places the emphasis on the object that is seen in the imagination. His abstract painting White on White is independent of the lived experience or the perception of the painter: ‘the pure thing, emerging from nothing else than its own invisibility’.17 Here, it is not perspective that opens up the world of the painting, as in Piero della Francesca’s work. Nor does the invisible occur, as it does in Monet, between the gaze of the painter and the visible at which this gaze is directed. Rather, it occurs in the visible itself and unites with it, insofar as the white square unites with its white base. Is that not the reason why

14 15 16 17

Marion, In Excess, 57-62. For this and what follows, see Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, chapter 1. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 15f. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 19.

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Malevich’s White on White is so obviously spoken of as an icon? As we will see, an icon also displays the invisible in the visible. Through their various techniques, these painters cause the unseen to burst open into the visible in surprising and unexpected ways.18 Something always remains invisible, as we just saw. The unseen never makes itself completely visible. Marion gives a nice description of what breaking open the visible from the unseen means.19 The true painter displays receptivity: he shows what wells up out of the unseen. After all, the painting arises out of itself. The stigmata, the half-healed wounds, of the unseen are engraved into the painting. Marion calls them ectypes, which are impressions that are internally present in the painting itself: they are not put there by the painter or the viewer of the painting. They come, rather, from outside our gaze and rise up from the background (le fond) of the painting. Because of these stigmata, the painting suddenly appears of itself (à partir de lui même). The stigmata only show the completion of the appearance whereby the original unseen remains unknown. The background (le fond) must be understood as a fund (un fonds), a hidden, underground stock of the unseen. The painter records the bursting out of the stigmata whose source (the archetype), the unseen itself, remains unknown. The painting should thus not be reduced to the visible: it is continuously charged with the vibration of the fight between stigmata and the ‘fund’, the stock of the unseen. ‘The painting offers to our terrified eyes the spectacle of a wall of the unseen, which cracks under the same pressure of the desire to appear.’20 He adds: ‘The flood of the visible overcomes it.’21 That is why Marion typifies the authentic painting as an idol, in the sense of the Greek word eidolon, the glow of the visible.22 The painting is the visible that completely saturates my gaze.23 We should remember here that the unseen never proves to be completely visible, as Marion argued above! I will use Gustave Courbet’s painting The Oak at Flagey (1864) [Fig. 3.16] as an example that Marion describes in his study Courbet: ou la peinture à l’oeil. This French painter paints human beings and nature so that they present themselves, show themselves. The painting The Oak at Flagey is not 18

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 32. For this and what follows, see Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 35-40. 20 Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 40. 21 Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 40. 22 J.-L. Marion, God Without Being, chapter 1; In Excess, 60-61, passim. The term thus has another meaning here than the negative sense of idol as the image of one’s own desire (3.2.2). 23 Marion, In Excess, 60-61. 19

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a representation of an oak but its presence. The old oak with its tangle of branches and leaves is painted in great detail. The tree makes an overwhelming impression on the viewer of the painting, taking up the whole canvas and even extends beyond its frame. The painting gives the presence of the oak not as the image of a tree but this tree ‘in person’ (en personne).24 Courbet makes what is unseen of this tree visible. This painting is an idol, a glow of the visible. It makes us aware of what true looking is in distinction from seeing.25 Courbet’s Realism Contra the Crisis of the Visible Using Courbet’s realism, Marion explains that the reality should be approached as little as possible from one’s own conceptual framework in order to be able to listen better to reality so that the unseen can better come to light. The painter therefore paints ‘by eye’ and not on the basis of a preconceived idea of the object. He succeeds in painting something by presenting it as it presents itself.26 Marion sketches the way the painter deals with reality as listening to or truly looking at it. Courbet’s painting by eye shows something that, of itself, presents itself to the painter and the viewer. The painting shows itself. If, in contrast, the painter works from a preconceived plan, then he is making an object, a product of the understanding.27 This involves the denial that the painting has to display the unseen. The painting is then the product of the orientation of the painter to an object (intentionality). Marion indicates that to be the crisis in painting today. The crisis in painting is that it no longer shows the unseen. Paintings are no longer bursting apart from showing the unseen in the visible.28 Instead of the unseen (l’invu) of reality, paintings show only the foreseen (prévu); that is, they show what the painter had thought of prior to her act of painting. In my view, Marion is generalising here to a certain extent and gives a somewhat suggestive picture of modern painting, for which Picasso serves as a negative model. He sees Picasso’s work as produced too much from the perspective of the gaze of the artist, at the expense of being open to reality and how this shows itself to him.29 Picasso is the 24 25 26 27 28 29

Marion, Courbet, 154. Marion, Courbet, 150-158; In Excess, 55-57. Marion, Courbet, 27. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 33-34. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 33-34. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 35.

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example here of the image crisis, which comes to expression in a crisis of the visible: It could be that the current crisis of painting demonstrates a crisis of the visible itself. This crisis of the visible would result from the pressure exerted upon the unforeseen appearance of the unseen in the visible by the strictly technical model of production of the visible according to the logic of anticipation (prévu).30

In short, in the current TV culture, the image has become the reality itself, the human being has reduced herself to an image of her desire, and painting no longer creates out of the unforeseen but produces works for the art market. All of this is an expression of a crisis of the visible, a crisis of the image that has no other original than itself. If only the image exists, and there is no longer any original, then existential values of life like love or religion have become impossible, just like (religious) art.

3.3 The Icon as an Alternative for the Image Crisis The central question in this image crisis as a crisis of the visible is what happens with the original. If a painter like Picasso uses the technical model of the production of the foreseen/anticipated (prévu), then the image is nothing more than the product of the painter himself, and the unseen is disregarded as unforeseen. The image then no longer refers to the reality outside the painter, as Courbet’s The Oak at Flagey does. If everything is image, then any possible original or the other disappears because it can never, per definition, appear. The question is whether only what is purely visible exists or if there is more. Marion poses the rhetorical question whether it should be concluded that what cannot be seen (the original or the other) does not exist. [D]oes invisibility indicate, in the case of a possible original, the pure and simple denial (dénégation) of its reality? In other words, does the fact that the original remains invisible suffice to disqualify every possible original?31

In our empirical perception, things are visible to us in only a limited way, which entails that there is always something that remains (empirically) unseen.32 An authentic painting is special because it shows us the unseen. Painting is concerned with, as stated above, first of all breaking open the 30 31 32

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 34. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 55. Marion, In Excess, 62-63, 104-109.

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visible from out of the invisible, from out of the conflict between the stigmata (ectypes) and the fund of the unseen. Let us recall what was said above about painting. For the painter, the invisible has the function of organising the space of the canvas by means of various techniques and to magnify the visibility of it. Piero della Francesca does that by means of perspective, which is itself invisible; in Monet, the invisible occurs between the gaze and the perceived (the visible); for Malevich, the invisible is seen in the visible itself and united with it, insofar as the white square is united with its white base. Marion holds that there is still a different way in which the invisible shows itself in the visible, other than what we see in Malevich as well. For that, he points to the icon viewed as the face of the other and the painted icon. Let us suppose that I look at the face of someone I love. I then see the visible face of the other, an object that can always be reduced to an image, such as the form of the face, the colour of the hair. But my gaze will see something that does not coincide with what this face presents to be seen by just anyone else. What does my (empirically non-visual) gaze then see, if it is not the visible of this face? My gaze will see the invisible in the face of the person I love. How can a gaze by our eyes ever see something that is invisible? Marion’s answer is that my passionate gaze, directed at the face of the other, can see the invisible origin of the gaze on me (from the other) that arises out of the darkness of the pupils. The pupils of the eyes are, after all, dark and empty holes.33 [T]he gaze alone is not real (réel): it is born from a black hole, which, in the dialogue I look for or flee from, I want to capture or avoid, precisely because its irreal space fascinates me, as the source of the invisible, as the center of the visible.34

The intentionality of love withdraws from the power of the image because my (invisible) gaze crosses another gaze that is also, in principle, invisible.35 It concerns a gaze that is not perceivable by outside spectators but only by those directly involved. In this way, Marion shows the possibility of the invisible in the face of another. The human being who has himself become an image (3.2.2.) is not able to see the invisible in the face of 33

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 56-57. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 21. In the original French: ‘Le regard seul n’est pas réel: il naît d’un trou noir, que dans le dialogue je cherche ou fuis, veut captiver ou éviter, précisément parce que son vide irréel me fascine, comme la source de l’invisible, au centre du visible.’ Marion, La croisée du visible, 43. 35 Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 57. 34

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another. He misses the loving gaze that eludes the image, and he is unable to engage in the crossing of the gazes. Marion goes a step further and provides the following alternative for the image crisis of the visible. Let us suppose that the gaze of the other is holy and can provide an image (icon) of God, the invisible one par excellence.36 Paul points to that when he calls Christ the image (eikon) of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). Marion presents the painted icon as an alternative for the image crisis and thus points to another way in which the invisible is shown in the visible other than in the icon as face. The Invisible Gaze and the Icon The invisible plays a fundamental role in the painted icon.37 The icon depicts a gaze that, although painted as an invisible object, belongs to a face. This gaze is always directed outward, at the believer who prays before the icon. The inverse perspective, after all, is found in the Eastern icon, a perspective in which the one depicted looks at the viewer of the icon. With this gaze, the invisible is taken up into the visible, and there is thus an exchange of gazes between the believer and God because the gazes cross each other. The icon withdraws from the objectivity of what is seen by inverting the relation between it and the viewer: the viewer discovers that he is seen invisibly by the one depicted on the icon in the painted gaze. This is seeing no longer with the physical eye but with the inner eye.38 The teaching regarding icons adds, alongside the gaze of the viewer that is directed at the face of Christ or a saint depicted on the icon, yet a third gaze: that of the prototype, i.e., the one the icon depicts.39 The gaze of the prototype intervenes as a gaze that regards the face of the viewer, a gaze that penetrates the screen of the first visible (the painted or sculpted image). For the secular image (that is an aesthetic object), I remain unseen as a viewer. Standing before the icon, however, as I keep looking I sense that I am seen. The icon is defined by a gaze – that of the depicted person on the icon (Christ, for example) – that regards the gaze of the observer. The visible field is no longer a screen but transparent and is penetrated: two gazes cross each other. The effect of the icon does not have to do with the perception of the visible, of the icon as such, but with 36 37 38 39

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 57. For this and what follows, see Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 20-22. Nicholas of Cusa, The Vision of God, § 6. For this and what follows see Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 57-60.

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a crossing of two gazes. Marion follows the teaching of the Second Council of Nicaea (787) that veneration was not directed at the icon itself but at the person whom the icon depicted. The veneration given to the icon is transferred to the prototype (St. Basil). The doctrine of the icon thus breaks with the status of the image in TV culture ‘since for the visible object … [the icon] substitutes a visible transit where two gazes cross each other …’.40 In summary, Marion sees the icon as an alternative to the image crisis in a twofold way. First, he points to the icon as the face of the other: the ‘natural image’ of the invisibility of the face of the beloved other. The gaze of love displays an aspect of the invisible in the visible. In the first instance, therefore, Marion gives a general philosophical and not a religious argument against the view that the (visible) image and reality coincide and that there is no original or origin for the image. Love belongs, after all, to the heart of human existence. Marion – I note in passing – here views the face of the other more broadly than Levinas does, who speaks only about the ethical appeal of the face of the other. Second, Marion points to the icon as a religious material image. The invisible here does not concern the invisible of the face of a loved one but the face of the invisible God or Christ. He thus also points at the heart of religiously inspired art with Christian themes: the assumption that the invisible can appear in the visible. The reader will see that the term ‘invisible’ has shifted from the purely sensorially invisible (the examples given of the paintings by Piero della Francesca, Monet, and Malevich) to the existentially invisible (the example of the icon as face) and finally to the invisible as religious transcendence, that which transcends the world, the painted religious icon of Christ or a saint.

3.4 Art and Christianity In his view of art, Marion foregrounds an element that is at the heart of religious art with Christian themes: the appearance of the invisible in the visible. This art, after all, assumes a connection or reference to God who is invisible. Marion thus also presents an argument for religious art in a secular age in which its position, we saw, is not at all obvious (chapters 1 and 2). In my view, Marion gives an impressive interpretation of the religious icon as a personal relationship, as a crossing of gazes. I will elaborate on 40

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 60 (italics mine); see also p. 85.

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this theological theory of the image and point to its Byzantine roots (9.3) and also to the visual practice that accompanies it (11.3.2). What I do not find convincing in Marion’s argument is that he limits this appearance of the invisible in the visible in religious art to the icon viewed as ‘sacred portrait’, to a personal face-to-face encounter, the crossing of the gazes (la croisée des regards). He does understand ‘icon’ in a broader sense than the Eastern icon of Christ, Mary, or a saint. Each religious painting that expresses a crossing of the gazes, such as Caravaggio’s The Calling of Saint Matthew (ca. 1599-1600) [Fig. 3.17], he does view as religious art. This painting does not belong to the genre of the sacred portrait but to that of the narrative image. The reason why Marion views this narrative painting as religious art as well is that it fulfils the function of a sacred portrait, namely, the crossing of the gazes that is the theme of Matthew’s calling. Indeed, Caravaggio’s The Calling of Saint Matthew does not concern the crossing of the gazes between the viewer and the depicted Christ but between Jesus and Matthew in the painting. Caravaggio makes the invisible calling of Matthew by Jesus visible. He succeeds in making the invisible being called by Jesus’ gaze visible by painting Matthew’s hand pointing to himself. Being called is then portrayed in the answer.41 In this way, Caravaggio makes the crossing of the gazes between Jesus and Matthew visible.42

Religious art here includes more than the sacred portrait, as the artworks that will be discussed in the following part of this study show. That seems obvious, but not for Marion. That makes one curious as to why he limited religious art to the icon as face. The Painting: Glory versus an Art of Poverty Marion explains why a landscape painting, for example, is not religious art and uses Cézanne’s Mont Sainte-Victoire as an example. He considers it to be a fine example of a painting as saturated phenomenon. Here we see in what is depicted a ‘gift of the visible by itself’.43 The painter does not impose anything on the landscape or the mountain but lets it show or give itself. Marion’s description of the painting as an idol, as glow, gives room to depict nature in a painting as creation, as was, for example, Van Gogh’s 41

Marion, Being Given, 283-385. See also Marion’s negative judgment of the painting as a (self-)portrait (The Crossing of the Visible, 22-23). 43 Marion, Courbet, 194. 42

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intention. In connection with his analysis of Cézanne’s painting, Marion cites the well-known saying by Plato: ‘But this is the privilege of beauty, that being the loveliest she is also the most palpable to sight.’44 Cézanne’s Mont Sainte-Victoire and – I will supplement this with two other paintings that will be discussed in chapter 4 – Van Gogh’s The Sower at Sunset (June 1888) and Starry Night Over the Rhône (September 1888), are examples of this. Should we not view these paintings as hymns to creation? According to Van Gogh, the invisible God shows himself in the visibility of his creation. Marion does not consider landscape paintings like these to be religious art. This genre of painting does not, he argues, have the status of icon. It is not the case that they fall short with respect to the glory of God – that radiates through the painted creation, as Marion also argues. Nor is the question here whether God is said to remove his ‘face’ from visibility. Christ has presented this invisible face once and for all. For Marion, the point is that religious art (as he views it) concerns the crossing of gazes. And that is what is missing in a landscape painting.45 And there is something else. Marion opts for a Christian art of poverty. By that he means that the image should be erased. That is precisely what the painting as idol, as glow, does not do. With respect to Christian art, Marion argues for an emptying (kenosis) of the material image. This notion has a theological background, which is found in the disfiguration of the body of Christ. For that he points to Paul’s letter to the Philippians in which he states that Christ did not cling to equality with God (2:5-11) and the text from Isaiah about the suffering servant of the Lord: ‘so disfigured beyond that of any human being and his form marred beyond human likeness’ (Isaiah 52:14).46 The religious image impoverishes itself. Thus, it is not a question of the visible of the painting but of referring the viewer to the prototype. Marion’s assessment of art with le style sulpicien is also characteristic of his approach. Such art is usually viewed as kitsch.47 Marion argues, however, that such art should not treated with distrust but viewed as the emptying (kenosis) of the image.

44 Marion, In Excess, 68 (Plato, Phaedrus, 250d; transl. B. Jowett; https://onemorelibrary. com/index.php/en/books/major-collections/book/plato-collection-370/phaedrus-3056). 45 Marion, Courbet, 194-196. 46 For this and what follows, see Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 63-65. 47 Art in le style sulpicien was sold in stores around the Saint Sulpice Church (Paris). It was a mass production of religious objects, such as cards and images that were usually viewed as kitsch.

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A painting is an idol, in the sense of the Greek word eidolon, pure visibility and glory. It shows itself with complete authority.48 That is also why Marion did not think painting was suited to serve as religious. The icon, namely, does not flaunt itself but empties the image (it depicts). Instead of showing its glory, the icon removes ‘the prestige of the visible from its face, in order to effectively render it an imperceptible transparency, translucent for the counter-gaze’.49 The icon, viewed as an access to the invisible God, should not glow; rather, it needs to erase itself in order to make the crossing of the gazes possible.50 This view of Christian art is one-sided. What the depiction of Christ brings to light is not only his emptying but also the fact that he is the true image of God. Both aspects, emptying and glory, humiliation and exaltation, belong together. In Christian art, therefore, the image cannot be linked to just one. Van der Leeuw even calls such a one-sided emphasis on emptying (kenosis) Christian nihilism.51 That leaves too little room for the creation and re-creation of human beings and nature. In what follows in this book we will see images of the suffering Christ – Rouault’s The Holy Face (1946) [Fig. 5.34] – as well as Christ in glory – Sutherland’s Christ in Glory (1962) [Fig. 7.63].52 From that perspective, it is too easy to promote art in this way with le style sulpicien viewed generally as kitsch. The Image of God: God as Personal and Suprapersonal The painting as idol has its limits: it cannot depict a face like an icon does. Marion also demonstrates that by means of Rothko’s abstract paintings in the Rothko Chapel in Houston. Rothko’s installation consists of surfaces without depth. The fourteen monumental canvases in the chapel are an abstract representation of the human drama. They present the human being in confrontation with his or her finitude. But we do not see any human figure or a face. Marion calls them ‘façades’ because the paintings show flat forms or surfaces in different colours like black and purple. As a flat surface, the painting can also depict things in the world 48

Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 43. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 61. 50 Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 60-61. 51 G. van der Leeuw, Sacramentstheologie, 272. 52 In his exposition of the Christ icons, the Eastern Orthodox theologian Lossky remarks that Christ shows himself as an archetype of the first human, the human being before the fall, the true image of God and also as the Man of Sorrows who takes the fallen nature of humankind upon himself (L. Ouspensky & V. Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 69). 49

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without depth, but not the human face, which is characterised by something invisible. That is, a painting has the phenomenological function of transforming ‘what gives itself’ into ‘what shows itself’. In other words, this is converting the potentially visible into the properly visible. Here, that entails that everything that is visible is traced back to the flatness of the surface of the painting, and that ends on the façade. The end of the painting process is thus a canvas as a façade. But the façade, as the flat, completely visible surface without depth, falls short of the reality of the face. Levinas – for whom façade and face are quite distinct as well – pointed to that already. A façade, namely, is closed: it does not look at us, while a face does. The face of the other with his invisible gaze directed at us is part of the icon, Marion says, and not of the painting with its ‘flat visibility’.53 In the case of Rothko’s murals for the Four Seasons restaurant in the Seagram Building (New York) (end of the 1950s), one can indeed speak of a painting as a façade [Fig. 3.18]. Rothko here followed the example of the blank windows of Michelangelo’s Laurentian Library in Florence. Looking at these paintings, which now hang in the Tate Modern, one feels that one is locked in a room with all the windows and doors bricked up. The only thing the viewer can do is to withdraw into herself for meditation. In my view, it is wrong to interpret the installation in the chapel in Houston in that way. They are monochrome canvases (except for the one at the entrance) and are not closed, as I will show below. Marion emphasises that Rothko’s installation in the Houston chapel does not have the status of an icon. He considers the chapel to be vaguely religious. The divine gaze that the icon can open is lacking in these paintings.54 But my question is: Are there no other relationships to the divine than just the one defined by the crossing of the gazes? In his view of God, Marion seems to be able to acknowledge only the personal relationship to God that he has described in his view of the icon as the crossing of the gazes, as a face-to-face encounter. This view of God is central to the Bible, but that does not exclude a non-personal relationship with God. In addition to speaking of a personal God, the theologian Paul Tillich also speaks of God as Being Itself and about the Power of Being.55 Being Itself refers to the power that is inherent in everything: the power to resist non-being. People can also experience 53 54 55

Marion, In Excess, 76. Marion, In Excess, 80-81. See my The Paradox of Complementarity in Tillich’s Doctrine of God, 104-121.

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God in a non-personal way, as the courage to be, for instance. We can derive that courage only from the Power of Being that has conquered all counterforces, i.e., non-being. No finite being is able to do that, threatened as it is by non-being. If this is acknowledged, then the Rothko Chapel can be viewed differently than how Marion views it. The chapel can have divergent religious functions. For those who only see God as the courage to be, it is precisely this installation of fourteen canvases that can invoke the drama of human existence: God experienced in a nonpersonal way as the courage to be. God is experienced in different ways by people. Rothko’s work can also have a function for those who have a personal image of God: in a mystical relationship with God, God can also be experienced as image-less, which the purple canvases in this chapel allow.56 Allow me to point out in this context that the one viewing the canvases does not come up against a ‘façade’. The power of Rothko’s paintings lies precisely in applying the paint in layers in such a way that the viewer does not come face-to-face with a façade but is struck by a certain transparency in his canvases. They have an effect on the viewer.57 The dark red/purple triptych in the apse and the four purple monochrome paintings in the four corners of the chapel invoke the possibility of transcendence through the way the paint has been applied. In this part, we have seen how art, God, and the image can be problems for modern and contemporary art with Christian themes. In the secular Western world, such art is undeniably disputed. The central question is how a work of art can be open to religious transcendence, how the invisible can appear in a work of art (Nancy and Marion) or how it can refer to the invisible. Another issue that arises is the following: Although the concept of art as autonomous is no longer (pre)dominant (1.5.2), the question still remains as to how the aesthetic as a value like beauty and as form of a work of art is important for religious art. Another very important question for such art is how it functions in a religious practice. We will discuss these questions in Part III. But first we will look at some works of art in Part II.

56 Thomas Merton gives an example of this in connection with an image-less canvas by Ad Reinhardt (see 4.4). For my interpretation of the Rothko Chapel, see my Where Heaven and Earth Meet, chapter 5. 57 An analysis of Rothko’s method and application of paint argues against Marion’s assessment of the Houston installation as a façade (A. Borchardt-Hume (ed.), Rothko: The Late Series).

Part II

Images of God in Modern and Contemporary Art

4. HOW CAN WE IMAGE GOD?

4.1 Can God be Imaged? Moses in Schönberg’s Opera Moses und Aron In Part I of this study we looked at the ambivalent position of art with Christian themes in Western secular culture. In this part (II) we will see – perhaps surprisingly for some readers – that such art does still exist. The questions that the previous section raised will be supplemented and explored in a more thorough way in this part and discussed in the following part (III). Jean-Luc Nancy and Jean-Luc Marion pointed at the core issue of art with Christian themes: Can an art image be open to religious transcendence? Can the invisible appear in the visible? Marion answered these questions from the perspective of his philosophical-theological phenomenology. In this chapter I approach this question from the perspective of the biblical prohibition against images and ask – via the tradition of Christian images – how the non-imageable God can be depicted. In Part II I will limit myself, as stated in the Introduction to the imaging of the triune God. The (non-)imageability of God the Father will be discussed in this chapter, that of God the Redeemer in chapters 5 and 6, and that of God the Holy Spirit as renewer and completer in chapter 7.1 How can God, who is non-imageable and invisible to our eyes in an image, be presented in a painting or sculpture? Aaron makes a golden calf that was to serve as a god for the people of Israel (Exodus 32:4), but Moses grinds the calf to powder and thus becomes one of the first iconoclasts. Iconoclasm is sometimes seen as nothing more than a love of destruction, but it is primarily a fight for the truth. Does God have a place in worship that uses images and, if so, how? There are two aspects to this with respect to religion: that of the veneration of images and that of the (non-)imageability of God. We can read about the veneration of images in biblical book Exodus in 20:4-5: You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall 1

For speaking about God as the triune God, I refer the reader to W. Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, vol. 1, and Moltmann, The Trinity and the Kingdom of God.

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not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God.

The veneration of images also plays a role in politics, not only in religion. After the fall of a political regime, the statue of its reviled leader is often toppled. The biblical God will not allow himself to be captured by people in an image. That limits his freedom. We read of God’s non-imageability in Moses’ speech to the Israelites in the book of Deuteronomy in chapter 4:12-16: Then the Lord spoke to you out of the fire. You heard the sound of words but saw no form; there was only a voice. He declared to you his covenant …. You saw no form of any kind the day the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire. Therefore watch yourselves very carefully, so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol, an image of any shape …. (italics mine).

How can God, of whom Moses saw no form, be imaged in a convincing way? And by ‘convincing’, I mean a depiction of God that respects God’s invisibility. Arnold Schönberg poses the problem acutely in his opera Moses und Aron (1930-1932) but does not resolve it, however. According to Moses in the opera, it is impossible to represent God and at the same time respect God’s invisibility. He tells Aaron, ‘How can fantasy thus picture the unimageable!’2 In contrast, however, Aaron thinks that senses and feelings are necessary for believing in God. That was why Aaron performed wonders for the people by, among other things, changing Moses’ staff into a snake, which convinced the people that God was able to protect them (Act 1, scene 4). He later makes the golden calf as an image of God for the people. Aaron says to Moses: You also would have loved this people, had you only seen how they lived when they dared to see and feel and hope. No folk is faithful, unless it feels.3

2 ‘Kein Bild kann dir ein Bild geben vom Unvorstellbaren.’ Act 1, scene 2. I am taking this text and the next one from the text accompanying the CD of Moses und Aron Chamber Symphonie No. 2 from 1975, conducted by Pierre Boulez. Schönberg wrote the libretto of this unfinished opera. 3 ‘Auch du würdest dies Volk lieben, hättest du gesehn, wie es lebt, wenn es sehen, fühlen, hoffen darf. Kein Volk kann glauben, was es nicht fühlt’ (Act 2, scene 5). For the English translation, see https://www.chandos.net/chanimages/Booklets/HA3314.pdf.

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Moses argues against Aaron and radicalises the problem by stating that not only is it impossible to make an image of God, it is also impossible to speak of him. For Moses, God becomes an idea, a thought that cannot be expressed in words (Act 2, scene 5). The imageless God cannot be represented in vocal music. Schönberg brings that out by not having Moses – who was not a good speaker – sing about the one inconceivable God in the opera. To sing about God is to represent him in an idolatrous image. Schönberg therefore uses the technique of the Sprechgesang, a singsong recitation. Aaron, who permits the people to worship the golden calf, is a very good speaker and sings as melodiously as a thrush.4 The Moses character in Schönberg’s opera is the example of extreme iconoclasm. On the one hand, there is the position of the non-imageability of God and, on the other, that of the manifestation, the presence of the non-imageable. Aaron embraces the second position – the presence of God. He wonders whether the people can handle Moses’ view of the one, non-imageable God (Act 1, scene 2). The people do not understand how they can worship a God they might not see: people can only understand what they feel and cannot believe in an abstract idea (Act 2, scene 5). The golden calf therefore served as an image. Moses respects only the first position – that of the non-imageability – and bypasses the second, that of God’s manifestation. In the opera he does not seek any mediation between the visible, the world, and the invisible God. God becomes nothing more than a thought, not even expressible in words. Can the two positions – God’s non-imageability and the manifestation, the presence of the non-imageable – be reconciled in an image? In this chapter I will show how Christian art in the West has arrived at an impasse here (4.2.3). At the same time, it is surprising how modern art inspired by Christianity has discovered two ways that do justice to both the non-imageability of God and to his manifestation, his presence (4.3 and 4.4).

4.2 Christianity and the Image of God With respect to the image, Christianity takes a different position than Judaism and Islam.5 Depictions of Christ began to circulate in the third century; apart from a few exceptions, there were initially no representations 4 5

G. Steunebrink, Schönbergs Moses und Aron, 175-196. See A. Besançon, The Forbidden Image, 73-81.

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of God the Father.6 We find all kinds of depictions of God as the threein-one in frescoes or icons in churches or in miniatures, breviaries, and psalters. The Trinity also functioned as a motif in icons of the Annunciation of Jesus’ Birth to Mary and the Baptism of Jesus. There are also depictions of theophanies, such as God’s appearance to Moses in the burning bush (Exodus 3), the vision of Isaiah in which he saw God on a throne (Isaiah 6), and the call vision of Ezekiel (Ezekiel 1).7 Michelangelo’s famous fresco in the Sistine Chapel shows God as the creator of Adam. Why did people start to represent God in images, and were there rules for respecting God’s otherness? The reason Christianity accepted the image of God in an indirect sense as an icon of Christ – the Greek word eikōn means ‘image’ – is because God has become visible in Christ. Paul calls Christ the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15), and in the gospel of John Jesus says that those who have seen him have seen the Father (14:9). But how has God become visible in Christ? The church father Irenaeus, bishop of Lyon (130-200) says about this: ‘the Father is the invisible of the Son, but the Son the visible of the Father.’8 That concords with the biblical prohibition against images. But how is God to be imaged (in)visibly in an image? The answer of the Second Council of Nicaea (787) is – as already stated (1.3.1) – that only the icon of Christ as the Word of God that has become flesh (John 1:14) is legitimate.9 Examples are the icon of the Holy Face (the Mandylion) [Fig. 5.28] and the icon of Christ Pantocrator [Fig. 7.61].10 Here, the Council made a distinction between an icon of Christ and an idol. The veneration of an icon is not directed at the image but at the (represented) Christ himself. The icon enables the human being to be in contact with the represented Christ. Nothing is said about an icon of God the Father or of the Trinity.11 And that is no coincidence, for it is obviously impossible to conceive of an image of God. Thus, there was no rule given for depicting God. In the West, the church was very reserved with respect to the question of how to depict God. I will not go into the question whether Charlemagne 6 F. Boespflug, Dieux dans l’art, 18-19. God the Father and his Logos-Creator are carved on the ‘Sacrophage des époux’ in Arles (fourth century) (p. 201). 7 A majority of texts in the Old Testament state that it is impossible to see God. In contrast to that, a minority holds that God can be seen in visions (e.g., Ezekiel 1 and Daniel 7:9) (F. Boespflug, Les Théophanies bibliques, 196-198). 8 Besançon, The Forbidden Image, 90; Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 116. 9 For the text of Nicaea II, see G.E. Thiessen, Theological Aesthetics, 65. 10 L. Ouspensky & V. Lossky, Meaning of Icons, 69-72. 11 Boespflug argues: ‘L’icône de Dieu n’est envisageable et légitimé que comme icône du Christ, Verbe de Dieu fait chair’ (Dieu et ses images, 115, (113-117)).

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and the spiritual leaders in the West properly understood the vision of the Second Council of Nicaea (1.3.1). What is important for the image in the Roman Catholic Church is the Council of Trent (1563). This gave a guideline for Christian art in the Western Church that remained in force for four centuries until the Second Vatican Council. Following in the footsteps of the Second Council of Nicaea, the Council of Trent confirmed the legitimacy of the image of Christ and other sacred images and their veneration. The question of the anthropomorphic representations of God and of the Trinity was not discussed, only the depictions of them in the biblical narratives.12 How much they were aware that God could not be represented is apparent from what the Council said about the narrative image. It is useful to use images to tell the biblical narratives, but it should be remembered that these images do not represent the divine ‘as though it could be seen by the eyes of the body, or be portrayed by colours or figures’.13 The Second Vatican Council argues for art in service to the church but does not say anything about the question how God is to be imaged.14 There were virtually no ecclesiastical regulations in the West for imaging God.15 The Eastern Orthodox Church, on the other hand, has rules for its rich icon tradition with respect to painting the various themes on icons.16 Nevertheless, there was one functioning – if not official – rule in the West for the representation of God. The starting point is the icon of Christ that had been recognised since the Second Council of Nicaea. The non-official rule for the representation of the Christian God is that of Christomorphism: God can only be depicted according to the form of Christ.17 I will first look at the classical model of the depiction of God in Eastern Orthodoxy: Rublev’s The Holy Trinity. I will then show how the representation of God gradually reached an impasse in the West since the Renaissance. 12 For the text of the decree of Trent, see documentacatholicaomnia.eu/03d/1545-1545, _Concilium_Tridentinum,_Canons_And_Decrees,_EN.pdf and the remarks by Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 288-291. 13 Cited by Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 289. 14 For the text of Vatican II, see D. Menozzi, Les Images, 275-278 and the commentary of Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 401-404. 15 An exception is Benedict XIV; see Menozzi, Les Images, 213-219. 16 L. Ouspensky, Theologie de l’icône dans l’Église orthodox, chapters 13, 15, and 16; E. Sendler, The Icon: Image of the Invisible Elements of Theology. 17 ‘[S]i Dieu peut et doit être figuré, c’est uniquement en raison du Christ et sur un mode christique, c’est-à-dire concrètement sous les traits (que l’on croit avoir été ceux) du Christ’ (Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 116).

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4.2.1 Rublev’s The Holy Trinity The story of God’s visit to Abraham is told in the book of Genesis: ‘The Lord appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre …. Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby’ (Genesis 18:1-2). A fresco from the fourth century in the Via Latina Catacomb in Rome shows a representation of the strangers’ visit to Abraham (Genesis 18) [Fig. 4.19]. There are three figures in the fresco; they are dressed in white, without wings, and without haloes. One of these visitors has sometimes been seen as God or Christ. The one in the middle is then given a halo with a cross in it and is often painted larger than the other two figures, and all three are portrayed with wings.18 A further development of the depiction of this story interprets the three men as a prefiguration of the triune God, as the church fathers had already done.19 The image thus changed from a reception by Abraham of three men, or of Christ as Lord with two angels (winged messengers) to a representation of the triune God. That can be seen not only in the East but also in the West, for example, on a mural from the twelfth century in the Santa Maria Lys Church in Cologne.20 The Russian icon painter Andrei Rublev, who lived at the end of the fourteenth century and the beginning of the fifteenth, knew of such an icon from the Holy Trinity Church of St. Sergius.21 Sergius of Radonezh (ca. 1313-1392) had devoted his life to the contemplation of the Trinity as a community of love: ‘men “through the contemplation of the Holy Trinity would be able to conquer the divisive hatred of the world”.’22 He wanted his monastic community and public life to imitate that community. After his death, Rublev was commissioned to make an icon of the Trinity to commemorate Sergius. This icon became the model for the later Eastern icon tradition of the Trinity. Rublev’s icon (ca. 1425) portrays the three men (visiting Abraham) as angels, winged and with haloes, sitting around a quadrangular table with a chalice containing the head of a slaughtered calf [Fig. 4.20]. The table has a Eucharistic character, given the chalice with the small calf’s head in it, a symbol of Christ’s voluntary sacrifice. The icon has an inverted perspective, which means that the figures do not grow smaller as they 18 This can be seen, for example, on a miniature from a Greek psalter from 1092 (G. Bunge, Der andere Paraklet, 30-31). 19 Ouspensky & Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 200-205. 20 For the illustration, see Boespflug, Les Théophanies bibliques, ill. 1.20, p. 62. 21 G. Bunge, Der andere Paraklet, 41 and 70. 22 For this and what follows, see Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 244-246.

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approach the horizon, as happens in a painting with a central perspective. Rather, we see the inverse: the three angels come toward the viewer. In Eastern Orthodoxy, this icon of the Trinity is the icon of the feast of Pentecost Sunday, on which the feast of the fulness of the revelation of the triune God is celebrated. The icon derives its spirituality from the Eastern Orthodox liturgy of Pentecost.23 Ouspensky points out that this icon is not a representation of the Trinity because God cannot be represented in his essence.24 The faces and figures of the angels are almost completely similar, which indicates the unity of the three divine persons. This is a community of Father, Son, and Spirit as mutually equal persons. The icon shows the unique identities of the Father, Son, and Spirit through their clothing and their gestures. Forms, colours, gestures, and the attitude of the three persons determine the depiction of the Trinity. The three persons sit in a circle around the table. That can be seen by drawing a line around the outside contours of the three angels. The three angels are bound to each other through the circle: the being of God is being-in-the-community of the three persons. Pseudo-Dionysius (late fifth to early sixth century) saw the circle as a symbol for God, whom he viewed as a movement in which all things are one and at the same time emanate from him and return to him.25 There are other geometric and abstract forms in the icon. In addition to the circle, we can detect a rectangle, a triangle, and a cross. For example, the top of the table is a quadrangle and thus contains the number four (four sides and four corners) that, according to the church fathers, is symbolic for the completeness of the four gospels. If one traces the lines from the corners of the table to the point just above the head of the angel in the middle, we see that the three angels are sitting in an equilateral triangle. That indicates the unity and equality of the three persons. If a line is traced straight down from the halo of the angel in the middle, this line crosses the horizontal line traced by the haloes of the other two angels. The cross – the tree of life behind the angels already points to the cross – is thus inscribed in the holy circle of the divine life.26

The minor differences between the three – in the colour of their clothes, their attitudes, and gestures – point to their different actions in the world. 23

Bunge, Der andere Paraklet, chapters 6 and 7. For this and what follows, see Ouspensky & Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 202. 25 Pseudo-Dionysius, The Divine Names, 916D. 26 Evdokimov points to yet other theological symbols of Rublev’s icon, The Art of the Icon, 249-252. Boespflug points in general to abstraction in the depiction of the Trinity, Dieu et ses images, 217-219. 24

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But who is who? Rublev does not answer that completely, for no one has seen the Father. The faces of the three angels are the same; they are not individual faces. The triune God is, after all, one in essence. The question who represents whom can thus be answered in different ways and remains, in my view, a matter of speculation. There is, however, little disagreement about the Spirit – he is the angel on the right. The Spirit’s clothing is largely green, which, according to Pseudo-Dionysius means ‘youth, fullness of powers’.27 Evdokimov holds that the angel in the middle represents God the Father and the angel on the left the Son.28 Others, like Ouspensky and Bunge, are of the opinion that the Father is on the left and the Son in the middle. I agree with this position. The clothing of the figure in the middle has the usual colour attributed to the incarnate Son of God: a dark purple undergarment and a blue cloak. The two extended fingers symbolise the two natures of the God-man and point to the chalice as a symbol of his sacrifice. In connection with this, the tree of Mamre behind the Son is to be seen as the tree of life that has become the wood of the cross. The posture of the Son is just like that of the angel on the right, the Spirit: both are looking at the angel on the left. The body language of both angels is directed at the angel on the left, who possibly represents God the Father, the invisible. The clothing of this angel testifies to this: the colour of his cloak is not very striking because of the light purple, and it covers most of his body so that little can be seen of the radiant deep blue undergarment.29 The unity and equality of the triune God is expressed by the three angels sitting on similar seats and holding similar staffs and all wearing clothes of deep blue. The angels form a community in movement, not only because they sit in a circle but also through their postures and gestures. Their gestures make it appear that they are conversing with each other. What are the members of the Holy Trinity talking about? The answer can only be speculative. Bunge suggests that the conversation as depicted on the icon can be ‘read’ as a passage from Jesus’ farewell address, which ends with Pentecost: ‘“[A]s the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit”’ (John 20:21-22). In the icon, the Son begins the conversation while looking at the Father questioningly and points with his right hand 27 28 29

202.

Cited by Ouspensky & Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 202. Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 248-249. Bunge, Der andere Paraklet, 99-100; Ouspensky & Lossky, The Meaning of Icons,

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to the chalice of his suffering and beyond that to the Spirit. With this gaze, the Son is asking the Father about his suffering and, with this gesture, about the sending of the Spirit into the world. The Father grants this: he directs himself to the Spirit and gives him the blessing to complete the salvific work of the Son.30 This icon of the Trinity does justice to the fact that God cannot be represented. God the Father is imaged symbolically without any identifiable facial features of his own, just the colour of his clothes, less visible than those of the Son and the Spirit, and his gesture of blessing with his right hand distinguish him from the other two. The icon portrays the triune God in actions towards the world. The church father Irenaeus applies that insight to the theophany to Ezekiel when he remarks that, just like Moses and Elijah, Ezekiel did not have to see God himself but only God’s actions towards him.31 4.2.2 Masaccio’s Trinity In the West, the Christomorphic rule for depicting God was followed until the twelfth century. This meant that God the Father was not, in principle, depicted in ways that clearly distinguished him from Christ. Aside from God the Father being sometimes depicted by an indirect sign such as a hand, when he was represented in human form, he was given the features of Christ, represented as young or as an adult. A shift gradually occurred in the depictions of God. That happened sometimes already from 1200 on, when God was also depicted as the Ancient of Days. This representation was new. The literary motif comes from the book of Daniel, which described the vision of Daniel: ‘As I looked, “thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. His clothing was as white as snow; the hair of his head was white like wool”’ (Daniel 7:9). The figure of the Ancient of Days had a different meaning in the East, as a designation of the pre-existent Son (‘born of the Father before all ages’), the Word that was with God in the beginning (John 1:1). The advanced age of the pre-existent Son (Christ) is a metaphorical reference to ‘eternity’. That also applies to the icon The Ancient of Days (seventh century) in St. Catharine’s Monastery on Mt. Sinai: this is not a representation of the God the Father but of the pre-existent Christ, the only begotten Son.32 30

Bunge, Der andere Paraklet, 105-109. Boespflug, Les Théophanies bibliques, 204-205. 32 Boespflug, Dieu dans l’art, 203-205; 21-27. L. Ouspensky, La Théologie de l’icône dans l’Église orthodoxe, chapter 15. 31

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The representation of God the Father as the Ancient of Days was used primarily in the depiction of the Trinity to distinguish him from the Son. Let us look at the monumental fresco by Tommaso di Ser Giovanni di Simone, better known as Masaccio, The Trinity with the Virgin, Saint John the Evangelist, and Donors (1427-1428) in the Santa Maria Novella in Florence [Fig. 4.21]. It is a work that is of great significance in art history because of, among other things, its linear perspective. I will comment on this work in relation to my question – the (non-)imageability of God. Masaccio’s Trinity in Florence is a very famous example of the ‘throne of grace’ type of painting, the most widespread presentation of the Trinity in the West. God stands or is seated in majesty and is holding the crucified Christ before him, while the dove completes the Trinity. In Masaccio’s Trinity, we see the Father standing with his hands supporting the cross on which Christ is hanging. Mary and John the evangelist are standing at the foot of the throne of grace, as Jesus’ mother looks at us and points to her son. John is grieving and looks at the crucified Christ on whom all light is falling. The two donors are painted at the bottom of the work kneeling in prayer somewhat further from the centre. The composition is structured in a harmonious way: the one donor and Mary take up the same space on the left side as John and the other donor do on the right. The fresco shows the throne of grace as situated behind the crucified Christ in a classical Roman arch, and behind the crucified Christ, and the whole gives the impression of simplicity and immobility. Masaccio has painted an altar on the wall under the two donors, with a tomb beneath it on which a skeleton is lying. The text is a memento mori and reads: ‘I was once what you are now, and what I am, you will also be.’ The installation has been interpreted differently. Is it an altarpiece or a tomb monument? T. Verdon interprets the Trinity, the community of the Father, Son, and Spirit as a ‘family’, as an analogy for the relationships within the family, and sees Mary and John and the donors as a reflection of the relationships within the Trinity: the Spirit is the bond of love between the Father and the Son. After all, Jesus says on the cross to his mother Mary, ‘Behold, your son’, and to John, ‘Behold your mother’ (John 19:26-27). The donors are on the same plane as Mary and John, and those looking at the fresco can stand in the same line as the donors and thus they form the bottom of the pyramid of which God forms the top. Moreover, the donors are – which was unusual at that time – depicted on the same scale as the sacred figures. ‘The equality of scale … includes viewers also, inviting them to perceive themselves as part of an infinite

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extension through space and time of the family love of God.’33 This interpretation is therefore important because God is not depicted here as a supreme power – a Jupiter or a pope (see below) – but as a triune community that can serve as a model for community among people. With respect to the question of this chapter – the imaging of God the Father who is non-imageable – we can see that Masaccio no longer depicts God in a Christomorphic way. The Father has become an older man with a grey beard and differs from Christ on the cross.34 This is very different from Rublev’s Trinity. In his icon the three angels, as stated above, are represented with the same facial features. God the Father is only symbolically depicted in the form of an angel. Both Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox experts in Christian iconography are right to reject a depiction of God the Father like Masaccio’s. What the Council of Moscow (1667) said about the depiction of God the Father also applies, in my view, to Masaccio’s Trinity depicting the throne of grace: representing God the Father in icons ‘with a grey beard, with His only Son on His lap, and a dove between Them, is exceedingly absurd and unseemly, since no one has seen God the Father ….’35 4.2.3 God as Pope or Jupiter Boespflug asserts in his Dieu et ses images that there has been a further decline regarding the depiction of God in the West since the eighteenth century.36 This began already in the fifteenth century in the Renaissance, when new ‘portraits’ of God emerged. In various Trinities and other representations of God as creator or in connection with the Last Judgment, God was depicted as a Greek or Roman god or hero. In his Vision of Ezekiel (1518), Raphael portrayed God as Jupiter. Michelangelo’s God in the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel (1534-1541) bore the features of Hercules. God was also represented wearing a papal tiara.37 That was the result of developments at the time with respect to the power of the 33

T. Verdon, Masaccio’s Trinity: Theological, Social, and Civic Meanings, 162-164. Thus also Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 233. 35 Cited by Ouspensky in: Ouspensky & Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 204. 36 Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, chapters 10 and 11. 37 Although the depiction of the triune God in the West would become a problem, I should point out that there are also exceptions. An example is the tapestry Schepping en Zondeval (ca. 1500-1510) (de Haar Castle, Haarzuilens) from the studio of Pieter van Edingen van Aelst. It shows the triune God as creator of heaven and earth. Just as on Rublev’s icon, the three figures are depicted as equal to one another, with that equality expressed through their similar external appearance. 34

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pope, both in relation to worldly power and in a theological sense to God’s power. Depicting God as a Greek or Roman god goes against the Christomorphic rule and is associated with the legitimation of certain power positions – that of God, of the pope, or both. One can attempt to interpret such representations as symbols of God’s omnipotence, as the Apostles’ Creed, for instance, speaks of it. But, however it is interpreted, such a depiction entails the humanising of God the Father. Furthermore, did the tiara not turn God into a pope of sorts? And what should be understood by this? This image of God the Father as pope with a tiara or as an elderly man with a beard in distinction from Christ can be found everywhere in Europe. Here are some examples from my own observation, which can be supplemented by countless others. God is portrayed like a pope with a tiara in the upper part of Lucas van Leyden’s The Last Judgement (1526/7) in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. In the Great St. Laurence Church in Alkmaar (1518), there is The Last Judgement (1515-1535). This is a ceiling painting by Jacob Cornelisz. Van Oostsanen. In the left part of heaven, God is seated on a throne under a Gothic canopy as an elderly man wearing a mitre. In Compiègne (north of Paris) is the St. James Church where Joan of Arc came to pray on the morning she was taken prisoner in 1430. A chapel in the church contains a painting that represents the Trinity: God the Father as an elderly man with a beard and distinguished from the younger Christ with the cross. Together with the Spirit as a dove, they float on the clouds above the earth.

This kind of representation of God can be found right up to the twentieth century – in the Sacré Coeur in Paris, for instance. It can be seen there on a mosaic (1900-1922) in the apse, with the symbol of earthly power, the papal tiara. Victor Hugo’s remark to a bishop on the depiction of God with a symbol of power like the tiara is to the point here. His own proposal for a more apt depiction, however, in my view, concerns the God of philosophical theism, and that is not the same as the triune God: If it concerns an old man with a long white beard, à la a pope or an emperor … Father, then I am an atheist with respect to that old, good God. But if it concerns the eternal, the one, infinite principle … then everything changes. Then I am the believer, Father, and you the atheist.38

An Impasse? The imaging of God the Father in the later Western church tradition is often less convincing because God is depicted in too anthropomorphic a way; either in a form distinguishable from the Son or by the addition of 38

Victor Hugo, L’année terrible, 1871, cited by Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 363.

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symbols of power. Aside from that, it is also disputed whether God the Father can be depicted in a human form. I will also comment critically on the Christomorphic rule applied to God the Father. Where this happens with Trinities, God the Father is depicted as an identical twin brother of Christ.39 Is that not just speculation about the God whose form could not be seen by Moses at Mount Horeb (Deuteronomy 4:12)? Is the Father not the invisible of the Son and the Son the visible of the Father (Irenaeus)? My objection to the depiction of God the Father as a human figure is that it places the same kind of limitations humans have on God – and that is still the case if God is viewed as (supra)personal. God is not an individual but a person or suprapersonal.40 If he is imaged in a limited human way, then Feuerbach’s critique that God is a human image projected on to God is applicable here: God did not create humans, but humans created God. Are there other ways of imaging God in an indirect, imageless way? For me, the Eastern Orthodox tradition did that in an exemplary way when it took Rublev’s icon of the Trinity as its model for depicting the triune God. This icon can, in my view, also serve as a model for the West in its depictions of the triune God. The attempt has also been made in modern painting to represent God in such a way as to show respect for God’s otherness. To explore that properly, I will highlight two aspects of Rublev’s Trinity: (1) the representation of God through his actions in the world and (2) its use of abstraction. The first aspect is that God, who cannot himself be represented, can be indicated by his actions in the world. After all, Rublev took his representation of the Trinity from the story of God’s visit to Abraham. Religious landscape painters have also chosen this way of not depicting God the Father directly but only via his actions in the world. John Calvin already pointed to the imaging of God through his creation. He considers sculpture and painting gifts of God41 and points to the beauty of God’s creation that we should enjoy: Has the Lord adorned flowers with all the beauty which spontaneously presents itself to the eye, and the sweet odour which delights the sense of smell, and shall it be unlawful for us to enjoy that beauty and this odour? What? Has he not so distinguished colours as to make some more agreeable than 39 See, for example, the Psalter of Ostrov (end of the twelfth century) (Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, 166-167). 40 For this view, see my The Paradox of Complementarity in Tillich’s Doctrine of God, 104-121. 41 Calvin, Institutes, I.xi.12.

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others? Has he not given qualities to gold and silver, ivory and marble, thereby rendering them precious above other metals or stones? In short, has he not given many things a value without having any necessary use?42

Such a view of art as an ode to creation in honour of God also stimulated the rise of Dutch landscape painting in the seventeenth century. One can point in this connection to, for example, Jacob van Ruisdael’s Landscape with a Corn Field Near the Sea (1660) [Fig. 9.76]. The beauty of the landscape and the clouds can be interpreted as the work of God the creator.43 Landscape painting can be secular or religious. A number of painters are undeniably religiously motivated. The nineteenth-century landscape paintings by Caspar David Friedrich, William Turner, and Vincent van Gogh are examples of this, as are those of Colin McCahon, Georgia O’Keeffe, Emily Carr, Georges Rouault, and Alfred Manessier in the twentieth century. With respect to the Netherlands today, I would point to the nature paintings by Gijs Frieling and the still lifes by Henk Helmantel. I will look at two paintings by Van Gogh as examples and show how he images God indirectly via God’s creation (4.3). There is of course a difference between the representation of God in these paintings and that in Rublev’s icon: the icon is a representation of God as Trinity, the religious landscape painters depict nature as the creation of God. I will return to this difference in my conclusion (4.5). What is also striking in Rublev’s Trinity is that there is something abstract about its figurative composition. The circle is, as stated above, a central given: the three persons sit in a circle around the table. Mystics in the Middle Ages, such as Hildegard of Bingen and Meister Eckhart, make use of the circle, the wheel, or the ring to refer to God. Abstract art arose in the West at the beginning of the twentieth century and can be used to leave a work of art open to religious transcendence. Thus, the second way to image God in an imageless way is via abstraction. As an example, I will discuss the Black Paintings of Ad Reinhardt whose work presents an imageless image (4.4).

4.3 God in Creation: Vincent van Gogh The early work of Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) is characterised by an expressive style and use of dark earth colours. That changed in Paris 42

Calvin, Institutes, III.x.2. Whether or not such landscape paintings are religious or not is a subject of discussion among art historians. I will discuss this issue below in the excursus in chapter 9.6. 43

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(1886-1888), when he came into contact with the work of impressionists like Monet, Renoir, Seurat, and others. The colours in Van Gogh’s works became brighter. He began to paint cityscapes in pointillist style from his window in the Rue Lepic.44 From a theological perspective, I will discuss two paintings by Van Gogh after his Paris period: The Sower with Setting Sun (June 1888) and Starry Night Over the Rhône (September 1888). When he went to Arles in southern France in 1888, Van Gogh was deeply impressed by the Provençal landscape. He wrote to the painter Emile Bernard that he had made large pen drawings of that landscape in the Japanese style:45 an immense flat expanse of country — seen in bird’s-eye view from the top of a hill — vineyards, harvested fields of wheat, all of it multiplied endlessly, streaming away like the surface of a sea towards the horizon bounded by the hillocks of La Crau. It does not look Japanese, and it’s actually the most Japanese thing that I’ve done. (641; 15 July, 1888)46

He continued with describing his religious experience of nature: Listen, I passed – a few days after my arrival — that place with a painter friend. There’s something that would be boring to do, he said. I said nothing myself, but I found that so astonishing that I didn’t even have the strength to give that idiot a piece of my mind. I go back there, go back, go back again — well, I’ve done two drawings of it — of that flat landscape in which there was nothing but.......... the infinite... eternity. (641; 15 July, 1888)

He experiences the flat landscape as ‘the infinite … eternity’. Two months later he wrote that he was overwhelmed by the beauty of nature. He wrote to his brother Theo: I have a terrible clarity of mind at times, when nature is so lovely these days, and then I’m no longer aware of myself and the painting comes to me as if in a dream. (687; 25 September, 1888)

At the end of the summer of 1888, he wrote to his sister Wil that ‘at present we must paint nature’s rich and magnificent aspects; we need good cheer and happiness, hope and love’ (678; 9 and around 14 September, 1888). Three years earlier, when he began with his study of colour, he 44

N. Bakker, Het begin van de Japanse ‘droom’, 19. For example, the pen drawing La Crau Seen from Montmajour (1888) (British Museum, London). In what follows I will cite from Vincent van Gogh: The Letters, by indicating the letter number and the date. 46 In Paris, and already in Antwerp before going to Paris, he became acquainted with Japanese prints, an ‘art that was “primitive” and pure’ (Bakker, Het begin van de Japanse ‘droom’, 19). 45

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wrote to Theo that a painter should not start with the colours on his palette, but with the colours of nature. Nonetheless, the colours in the painting did not need to match those in nature precisely: ‘I study nature so as not to do anything silly, to remain reasonable — but — I don’t really care whether my colours are precisely the same, so long as they look good on my canvas, just as they look good in life’ (537; 28 October, 1885).47 For Van Gogh, love and beauty were two core words that he used in his letters when he spoke of nature as creation. He had been raised to view it that way,48 and we will see how that came to expression in his paintings. 4.3.1 The Sower with Setting Sun (June 1888) Van Gogh had written to his brother in 1882 about how the artist can show something of God in his work (288; 26-27 November, 1882). He does that in The Sower [Fig. 4.22], where we see a sower with a dark yellow sun hat scattering seed with wide gestures over the field. In the background is a field with low ripe grain extending to the horizon with a house and farms in the distance. A sun, painted large, illuminates the field with its rays. The painting makes an impression on the viewer through the use of colour. I will first look at the question of colour via Van Gogh’s letters and then at the painting itself. Van Gogh had learned about the complementary use of colours from paintings by the French painter Eugène Delacroix. He wrote to his brother: ‘Can we now paint the sower with colour, with a simultaneous contrast between yellow and purple49 for example (like Delacroix’s Apollo ceiling, which is precisely yellow and purple), yes or no? Yes — definitely’ (634; 28 June, 1888). And he does that in The Sower with yellow above and purple below as a contrast. The setting sun is central to the image. Day after day, it ripens the seed sown by the warmth of its rays. Van Gogh had studied Delacroix’ painting Christ Asleep during the Tempest (1853) very closely. This painting shows Christ asleep on a boat during a storm on the Sea of Galilee. Aside from the complementary colours, he was also struck by the yellow radiant halo or nimbus around Christ’s head. He has a radiant halo, ‘a little lemon yellow for the halo, 47 See also his letter to Theo about his still lifes of birds’ nests that ‘some people who know nature well might like them because of the colours of the moss, dry leaves and grasses, clay &c.’ (533; 4 October, 1885). 48 W.J. Verlinden, De zussen Van Gogh, 25. See also 811; ca. 21 October, 1889. 49 The translators of these letters have chosen to translate Van Gogh’s Dutch term violet as purple.

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the aureole’ (634; 28 June 1888). In The Sower, it seems as if the sun above the grain field has a halo like that.50 The complementary colours of yellow and purple also have an impact and show the connection between the land worked by the sower on the one hand and the sun on the other: the purple earth on which the sower scatters his seed does not show much life yet, but tufts of orange can be seen as the result of the activity of the sower and the warm sunlight. Van Gogh provided an explanation of his Sower. In a letter to the painter Emile Bernard, he speaks in the context of The Sower about his yearning for ‘that infinite of which the Sower, the sheaf, are the symbols’ (628; 19 June, 1888). He thus views the painting symbolically. With respect to the sheaf, the wheat field, and the field being sown, he had earlier – the previous summer – compared people to grains in a letter to his sister Wil. Just as there is germinating power in the wheat, so love has germinating power in each human being. ‘And so natural life is germinating. What the power to germinate is in wheat, so love is in us’ (574; late October, 1887).51 The wheat field in The Sower is to be seen as representing human existence. And what does the sower represent in this painting? Van Gogh often compares the artist with a manual labourer, one who works the land or raises flowers, and making art with working the land or raising some crop (811; ca. 21 October, 1889). Thus, the sower here is a symbol for the creative activity of the artist. In The Sower, the activity of the painter – making art – is important, more so than the painting as a completed work. The sower-artist is, after all, still busy sowing, still busy with the creative process of painting. The result of Van Gogh’s work are his portraits, wheat fields, sunflowers, olive gardens, parks, and starry nights, all of them ‘seeds of life-giving ideas and feelings’.52 Let us look once again at the sower-artist. His work would not bear any fruit without the warmth of the sun. That is obvious for the farmer, but also for the artist who needs creativity. In that context, Van Gogh connects the sun and Christ. In the same period that he was working on The Sower, he calls Christ the greatest artist. For him, Christ is the artist 50

D. Silverman, Van Gogh and Gauguin, 83, 89-90. Later, when he was already sick, he wrote to Theo about the latter’s marriage: ‘Ah well, do you know what I hope for once I set myself to having some hope, it’s that the family will be for you what nature is for me, the mounds of earth, the grass, the yellow wheat, the peasant. That’s to say that you find in your love for people the wherewithal not only to work but the wherewithal to console you and restore you when one needs it’ (800; 5 and 6 September, 1889). 52 N.M. Maurer, The Pursuit of Spiritual Wisdom, 67. 51

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of the spoken word, art that is pure creative power (632; 26 June, 1888; 633; 27 June, 1888). We should remember that Van Gogh here derived the importance of colour as a symbolic language from Delacroix’ paintings here. In Delacroix’ Christ Asleep during the Storm, he saw Christ with his radiant yellow halo. As a symbol of light, the radiant halo represents God or Christ, according to an old tradition.53 He used that in a different way in the later Sower than in his earlier Sower. If the sun in The Sower of June was a halo over the whole country, in The Sower of November, it has now become a halo around the head of the sower-artist. Thus, there is a correspondence in the latter painting between Christ as artist and the sower-artist, and that correspondence is found in their creative power.54 In short, The Sower with Setting Sun (June 1988) shows Van Gogh’s representation of God indirectly via creation: the sun as a halo radiating over the whole countryside, the sower-artist as the image of God scattering seed, the wheat field as human existence, the wheat as an image of people, as an image of the germinating power of love. The painting shows the beauty of creation through the colour combinations. 4.3.2 Starry Night Over the Rhône (September 1888) In Starry Night Over the Rhône [Fig. 4.23], we see how the night, illuminated by twinkling stars, arches over the lit houses whose light is liberally reflected in the water of the river. Two people, a man and a woman, are standing together in the foreground. This painting, too, is impressive in its use of colour. At the beginning of September 1888, Van Gogh wrote to his sister Wil that ‘I definitely want to paint a starry sky now’. He felt that the night is even more richly coloured than the day, coloured in the most intense violets, blues and greens. 53 Pseudo-Dionysius, The Divine Names, 71-72. Van Tilborgh gives a different interpretation of the sun: ‘to indicate that the Provençal rural life was truly an Eldorado he often included the sun in his landscapes, which he – following in the footsteps of Japanese woodcuts – invariably represented as a large globe’ (with reference to, among others, The Sower with Setting Sun painted in November (1888) (Van Tilborgh, In het licht van Japan, 59). Van Tilborgh thinks – in contrast to what appears from Van Gogh’s letters – that religion had disappeared from Van Gogh’s life already before his Parisian period (Van Tilborgh, In het licht van Japan, 53). Van Gogh was still religious after then, as is apparent from his later letters, which will be cited below. 54 As we can see from his letters, this painting, and Starry Night as well, Van Gogh’s view and experience of nature should not be characterised as pantheistic, as Walther and Metzger do (J.F. Walther & R. Metzger, Vincent van Gogh, 607).

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If you look carefully you’ll see that some stars are lemony, others have a pink, green, forget-me-not blue glow’ (678; 9 and 14 September, 1888).

He did the painting by the end of September, he wrote to his brother Theo. He had painted his Starry Night Over the Rhône (hereafter Starry Night) at night by the light of a gas lamp and added a ‘scribble’ about it to the letter: The sky is green-blue, the water is royal blue, the areas of land are mauve. The town is blue and violet. The gaslight is yellow, and its reflections are red gold and go right down to green bronze. Against the green-blue field of the sky the Great Bear has a green and pink sparkle whose discreet paleness contrasts with the harsh gold of the gaslight. Two small coloured figures of lovers in the foreground. (691; ca. 29 September, 1888)

Although Van Gogh also painted the darker side of the night,55 the starry night was very enriching for him in a religious sense. In the letter to Theo cited above he confessed that he had ‘a tremendous need for, shall I say the word — for religion’. He continued: ‘… so I go outside at night to paint the stars …’ (691; ca. 29 September, 1888). For him, religion was not a matter of doctrine and dogma but the religious experience of nature as creation, of love and fellowship among people. Van Gogh reminded Theo twice of the words from a poem by Craik: ‘When all sounds cease – God’s voice is heard – Under the stars’ (119; 4, 5 June, 1877) (131; 18 September, 1877).56 For Van Gogh, the starry night evokes thoughts of the infinite. Because of the sight of the stars, he is also struck by the thought that human existence does not end with death. He draws on the ideas of the astronomer Camille Flammarion about continued existence in the universe.57 While I myself do not see this reference in the painting directly, I do see another idea in the painting. The lovers in the foreground have a symbolic meaning in the painting. The philosopher Immanuel Kant said that ‘the starry heavens above and 55 See The Night Café (September 1888) (676; 8 September, 1888) (677; 9 September, 1888); see also the sequel Starry Night (June 1889). 56 From the poem, ‘Under the Stars’ (1875) by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik. 57 See Maurer, The Pursuit of Spiritual Wisdom; Van Gogh writes: ‘The sight of the stars always makes me dream in as simple a way as the black spots on the map, representing towns and villages, make me dream. Why, I say to myself, should the spots of light in the firmament be less accessible to us than the black spots on the map of France. Just as we take the train to go to Tarascon or Rouen, we take death to go to a star.’ (638; ca. 9 July, 1888).

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the moral law within’ filled him with admiration and awe.58 In his own way, Van Gogh made a comparison in his Starry Night between the shining of the starry sky and the couple in the foreground with the lit houses of Arles along the Rhône. Love is a core moment in Van Gogh’s view of faith. I already cited above his comparison of wheat with love: ‘What the power to germinate is in wheat, so love is in us’ (574; late October 1887).59 In his letter to Theo on the starry sky cited above, he also points to Tolstoy’s book, Ma religion: Tolstoy ‘believes — I’ve perhaps written you it already, in non-violent revolution, through the need for love and religious feeling which must manifest itself in people as a reaction against scepticism and desperate and appalling suffering’ (687; 25 September, 1888). ‘[T]he best way of knowing God is to love a great deal’, as he had already written earlier (155; 22 and 24 June, 1880). And in yet another letter we read: [T]o believe in God, by that I mean feeling that there is a God, not a dead or stuffed God, but a living one who pushes us with irresistible force in the direction of ‘Love on’. That’s what I think. Proof of His presence – the reality of love. Proof of the reality of the feeling of that great power of love deep within us – the existence of God. (189; 23 November, 1881)60

Van Gogh sees a connection between heaven and earth in that both can radiate love. In Starry Night this is symbolised by the couple in the foreground and the brightly lit houses as a sign of the warmth of family life, with the radiant stars above.61 In this painting, he used, as stated above, a dominant contrast of green-blue and red-gold and, in addition, the contrast between purple and yellow (691; 29 September, 1888). Maurer points in this context to Vincent’s letter to his sister in which he speaks of the symbolic meaning of such interactions of harmonious complementary colours. He compares this with the love between a man and a woman: ‘that there are colours that make each other shine, that make a couple, complete each other like man and wife (626; ca. 20 June, 1888).62 58

Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, conclusion; https://www.gutenberg. org/files/5683/5683-h/5683-h.htm. 59 See also Van Gogh’s Landscape with Couple Walking and Crescent Moon (May 1890). 60 On love see also letter 187; 19 November, 1881. 61 On this ideal, see letter 131; 18 September, 1877. 62 Van Gogh wanted to study colour and repeats this metaphor in a letter to Theo: ‘To express the love of two lovers through a marriage of two complementary colours, their mixture and their contrasts, the mysterious vibrations of adjacent tones’ (673; 3 September, 1888) (Maurer, The Pursuit of Spiritual Wisdom, 74).

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Van Gogh’s View of Nature During his Illness In June 1889, when he had been admitted to the psychiatric hospital in Saint-Rémy, Van Gogh did yet another painting of a starry night. His bad health was mirrored in the new version: Starry Night (June 1889) [Fig. 4.24]. The stars are also bright here, but the sky is painted expressively and is very restless with its swirling, light-filled movements. The landscape shows a church with a tall steeple and cypresses, which he painted quite often in this period. He found them ‘beautiful as regards lines and proportions, like an Egyptian obelisk’ but they are gloomy: ‘It’s the dark patch in a sun-drenched landscape’ (783; 25 June, 1889). They symbolise ‘night, mystery, and death’.63 There is an undeniable tension in the painting between the dark landscape with the cypresses and the expanse of light above. There is no loving couple here, though we do see lit houses. Van Gogh also painted a wheat field during his illness, now with a reaper. He wrote to Theo that he had begun to paint a ‘wheatfield where there’s a little reaper and a big sun’ (784; 2 July, 1889). Two months later, he related that he was wrestling with a ‘reaper’. He was referring here to Wheat Field with a Reaper (June-September 1889). Tormented by his illness, he saw the reaper in an ambiguous way: I then saw in this reaper – a vague figure struggling like a devil in the full heat of the day to reach the end of his toil – I then saw the image of death in it, in this sense that humanity would be the wheat being reaped. So if you like it’s the opposite of that Sower I tried before. But in this death nothing sad, it takes place in broad daylight with a sun that floods everything with a light of fine gold. (800; 5/6 September, 1889)

Van Gogh sees suffering and death as part of a meaningful and comforting greater whole. For that, he points to God as the sun that ‘floods everything with a light of fine gold’. This view of suffering emerges in his other letters as well written during this period. There too, looking at the wheat field with all the symbolism Van Gogh attached to it is a source of encouragement: It is precisely in learning to suffer without complaining, learning to consider pain without repugnance, that one risks vertigo a little; and yet it might be possible, yet one glimpses even a vague probability that on the other side of life we’ll glimpse justifications for pain, which seen from here sometimes takes up the whole horizon so much that it takes on the despairing proportions of a deluge. Of that we know very little, of proportions, and it’s better to look at a wheatfield, even in the state of a painting. (784; 2 July, 1889)64 63 64

Maurer, The Pursuit of Spiritual Wisdom, 92. Maurer, The Pursuit of Spiritual Wisdom, 92-93.

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Imaging God in his Actions For Van Gogh, God is ‘unfathomable, “awfully Unnameable”’ (403; ca. 5 November, 1883). As a celestial figure, God cannot be depicted or represented. He wrote to Emile Bernard that one had to paint things ‘as they are’, like the Dutch painters do. God Himself cannot be imaged, nor can we seek for Him via a metaphysical path. We should not allow our mental powers to evaporate in sterile metaphysical meditations that aren’t up to bottling chaos, which is chaotic for the very reason that it won’t fit into any glass of our calibre. We can — and that’s what those Dutchmen did, desperately clever in the eyes of people wedded to system — we can paint an atom of chaos. A horse, a portrait, your grandmother, apples, a landscape. (655; ca. 5 August, 1888)

Van Gogh indicates sharply that God ‘won’t fit into any glass of our calibre’, that the painter can show him only indirectly, in creation, as ‘an atom of chaos’. God’s non-imageability does not turn God into an empty concept – to the contrary. God is love, according to Van Gogh. After all, the divine mystery is revealed in creation as love, as I cited from his letters. That is also why he painted nature primarily as material nature, the things ‘as they are’: for him, the transcendent loving God is present in nature – the couple in his Starry Night (September 1888) symbolise that. He compared the germinating power of kernels of wheat with the love in us. Creation was, for him, also an expression of beauty. Love and beauty go together, as I already cited from the letter to his sister Wil, written when he was painting Starry Night: he wants to ‘paint nature’s rich and magnificent aspects’ because ‘we need good cheer and happiness, hope and love’ (678; 9 and 16 September, 1888). According to Silverman, Van Gogh’s paintings show a theology that is similar to that of the Dutch modern theologian, J.H. Scholten, and especially Allard Pierson.65 The background of this theology of modern thinkers in the nineteenth century in the Netherlands and of Van Gogh’s view of faith is the thinking of the German theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher. In my view, Van Gogh masterfully translated Schleiermacher’s definition of religion – ‘intuition of the universe and feeling for the infinite’ – in his paintings. In doing so, he shows how God can be represented indirectly, without using any image of God as such. He depicts God 65

Silverman, Van Gogh and Gauguin, chapter 5.

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indirectly through his actions in the world by depicting nature as the creation of God.66

4.4 The Abstract Imaging of God: The Black Paintings of Ad Reinhardt In addition to the depiction of God in his actions, there is also the possibility of depicting Him through abstraction without resorting to images. In the twentieth century, a number of painters began to use abstraction to show the invisible in the visible. Kandinsky, Mondrian, Newman, and Rothko made use of abstraction to evoke a transcendental reality.67 In his paintings, the American artist Ad Reinhardt (1913-1967) sought the limits of the image by abandoning the image. He wanted to make ‘final images’ in order to bring painting to an end. We will first look at two of Reinhardt’s well-known Black Paintings, a silk screen from 1964 (No title) [Fig. 4.25] in Tate Britain and Abstract Painting No. 5 from 1962, which hangs in Tate Liverpool [Fig. 4.26]. The silk screen is a square of 30.5 by 30.5 centimetres on white paper. Looking at it, I first saw only a uniform black monochrome square. After some time, I discerned the form of a Greek cross in it, one broad vertical beam and one horizontal, both extending to the edge. I was able to distinguish both beams because of a somewhat lighter black, tending towards grey, which makes them stand out a bit against the black square. What did I actually see? The vague cross turned the black area of the square into a grid with three equal parts or nine sub-squares. Was I looking at a cross or at emptiness? The cross seemed to fade away. Something similar can be said about Abstract Painting No. 5.68 The central term in Reinhardt’s abstraction is negation with respect to painting itself. His iconoclasm is a matter internal to painting itself and has no religious motivation. What I saw as a Greek cross in this black work 66 B. Welsh-Ovcharov gives a different explanation of Van Gogh’s view of religion, interpreting paintings like The Sower and Starry Night in a mystical way. The term mysticism is thus used in a very broad way. Welsh-Ovcharov even believes she can indicate the mystical path of purification, enlightenment, and unity in Van Gogh. For her mystical interpretation of versions of The Sower and Starry Night, see B. Welsh-Ovcharov, ‘Let us become Mystics of Art’: Van Gogh, Gauguin and the Nabis, 81-88. 67 See my Where Heaven and Earth Meet; for what now follows, see also my Beeldverbod en mystiek: Ad Reinhardt, 55-65. 68 Reinhardt describes his Black Paintings as ‘classical black-square uniform five-foot timeless trisected evanescences of the sixties’ (A. Reinhardt, Art as Art, 10; see also pp. 82-83).

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was intended as something different by Reinhardt himself: ‘I never had … the cross as a symbol in mind in my paintings …. I want to give it no meaning.’69 In his abstraction, Reinhardt is concerned with the aesthetic experience that the black canvas evokes and not with a religious experience. As an artist, he is seeking the image that is not an image, not a presentation of the observable world. It is an attempt to present the final image, thus separate from observable reality. The painting comes close to being a surface without an image, objectless, an imageless image. He still uses the form of a cross and black in different tones to make the blurred cross somewhat visible. It will stop short of being completely imageless for, if it did not, one would no longer be able to speak of a painting in distinction from its physical medium, such as a linen canvas and paint.70 According to Reinhardt, painting should be as pure as possible – in that respect he aligns himself with the school of thought that holds that painting should be autonomous (1.5.1) That is why painting can no longer be dependent on other realities like history (history painting), people (portraiture), nature (landscapes), or still lifes.71 Thus, Reinhardt himself does not view his Black Paintings as religious works. Various experts of his work do, however. There are good reasons to view Reinhardt’s painting as a good example of how to depict the God beyond depiction. There is an undeniable parallel between this almost imageless painting and mysticism. Reinhardt had read a great deal about mysticism, as his own writings show. Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk in the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky was a friend of Reinhardt and asked him in the mid-1950s to paint a small black and blue painting with a cross for his cell.72 He was given one of the Black Paintings in November 1957 and wrote in a letter to Reinhardt that he saw it as a religious painting and used it to focus his concentration and empty his mind of images while engaged in contemplation. ‘It is a most religious, devout, and latreutic small painting (“latreutic” here meaning conductive to worship).’73 69 Reinhardt in an interview with Walter Gaudneck, cited by B. Rose in Reinhardt, Art as Art, 186. 70 L.R. Lippard, Ad Reinhardt, 155-162. 71 Reinhardt himself points to negative progression in painting where ‘[t]he still life, landscape, the pure still life and the pure landscape and the pure portrait were negations of all kinds of narrative, mythological, and historical painting.’ An interview with Ad Reinhardt, 1966-1967, in Art as Art, 17. 72 See the photograph of this painting in the article by J. Masheck, Five Unpublished Letters from Ad Reinhardt to Thomas Merton and Two in Return, 23-27. 73 Masheck, Five Unpublished Letters from Ad Reinhardt to Thomas Merton and Two in Return, 24.

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Merton explains why this painting is an aid to contemplative prayer. He points to the almost invisible cross on the black background. Although it is immersed in darkness, the cross does attempt to show itself. But one has to look closely to see the cross. It requires concentration on the painting, as if one is looking through a window at night. Merton calls it a holy painting, an image without features, to have the spirit actually grow accustomed to the night of prayer – and to help the one praying put aside trivial and useless images that hover in his mind and have an adverse effect on prayer.74 In his Seeds of Contemplation, Merton writes that one can begin with contemplation by: A sudden emptying of the soul in which images vanish, concepts and words are silent, and freedom and clarity suddenly open out with you until your whole being embraces the wonder, the depth, the obviousness and yet the emptiness and unfathomable incomprehensibility of God.75

He cites John of Ruysbroeck who speaks of a light that is darkness at the same time: ‘and from the unity of God there shines into him a simple light. This simple light shows itself to be darkness, nakedness, and nothingness.’76 This paradoxical unity of light and darkness can be seen if one lingers over Reinhardt’s Black Paintings. In her study of Reinhardt, Lucy Lippard writes how, when looking at the Black Paintings in that way, the black paradoxically becomes lighter: The effect is already cool, the black so matte that it appears grayed – the source of a curious effect unique to Reinhardt’s work in which the light seems to derive from the surface itself as well as from the colors hidden within.77

Reinhardt has applied paint in many layers, with the effect that dark and light coincide. For the motivation behind his Black Paintings, Reinhardt points to the well-known saying by Nicholas of Cusa on the coincidence of opposites.78 According to Nicholas, opposites coincide in God, and that applies here to the Black Paintings with their light and dark. 74

M. Corris, Ad Reinhardt, 88. T. Merton, Seeds of Contemplation, 214. 76 T. Merton, Contemplative Prayer, 103. 77 Lippard, Ad Reinhardt, 144. On black and colour in the Black Paintings, see Lippard, Ad Reinhardt, 146-152. The catalogue of the Tate Gallery states about Abstract Painting No. 5: ‘In fact the blue-black surface … has an underlying grid of different coloured squares …. Each of these colours was mixed with black oil paint to give a matt surface quality’ (www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/reinhardt-abstract-painting-no-5-t01582). 78 Reinhardt: ‘How needful it is to enter into the darkness and to admit the coincidence of opposites to seek the truth where impossibility meets us. Nicholas of Cusa,’ Art as Art, 10. The influence of Eastern mysticism possibly plays a role here as well, according to B. Rose. Reinhardt opted for the polarities that one encounters in Eastern thinking, according to 75

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There are other correspondences between mysticism and this (almost) imageless painting by Reinhardt. Time, attention, and concentration are required both in viewing the Black Paintings and in the mystical exercise. Painting itself is based, according to Reinhardt, on formula and repetition. Thus, in the last seven years of his life, Reinhardt repeated the Black Paintings with minute variations. Both the mystical path and Reinhardt’s painting ask for detachment from oneself. The mystical knowledge of God is a process in which one transcends both oneself and also the analogies with which we usually speak about God; here one must let go of the familiar subject-object attitude. Reinhardt asks the artist to do something similar. He views freedom as a liberation from oneself and from the vicissitudes of everyday.79 And does that not also apply to the viewer when he looks at the Black Paintings in a contemplative way? Interpreted religiously, Reinhardt’s imageless black works are good examples of how God can be represented in an image-less way. The strength of his painting is that, as an artist, he iconoclastically calls the image as such into question. In that way he prevents the image from becoming an idol. Painting and negative theology both display a parallel movement of iconoclasm.80 In connection with the (im)possibility of speaking about God, the latter does not want to borrow any terms from our world. Both are critical of images; this is seen in painting in the representation of reality in general and, more specifically with respect to what can be called an image. Reinhardt points out that in searching for meaning in a painting, we must look not only at what painters are doing but also at what they refuse to do. That also applies to himself. He speaks in terms of negation about his pure abstraction: The one object of fifty years of abstract art is to present art-as-art and as nothing else, to make it into one thing it is only, separating and defining it more and more, making it purer and emptier, more absolute and more exclusive – non-objective, non-representational, non-figurative, non-imagist, non-expressionist, non-subjective. The only way and one way to say what abstract art or art-as-art is, is to say what it is not.81

In both, ‘negative’ painting and negative theology, the issue is not one of nihilism, of the lack of meaning or purpose. Reinhardt considers his black abstractions to be meaningful art, art as art. He sees emptiness as which a view cannot be given without immediately evoking its opposite. In this context, the cross becomes an ideal image for expressing the polarities of horizontal and vertical. Rose in: Art as Art, 186. 79 Rose in her introduction to Reinhardt, Art as Art, xvi. 80 See also his reference above to Nicholas of Cusa, note 78. 81 Reinhardt, Art as Art, 53.

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the limit of the image in painting. In a religious interpretation of his Black Paintings, emptiness is viewed as the ‘emptiness and incomprehensibility of God’. The negativity of these abstract works in no way detracts from their numinous effect, as the well-known American art critic Donald Kuspit notes. Here it concerns an experience that cannot be expressed in words: There is no denying the numinous effect generated by the negativity of silent abstraction. Silent painting, contemplated in a more than casual way, has a numinous effect simply by reason of its radical concreteness, its conditional immediacy. It is … not the vehicle of communication of religious dogma but of a certain kind of irreducible, nondiscursive experience.82

The Black Paintings evoke a religious experience that can no longer be expressed in words. In the mystical void, one’s experience of God is radically different. The Paintings share with Schönberg’s Moses the view that God is radically different, but with this difference: according to a religious interpretation of Reinhardt’s paintings, God is not an empty idea but is experienced and imaged as emptiness and incomprehensibility. According to a religious interpretation, Reinhardt seeks the boundary between the image and abolishing the image in order to depict what is wholly other than our reality. These works show the relation of God to the world as one of radical transcendence by emphasising the greatest possible difference between God and human beings. 4.5 Conclusion Two Objections In the modern art of Van Gogh and Reinhardt, I have given two examples of how the impasse in art with regard to the early modern Western depiction of God the Father (4.2.3) has been overcome. Two objections can be made against my interpretation. With respect to Van Gogh’s The Sower and Starry Night, it can be stated, as said above, that the theme is not God but the landscape or the starry night. I interpreted them as examples of representations of God’s actions in creation. Rublev’s icon also depicts God in his actions, but with this difference: the Trinity icon has God as its theme. The Sower and Starry Night do not have God as their theme but as their motif. I will explain that below. 82 D. Kuspit, Concerning the Spiritual in Contemporary Art, 319. See also G. Boehm, Ikonoklastik und Transzendenz, 29.

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In this chapter, I have interpreted some works by Van Gogh and Reinhardt as religious works of art that receive meaning within religious practice. I used the term meaning in different ways. Regarding the two paintings by Van Gogh, it had to do with the meaning that he himself ascribed to his works in his letters. In Reinhardt’s work it concerned the meaning the users attributed to it despite the intention of the artist. Is that a responsible way to interpret art by making use of the artist’s intention in the one case and of the response of the work of the viewers in the other? The Interpretation of a Work of Art Hermeneutics discusses the question as to where the emphasis should lie on the interpretation of texts – on the intention of the author, on the work, or on those who read the work. This question applies not only to the interpretation of texts but also to the visual arts. One cannot always trust the artist’s spoken intention. There is always the question whether she or he has been able to express that intention, and that is why the work can never be judged exclusively on that basis. That would be committing the intentional fallacy. Something similar obtains when the interpretation is determined exclusively by the response to the work. The ones viewing the work can read something into it uncritically. In my view, we should follow the rule that one should start with the work of art itself, but both the artist’s intention and the reception of those who are knowledgeable on the matter also play a role. All three – the work of art itself, the intention of the artist, and the response to the work of art – figure in the interpretation. How? That depends on the specific work, as we saw above in the interpretation of Van Gogh and Reinhardt.83 In the case of the former, the intention of the artist was important; in the case of the latter, it was not. In both cases, the interpretation is connected back to the work itself. That is the requirement: the work itself is the basis of possible interpretations of it. In this context, I now come back to Isabelle Malz’ assessment of the works in The Problem of God exhibition. She approached that from the artist’s intention; she was speaking, after all, of non-religiously motivated works (2.2). The judgment of the religious character of some works varies if the viewer’s – such as A.M. Spijkerboer’s84 – response is also taken into account. 83 Wolterstorff also distinguishes between the ‘maker-meaning’ and the ‘social practice-meaning’. He considers both to be important (Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 111-116). 84 A.M. Spijkerboer, Gods pijn, 67-83.

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The interpretation of art can be more or less convincing, though we should remember that a work of art is open to different interpretations. When interpreting religious works as we are doing in this part of this book, the question arises: How do works with Christian themes relate to Scripture and tradition? We will explore this question in the next chapter (5.3 and 5.5). Imaging God as Theme or Motif Rublev’s icon has God as its theme (just as Reinhardt’s Black Paintings do when interpreted religiously). The Sower and Starry Night have, respectively, the sower and the fertile field, and the starry sky as theme. How can they be considered examples of an (indirect) representation of God? The distinction between theme and motif from Christian iconography is illuminating.85 Theme refers to the subject of a work. Thus, the icon that depicts Mary and the angel Gabriel has the annunciation of Mary’s pregnancy as its theme. Motif refers to a part of the work and serves the theme. In an icon like The Annunciation to Mary, a small representation of God can appear above in the centre as a motif in which God commissions Gabriel to convey this news to Mary. God is also presented as a motif on icons of the Baptism of Jesus: beams of light can be seen above in the centre, sometimes with a dove that descends on Jesus in the Jordan from above. How is God to be indicated as a motif in Van Gogh’s paintings of The Sower and Starry Night? The theme of The Sower is the sower and the fertile field. As motif, God is here the creator of the fertile land and is presented symbolically as the sun with its halo. In Starry Night, God is imaged symbolically as a motif by the ‘the stars and infinity above’. In connection to the question of theme or motif, I refer in passing to a special landscape painting, Northland (1962) by the New Zealand painter Colin McCahon [Fig. 4.27]. Given its title, this painting seems to have landscape as its theme, but in fact it is God that is the theme here. McCahon does that by representing the landscape abstractly by means of abstract figures borrowed from the Christian tradition.86 In this chapter we have discussed various ways of imaging God as ‘the invisible of the Son’. In the next chapter we will look at the way in which Christ is imaged in modern and contemporary art as ‘the visible of the Father’. 85 86

Boespflug, Dieu et ses images, s.v. Motif and s.v. Sujet, 513, 515. M. Bloem, Colin McCahon: A Question of Faith, 199.

5. THE FACE OF CHRIST

5.1 Introduction Let us look at few portraits of Christ that were made in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. I will compare them with an icon of Christ from Eastern Orthodoxy like the Mandylion [Fig. 5.28] or Hans Memling’s Saint Veronica [Fig. 1.5]. As far as composition is concerned, Lefteris Olympios’ work [Fig. 5.39] resembles Memling’s. What is depicted, however, is not Christ but a freedom fighter. Jawlensky’s Face [Fig. 5.32] is abstract and differs visually from the Mandylion and the Veronica. Rouault’s Holy Face [Fig. 5.34] is not like the older Holy Faces, though there are some similarities: an oval face with a long, thin nose, a beard, and a moustache. There is a family resemblance. According to tradition, the Mandylion and the Veronica were ‘not made by human hands.’ The origin legends claimed that they were ‘true representations’, as I discussed in chapter 1 (1.3.1). Contemporary images of Christ do not claim true likeliness. This chapter will look at examples of the Holy Face by Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios (5.4). The issue we will be exploring is how modern and contemporary images of Christ can be seen in relation to the Face of Christ ‘not made by human hands’. To answer this question, I will discuss the argument that the Eastern Orthodox theologian Vladimir Lossky provides for the authenticity of the Mandylion (5.2). But I will first give a more complete introduction to this icon.

5.2 An Argument for the True Likeness of the Mandylion The Mandylion Icon The Mandylion icon shown here [Fig. 5.28] goes back to the second half of the nineteenth century. It is a copy of the Holy Face, the image of Christ not made by human hands. If an icon is made according to the rules of the church, it is to be seen as the Mandylion, the icon of Christ, even if it is a replica. Such an icon consists of two parts: the face of Christ and the cloth on which the face of Christ was imprinted. At the top can be found the Greek letters IC – XC, the abbreviated name of

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Jesus Christ as a designation for the incarnate Son of God. The halo around his head contains the sign of the cross with the Greek phrase ho oon (Greek) – barely visible here – which means ‘He who truly is’ (Exodus 3:14). The form of the cross is his halo, and this points to his suffering. The double lines in the halo behind Christ’s head point to his twofold nature. Under the face of Christ the words ‘not made by human hands’ are written in Church Slavonic. In older representations, this icon was painted in a flat, two dimensional way. Since the second half of the thirteenth century, however, it was given pleats, as in this icon. That gives the impression that Christ’s face is not on the canvas but is hovering in front of it. The divine face is incorruptible and therefore not subject to the pleats on the cloth. The face is serious, the eyes are wide open and the gaze is directed outward; the nose is fine, elongated, and turns at the top into two elegant eyebrows; the hair falls in wavy tresses alongside the face. It is the expression of Christ who did not come into the world to condemn it but to save it (John 3:17). Lossky on the Holy Face ‘Not Made by Human Hands’ The Eastern Orthodox theologian Vladimir Lossky states that the designation ‘not made by human hands’ (acheiropoiētos) is applicable first of all to Christ himself.1 In support of this, he points to Jesus’ words: ‘I will destroy this temple made with human hands and in three days will build another, not made with hands’ (Mark 14:58). Here Jesus points to his resurrection on the third day, on Easter morning. Lossky considers this term ‘not made by human hands’ to be applicable not only to Christ but also to his material image, the Mandylion. This brings us face to face with a central point of the Eastern Orthodox doctrine of icons. This characteristic of ‘not made by human hands’, which obtains for the risen Christ, was also attributed to his depiction, the icon of Christ. The icon painters, Lossky continues, had to suppress their own inclination to create (with their hands) when making the icon of Christ. Instead, they had to follow the tradition that connected them with the original ‘not made by human hands’. For this, he refers to the legendary Abgar story already discussed above (1.3.1). The Mandylion of which this story speaks was said to be the material witness ‘not made by hands’ to the incarnation of the Word. In its own way, it expresses the view that Christian iconography – and 1 For this and what follows see Lossky in L. Oupensky & V. Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 69-72.

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above all the possibility of representing Christ – has its foundation in the fact of the incarnation, in God’s becoming flesh. Thus, the sacred art of the icon cannot be the arbitrary creation of the artist. Rather, the artist has to bring the living Truth, ‘not made by human hands’, to expression in his art. Like no other holy image, this icon ‘not made by human hands’ expresses ‘the dogmatic principle’ of iconography. This icon was venerated at the feast of Orthodoxy. To preserve its sacred character, the Stoglav Council of Moscow (the Council of 100 Chapters) prescribed in 1551 that the image of Christ needed to be painted with great care following the traditional type. Only those who, through God’s grace, could reproduce the form and the likeness were allowed to paint icons.2

5.3 The ‘True Image’ Questioned I do not find this explanation of the Mandylion as ‘not made by human hands’ convincing, however.3 What Jesus says about his appearance after his resurrection – ‘not made by human hands’ – cannot be compared with his depiction, the icon of Christ.4 The New Testament does not tell us how Jesus rose from the dead, how the resurrected body was made ‘without hands’. The analogy between the origination of a portrait ‘not made by hands’ and the risen body of Christ is too weak because, according to the evangelists’ account, the resurrection is an event that took place on the boundary between heaven and earth. We will see below how Gijs Frielings’ Paasmorgen (Easter Morning) depicts the Paschal mystery (7.2). Augustine already established that we do not have an original image of God. According to him, the reader of the New Testament constructs an image in his mind of what is written about Him. Such images are our own ideas, and it is uncertain who is the closest to the real Jesus and has the most accurate idea. Augustine then writes about the face of Jesus: For even the countenance of our Lord Himself in the flesh is variously fancied by the diversity of countless imaginations, which yet was one, 2 See the text of the Council in: D. Menozzi, Les images, section 23. See also Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, chapter 21. 3 For the Veronica, see chapter 1.3.1 of this study and for the Shroud of Turin, see N. MacGregor, Seeing Salvation, 99-104. 4 Belting also rejects arguments like Lossky’s but refers in this context not to Christ’s resurrected body but to Christ himself as the image of God not made by human hand (Belting, Das echte Bild, 69-70).

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whatever it was. Nor in our faith which we have of our Lord Jesus Christ, is that wholesome which the mind imagines for itself, perhaps far other than the reality ….5

The Roman Catholic historian of Christian art François Boespflug remarks that he does not distinguish between material images not made by human hands, like the Mandylion or the Veronica, and other images of Christ that he discusses in his Le Regard du Christ dans l’Art (2014). According to him, there is no canon of paintings like a canon of writings that we call the Bible. He does not consider the various depictions of the Holy Face to be inspired in the same way in which people speak of the inspiration of the Bible.6 If there is no true image of Christ, then the question is what the starting point is for the depictions of Christ like those by Jawlensky and Rouault. When Boespflug speaks of the portrayal of God in Dieu et ses images, he proposes the rule, as we saw in the previous chapter, that God should be depicted in a Christomorphic way. But what does it mean to depict something in the form of Christ if we do not have any ‘true’ image of Christ? In his Le Regard du Christ dans l’Art, Boespflug remarks that artists in the West have depicted the God-man in very different ways throughout the whole of history (multiple et disséminée en mille et un visages).7 This discourages him, as a historian, from believing in the historically accurate knowledge of Jesus’ physiognomy, and therefore he cannot agree with ‘the theory of the church memory of the physical features of Christ’. Such a theory contradicts the facts.8 Boespflug makes a proposal for resolving the problem. First of all, he considers the diversity itself of depictions of Christ to be the positive side of the constantly new ‘aesthetic inculturation’ of the face of Christ. The depiction of Christ concerns a spiritual resemblance, an affinity that goes beyond the external similarity to the historical Jesus. In his view, when looking at representations of Christ, the focus should be on the pictorial archetype of this human being: gentle and humble in heart, one who is 5

Augustine, On the Trinity 8.4.7. F. Boespflug, Le Regard du Christ, 215-216. 7 Boespflug, Le Regard du Christ, 216. 8 Boespflug, Le Regard du Christ, 216. David Morgan, who has primarily studied the material image of Jesus in the popular culture of the English-speaking world, comes to similar conclusions. An image of Christ arose that was generally recognisable, such as Head of Christ by Werner Sallman, 1940 (D. Morgan, The Forge of Vision, chapter 6), but the visual difference of this ‘holy portrait’ from the Eastern Orthodox Christ icon is extensive. 6

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able ‘to empathize with our weaknesses’, who ‘has been tempted in every way, just as we are – yet he did not sin’ (Hebrews 4:15).9 I agree with Boespflug’s critique of the claim of the ‘authenticity’ of the depiction of Christ and look for the solution for a proper depiction of Christ along the same lines. I will make the following proposal for how we can approach the ‘pictorial archetype’ of the Christ figure. The Image of Christ in the New Testament The starting point for the material images of Christ should, in my view, be Christ as the New Testament describes him, and that is, contra Boespflug, not limited to the Letter to the Hebrews. Christ is ‘painted’ in many different ways in the stories of the evangelists, in the New Testament letters, and in the Revelation of John. There is no ‘pure image’ of Jesus that can be discovered under or behind the descriptions provided by the New Testament writers. I will give a brief impression of the different ways the gospel stories and the Revelation of John speak of him. And I will do so only insofar as it is necessary to identify them in the various depictions of Christ. The evangelist John has a ‘high’ image of Christ: the heavenly man who descends to earth from heaven and returns to the Father after completing his task. John sketches Jesus as living in a deep relationship with God the Father: ‘I and the Father are one’ (John 10:30). Mark’s Jesus contrasts with that picture. In Mark’s gospel, Jesus’ path is not one of triumph but of opposition. This gospel ends with an open question about the resurrection. Between the conceptions of Mark and John are the two gospels of Matthew and Luke. Matthew presents Jesus in terms of his Jewish background – the Son of David, the Son of Abraham – and sees him as the expected Messiah. Luke wrote his gospel for non-Jewish readers and traces Jesus’ lineage back to the ‘son of Adam’. Moreover, Luke places the accent on the diaconal Jesus; see, for example, the parable of the Good Samaritan. In the book of Revelation, John sees in his vision God and Christ with the power that they exercise in different ways in the world: the Father as source of ultimate power and the Son as the suffering redeemer who is deemed worthy to open the book of history (Revelation 1:19-20; 4 and 5).10 9

Boespflug, Le Regard du Christ, 216. N. O’Hear and A. O’Hear, Picturing the Apocalypse. See also Sutherland’s representation of Christ in majesty (7.4). 10

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If the New Testament is the starting point for the material images of Christ, it is not a question of physical likeness but of the spiritual image that the evangelists and John’s Revelation sketch of him. Depictions of Christ’s Holy Face arise in certain historical contexts. We will now look at a few modern and contemporary examples of this. In the conclusion I will give my view of whether we can speak of continuity between the old and the modern and contemporary images of Christ found in Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios and link these with their starting point: the descriptions of Jesus in the New Testament (5.5). 5.4 Contemporary Depictions of the Holy Face 5.4.1 Alexej von Jawlensky: The Face as Interiorised Meditation Image In addition to his still lifes and landscapes, the Russian painter Alexej von Jawlensky (1864-1941) primarily painted portraits. He began his series Faces in 1917. I will give a few examples of his religious Faces from three series: Saviour’s Faces (1917-1922), Abstract Heads (1918-1934), and Meditations (1934-1937). In Saviour’s Face: The Holy Hour – Last Look (1919) [Fig. 5.29], we see an oval, stylised face with a somewhat round mouth, the lips quite visible because of their red and green colour, a straight line for the nose, which turns sharply at the bottom and ends above as an eyebrow, also with a sharp turn. The almond-shaped eyes are wide open, with deep black pupils. Above the eyes is a green dot, possibly a symbol of wisdom. The hair is parted in the middle and falls downwards in waves alongside the face. The face takes up almost the whole canvas and is cut off above by the edge of the canvas. The expression on the face is that of a visionary, apparent not only because of the wide-open eyes but primarily because of the various colours of yellow, green, pink-red, light blue, brown, and the black of the eyes, while the edges of the canvas are various shades of grey. The title The Holy Hour – Last Look refers to Jesus’ time of prayer in Gethsemane (Matthew 26:38-39), which is called the ‘holy hour’. The faces gradually become more stylised. An example is found in the series Abstract Heads, called Abstract Head: Pain (1927) [Fig. 5.30]. The chin and cheeks form a U-shape. The face is composed of various areas. The mouth is a half-circle, and the nose a triangle: it extends on the one side to an eyebrow, a black-brown stripe. The eyes, two black stripes, are closed. The forehead is shaped like a tent or curtain. The colours are applied in fields and go from light to dark, like the blue on

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the right cheek or change, as on the forehead, into other colours: purple, blue, yellow, green, orange, and black. The closed eyes and the colours give the portrait the expression of quiet grief. At the end of the 1920s, Jawlensky showed signs of arthrosis, which gradually caused him much pain when painting. He wrote the following about his last series, Meditations (1934-1937): This stiffness in my elbows and wrists has tremendously hindered my painting and I have had to find a new technique. My art in the last period has all been in small format, but my paintings have become even deeper and more spiritual, speaking purely through colour.11

An example can be found in the Meditations series: Meditation Versunken (1934) [Fig. 5.32]. The human face is no longer geometric as in Abstract Head: Pain but reduced to black bars. The face is slightly inclined. Below, we see a short horizontal line and, above, two smaller black lines on the side; the lower face has the form of a U that is cut off by the edge of the canvas. The mouth, nose, and eyes emerge through thick stripes. Together, the bars form a cross. The paint is applied with long brush strokes in different directions. The various parts of the face are done in different colours. The right cheek is green and yellow, the left dark purple and orange; the brush strokes show that they have been applied vertically. The area above the eyes is lighter in colour. What is striking is the white section above the eyes, which is similar to the symbol of wisdom, we saw on the Saviour’s Face. The face seems to come towards the viewer, an impression that arises because, more so than in the previous series, image and canvas converge and the face is also cut off above. The face is strongly interiorised. Jawlensky’s Faces How are we to view the faces against the background of the depictions of the face of Christ in the Christian tradition, such as the Mandylion? Can we agree with Wouter Prins that the paintings in the series Saviour’s Faces resemble ‘modern icons, spiritualised portraits of Christ?’12 Angelica Jawlensky-Bianconi also calls these Faces ‘the angel-like face of Christ’.13 Other authors as well point to the affinity between Jawlensky’s 11

Jawlensky, Memories, 23. W. Prins, Het heilig aanschijn, 508. 13 A. Jawlensky-Bianconi, Innere Visionen, 28. Rombold also holds that various faces resemble the Christ figure (G. Rombold, Der Streit um das Bild, 159). 12

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faces and the Eastern Orthodox icon.14 That is also obvious because he himself felt closely connected with the icon tradition.15 The accompanying text of the exhibition Alexej von Jawlensky: Expressionisme en devotie (November 2018 – January 2019, Kunstmuseum Den Haag) also refers to the connection with the icon tradition but emphasises that Jawlensky was looking for a universal spirituality. What is meant by that? A universal religion? An accompanying text at the exhibition quotes Jawlensky: ‘A face is not just a face for me, but the whole cosmos. The whole universe is revealed in a face.’ Almost all heads at the exhibition point to the Christian tradition. Jawlensky was also familiar with the mystical tradition of other religions. One of his Faces is called Abstract Head: Karma (1933). There are numerous references to Jawlensky’s search for universal spirituality. We will see what this ‘universal aspect’ entails below. How are we to view Jawlensky’s heads in a religious sense? A first glance at the heads shows a difference in external form from the Eastern icon of Christ. That is also true as well for the faces that refer explicitly in their titles to Christ, such as Saviour’s Face: The Holy Hour – Last Look and Saviour’s Face: Christ (1920) [Fig. 5.31], where Christ is depicted with closed eyes. Some heads refer to other figures in the Christian tradition, such as John the Baptist or the angel Gabriel, and other heads often refer to an emotional state in their titles, such as Saviour’s Face: Self-Denial (1921) or Abstract Head: Light and Darkness (1925) or the Abstract Head: Pain discussed above. That can point to Christ and to the mystical believer in his meditation. What does Jawlensky want the viewer to see in his heads? Is it the face of Christ or of a mystical believer, or both? Before I answer that, I would like to say something more about his development as a painter and his view of art during his time in Munich (1896-1914). The Synthesis The heads discussed above are not portraits in the sense of depictions of specific individuals. Katharina Schmidt points to the spiritualised expression of the face in the Saviour’s Faces through the subtle nuances of 14 J. Hahl-Koch, Der frühe Jawlensky, 28-29, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 24-46; K. Schmidt, Das Prinzip der offenen Serie, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 97-98. For other interpretations, see V. Rattemeyer, Vorstoss ins Reich des Sublimen, 59-77. 15 V. Rattemeyer, From the Large Figural Representations to the ‘Meditations’, 24.

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colour that create an impression of immateriality and irreality. They seem to be ‘allegories of the Christian gospel’.16 To arrive at such an abstract, non-realistic way of painting, Jawlensky underwent a development that began with the realism that he learned from the well-known realist painter Ilya Repin in Petersburg. He later distanced himself from this realism in Munich. If we look at his portraits from his time in Munich (1896-1914), the focus proves not to be on the portrayed subject but on the colours of the painting. That can already be seen in the portrait of the woman who would later become his wife, Helene: Helene in Spanish Costume (1901).17 We have a full-length view of her, with her wide red skirt and orange-red shawl with green dots. Next to the red is the complementary colour green of her blouse, while the white and bit of black of her waistband contrast with her black hair. The painting makes an impression more through the colours chosen than by the nice but somewhat common face of Helene.

Jawlensky gradually distanced himself from the classical portrait that is intended to depict a person in his or her individuality and status. In contrast, Jawlensky uses the portrayed subject for developing colour combinations. What we saw above in the later religious Faces can also be seen in its initial stages from his period in Munich.18 The colours used blur the individual character of the face and express primarily an attitude or a specific emotional state of the person depicted. In Munich, Jawlensky worked with the notion of ‘synthesis’ that he shared there with Kandinsky, Marc, and other painters. That was the view of art endorsed by the New Artists’ Society of Munich (Neue KünstlerVereinigung München) (1909). This synthesis entails that the artist seeks artistic forms that interweave the impressions received from the outside world (nature) with the gathering of experiences from the inner world of the artist, according to the society’s articles of association.19 The artistic synthesis concerns the bipolarity of a work of art: external forms of the nature and their intertwining of the inner world of the artist. Jawlensky underscores that already in 1905: ‘for me, apples, trees, human faces are nothing more than indications to see something else in them: the life of colour ….’20 The mutual influence of the outside world 16

Schmidt, Das Prinzip der offenen Serie, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 96. See www.jawlensky.ch, Helene im Spanischen Kostüm. 18 To support this view, Gronert points to Russian Woman (1911) and Girl with Downcast Eyes (1912): S. Gronert, Alexej Jawlensky: Große Meditation, 29-36. 19 A. Zweite, Jawlensky in München, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 55. 20 G. Leinz, Das Problem der Synthese bei Alexej Jawlensky, 44, cited by V. Rattemeyer, Vorstoss ins Reich des Sublimen, 66. 17

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and the interior world of the artist is, for Jawlensky, a search for the original form of things. Paintings of nature or human beings are to be seen primarily as surfaces on which colours and forms interact harmoniously. That entails the rejection of impressionism with its accent on the specific observation of nature by the artist, as well as pure abstraction in which a landscape or a face no longer appears at all, as in Kandinsky’s abstractions. The Original Form of the Mystical Face Jawlensky further developed the ideal of synthesis in 1914 and continued to paint series of landscapes and portraits. It was in this way, via the individual character of a landscape or a face, via the possible ways it can appear, that their universal images emerged.21 Through the continual representation of what was given, Jawlensky arrived at depicting the original form of what he was painting. And that was true in particular for his religious Faces. In the Saviour’s Faces series, the primal form is still somewhat less fixed than in the Abstract Heads series. There the basic structure of the face is the U-shape, the formula for the series. One of the Abstract Heads is thus called Urform (Original Form).22 While the basic structure is the constant in the series, the colour is the variable element. In the example given above, Abstract Head: Pain, it is primarily the colours that express the emotional state of grief. In the Meditations, the black cross is the fixed form and the individual works acquire their individuality because of the colour.23 By continuing to paint the face, Jawlensky adheres to the synthesis view until the end. For him, nature and people are the starting point. More than the landscape, the face lends itself to the interiorisation of Jawlensky’s painting. It is, after all, the place where the outer and the inner worlds meet. He himself says: ‘I have painted many, many faces…. They … radiate great spirituality.’24 Jawlensky shows the Holy Face in a specific way: it is the interiorised face of a mystic. Bit by bit, he paints 21

Rattemeyer, Vorstoss ins Reich der Sublimen, 69-70. Abstract Head: Original Form No. 6 (1918) 23 It is always a question of open series, without beginning or end: Schmidt, Das Prinzip der offenen Serie, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 87-105. 24 Letter to Willibrord Verkade on 12 June, 1938, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 118; for the translation see https://www.phillips.com/detail/alexej-incorrect-jawlensky/ NY030110/110. 22

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the faces with closed eyes, which also refers to mysticism, to looking inward. Whose face is that, actually – Christ’s, a mystic’s, or both? In my view, it is the face in its original form, the ideal face as well as that of Christ and those who want to be Christ-like. Through his repetitions, Jawlensky is searching for the original image that is primarily the Face of Christ but also of those who follow him. I see Saviour’s Face: Christ (1920) and Saviour’s Face: The Holy Hour – Last Look as Jawlensky’s attempt to depict the original form of Christ’s face. There are other titles that point to Christ, such as Crown of Thorns (1918) and the large meditation Good Friday (1937). The other two examples I gave in the introduction – Abstract Head: Pain and Meditation: Versunken – are to be viewed as images of the mystics who want to be like Christ.25 One thinks here of the words of John: ‘now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him …’ (1 John 3:2). Although it is somewhat stylised, the mouth and eyes of Saviour’s Face: The Holy Hour – Last Look does give the painting the feel of a portrait, of a depiction of someone specific. The wide-open eyes show Jesus’ emotional state during the ‘holy hour’ in Gethsemane before his death. The face expresses extreme concentration. What Angelica Jawlensky says about the Saviour’s Faces series also applies to this head of Christ: The first distinctive features of the ‘Saviour’s Faces’ series are visible, for instance the dots of the sign of wisdom, the rectilinear nose, the stylized lock of hair and the androgynous, angelic character of the head. In the ‘Savour Faces’, Jawlensky sublimates the human face into a divine being, neither male nor female, qualifying as a modern interpretation of the Russian icon.26

Abstract Head: Pain has a fixed geometric structure, and thus it is only the use of pastel colour that makes this head unique. The colours, especially the purple and the blue that is almost black at its edges, express the ‘pain’. That can be explained as either grief in general but also the moment in mysticism that is called the ‘dark night’. Strikingly – in my view – the art historian Werner Haftmann views the face in the series of heads as the human face on which ‘the distant imprint 25 Schmidt says of the series Saints’ and Saviour’s Faces that Jawlensky is concerned with mystical experience and the mediation of its content. See Schmidt, Das Prinzip der offenen Serie, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 96. 26 Angelica Jawlensky, Jawlensky’s Drawings and Watercolours: Boldness and Poetry, 150.

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of a divinity’ takes shape.27 That is also apparent from Jawlensky’s letter to Willibrord Verkade on 12 June, 1938, in which he writes that the artist has to use form and colour to say what the divine in him is: I went on painting these variations for several years, and then it became necessary for me to find a form for the face, for I realized that great art was only to be painted with religious feeling. And that was something I could bring only to the human face. I realized that the artist must express in his art through forms and colours that within him which is divine. That is why the work of art is a visible God, and why art is ‘a longing for God’.28

In a letter to Emil and Ada Nolde in 1936, he wrote about working on the Meditations: ‘I meditate; it is like my prayer’.29 Meditation and prayer are always individual matters, and that is what Jawlensky portrays in his Faces. The title of the last series refers first of all to the artist himself, as is apparent from his letter to the Noldes. The emotional state to which the titles of the Meditations refer can also stem from his physical pain caused by his arthrosis. In Meditation: Versunken (1934), the face is reduced to the cruciform framework and the colours in the fields. According to Schmidt, the Meditations consist of two layers or levels. The top layer, which coincides with the surface of the canvas, is dominated by the black structure of the cross. Behind or under that layer is the colourful layer. Because of the use of wide brush strokes to apply the paint and the contrast with the black cross, the colours appear transparent, like multicoloured glass.30 Thus, through the shades of colour, Versunken displays an internal glow and thus the ideal-characteristic face of a mystic sunk in meditation. Jawlensky’s Faces and the Eastern Orthodox Icon How are we to see Jawlensky’s Faces in relation to the icon of Christ in Eastern Orthodoxy? Jawlensky is not looking for the face of Christ in a historical sense but attempts to construct an ideal type as the original form. In this attempt he undeniably stands in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, given the similarity in his intention to present Christ in a particular 27 W. Haftmann, Malerei im 20. Jahrhundert, cited by Rattemeyer, From the large figural representations to the ‘Meditations’, 19. 28 Printed in Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 117; English translation taken from https://the-paintrist.tumblr.com/post/80865852479/yama-bato-alexej-von-jawlenskyslanted-eyes. 29 Letter to Emil and Ada Nolde on 6 June, 1936, printed in Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 116. 30 Schmidt, Das Prinzip der offenen Serie, Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 100.

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way as an original image. His Faces do differ outwardly from the Eastern icon – that can be explained on the basis of the difference in the way in which Jawlensky made the Faces, as we saw above. In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, an icon (of Christ) is made according to prescribed rules. The representation of Christ is not focused on his human individuality but on his personhood as such, on his status as the God-man. As a human being, Christ is also the true image of God, the archetype of the first human being, the human being before the fall (Genesis 1:27).31 In that sense, he is the universal human being. The icon reveals the mysterious character of the Face in the way Pseudo-Dionysius (ca. 500) had emphasised that: ‘The Face of faces and the face of the Inaccessible One ….’32 Plato’s view of the relation between original image and copy is influential here, though in a modified way. In Plato’s thinking, the Idea (the original image) is not part of the empirical world, whereas the original image of Christ is, for it does possess, according to the Council of Chalcedon (451), both human qualities based on his earthly life and divine qualities. The painter of icons can indeed only paint the human nature of Christ, and he needs to do that in such a way that the icon establishes a connection with the eternal-unchanging original type of Christ. The original image is unchangeable, and therefore the icon, the representation of Christ, should not be changed either. In this view, making an icon is not the free use of portraiture but ‘the reading of archetypes and the contemplation of prototypes’.33 In his own way, Jawlensky paints the proto-image of Christ, the Face of faces. From the Abstract Head series on and in the Meditations, the fundamental form of the face is abstract. They show an ideal type of face. If the Jawlensky exhibition in The Hague discussed above, claims that Jawlensky is seeking ‘a universal spirituality’, that universal aspect is to be understood as follows: for Jawlensky, that aspect is found in the face of Christ as the true image of God. The differences in this series, which can be seen in the small changes in the form and especially in the alternating colour combinations, point to different emotional states often indicated by the titles or to new attempts to depict the original form of the face. In short, Jawlensky shows the face of Christ in its original form as a mystical face. At the same time, in connection with that, he also shows 31

L. Ouspensky & V. Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 69. Cited by Evdokimov in his explanation of the dogmatic foundation of the icon (Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 211). 33 Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 216. 32

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the face of every mystic who wants to follow Christ, the believer in whose face the artist has painted ‘the distant imprint of a divinity’ (Haftmann). 5.4.2 Georges Rouault: Christ Among Us We will now look at two examples of the Holy Face by the French painter Georges Rouault (1871-1958). One is number 33 from the series of engraved prints called Miserere, which were made in the years 19121927 but not published until 1948 [Fig. 5.33].34 Number 33 shows the Veronica, while the other is an oil painting from 1946 called The Holy Face [Fig. 5.34]. Engraving no. 33 of Miserere has no title but is accompanied by the caption: ‘Veronica with her veil of compassion still passes along the way.’35 This work is done in black and white.36 Painted with a short beard and moustache, Christ is wearing a crown of thorns. The white suggests Veronica’s cloth on which Jesus’ face seems to be imprinted. The oil painting The Holy Face (1946) shows Christ in a somewhat different way. He also has a short beard and moustache, but his face is oval; the nose is painted with two long stripes, the crown of thorns has been reduced to black spikes with some red on his temple indicating blood. The whole is enclosed in a white frame, and the face is largely surrounded by green, which complements the red of the lips and the red on Christ’s temple. The face has a golden yellow sheen, and the golden yellow extends over the contours of the face, recalling the golden yellow backgrounds on icons. The style of The Holy Face (1946) is difficult to characterise. In his early years, Rouault was a formal member of the movement called the Fauves (‘Savages’) (1904-1907), but he followed his own path. He showed affinity with German Expressionism. In his later work – we saw something similar in the later Jawlensky – he was concerned not with colour in itself but colour in relation to content.37 There is a parallel with early Christian and Roman Byzantine art. It is not a question here of imitating reality but of the visible as an indication of the invisible.38 34 I am using the reprint of the edition of 1948. The structure of Miserere was originally something else; see P. Courthion, Georges Rouault, 195-196. 35 ‘Et Véronique au tendre lin passe encore sur le chemin…’. 36 Rouault calls the works in French gravures and describes the technique of making them in his Preface (1948) of Miserere, 7. 37 R. Beck, Form-Farbe-Harmonie, 87; W.A. Dyrness, Rouault: A Vision of Suffering and Salvation, chapter 4. 38 Beck, Form-Farbe-Harmonie, 108.

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Rouault’s Holy Face of 1946 is an example of that, like his later biblical landscapes. Christ’s long, thin nose is striking. We see that, for instance, in his Veronica (ca. 1945) [Fig. 5.35] as well. The colours of this painting are different from those in the portrait of Christ. Veronica’s veil is white with some blue that transitions into red. White is a sign of her pure heart and red of her solidarity with Jesus’ suffering. She is looking at us as well. Did Rouault want to suggest a similarity between her and Jesus?39 With respect to form, both portraits are characterised by striped frames, thick black stripes that we recognise from stained-glass windows. That was a technique that Rouault was familiar with from his early apprenticeship with a stained glass artist.40 The form with its black stripes and the thickly applied paint with the chosen colours give his work a transcendent character. Rouault does not want to repeat the Holy Face of the tradition. According to him, it is no longer possible for a painter to make a work in the way it was made in the Middle Ages, when ‘art’ was one with life.41 Every age asks for its own representation of salvation. Although he follows the old tradition of the Holy Face with respect to form, the images he produces departs from that. Rouault, namely, wants to be a modern painter, who, unlike the icon painter, does not follow the tradition and its prescriptions but gives his own view of Christ on the basis of his faith as he experiences it. He does not speak of sacral art but of art by the religious artist.42 Rouault’s visual theology is quite visible in Miserere because a large number of engravings in it are connected to each other and provided with a short commentary or Bible text.43 I will show how number 33 (the Veronica) has a place in Miserere. At the same time, that will explain his later Holy Face (1946). The Suffering Christ in Miserere Around 1902, Rouault became personally affected by human suffering. He was influenced in this by the novels Le Désepéré and La Femme Pauvre by the Catholic writer Léon Bloy whom he knew personally. 39 W. Prins points to a similarity with another Holy Face, La Sainte Face (1953) and a clown figure, Clown/Pierrot (1920), and quotes Rouault: ‘In the profoundest depths of the offensive or impure creature Jesus is present’ (W. Prins, Het heilig aanschijn, 506-507). 40 Beck, Form-Farbe-Harmonie, 107. 41 Courthion, Georges Rouault, 382. 42 Courthion, Georges Rouault, 382. 43 Courthion, Georges Rouault, 354, 357.

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Rouault considered human existence to be tragic, and that applies not only to those who suffer from social circumstances but to everyone. He shows this in the series Miserere. He borrows the title from the first engraving under which the words from Psalm 51, ‘Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving-kindness’, are written in Latin. The engraving shows Christ bowed under suffering with an angel above. This image of the suffering Christ is repeated in the second engraving, ‘Jesus reviled …’, and the third shows Jesus being whipped: ‘forever scourged …’, now standing and with more than just his bust depicted. Then we see a number of engravings in which a human being is portrayed in wretched circumstances. To cite a few examples: a tramp (no. 4), a lonely, suffering person (no. 5) a prisoner in chains (no. 6), a clown (no. 8), a worldweary person (no. 12), a girl of pleasure (no. 14), a well-to-do lady (no. 17), a condemned man (no. 18), The Holy Face (no. 33), Christ on the cross (no. 35), a middle-class couple (no. 39), the mortal human being (no. 43), and a dead soldier (nos. 46 and 47). Just like the series began with the suffering Christ, so it ends (no. 58) with the Holy Face, with the caption below: ‘And with his stripes we are healed’ (Isaiah 53:5). What is the connection between these engravings, in which black dominates over white and in which, in addition to other engravings of the suffering Christ, the Holy Face appears five times (nos. 33, 34, 46, 47, and 58)? Venturi says here that Rouault saw life in a gloomy way and painted it as such: ‘he takes a journey through hell but with faith in redemption.’44 The key to understanding how these works fit together is provided by engraving no. 35 [Fig. 5.36] in which Christ on the cross is depicted with the caption below: ‘Jesus will be in agony until the end of the world.’ This text is taken from Pascal’s Pensées, specifically from his meditation on Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane. Jesus asked his disciples to watch with him but they fell asleep. Pascal’s saying connects the suffering of Jesus with that of the people in his time: Jesus suffers from their forsakenness until the end of the world. After the words that Rouault cites – ‘Jesus will be in agony until the end of the world’ – Pascal adds: ‘There must be no sleeping during that time.’45 Miserere is not only a complaint about the tragedy of human existence but also a summons to watch with Christ. That is underscored by engraving no. 32, which depicts the Emmaus scene from the gospel of Luke (24:13-35): the encounter of two disciples with a stranger 44 L. Venturi, Georges Rouault ‘L’Europeo’; Milan, 25 April, 1954, cited by Courthion, Georges Rouault, 82. 45 Pascal, Pensées, no. 919; Lafuma edition, no. 736 and Brunschvicg, no. 553.

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who turns out to be the risen Jesus. Rouault paints two figures. The one is Jesus: his face and black hair are illuminated by the white of a halo. The caption below translates the response of the other figure who extends his hand to Jesus: ‘Lord, it is Thou, I know Thee’ One can ask why the clown, the prostitute, the well-to-do lady appear in the Miserere series. As is well known, Rouault often painted clowns and prostitutes. They are symbols of the tragedy of human existence. The world of the clown, of the circus, shows a contrast between the entertainment and splendour that the circus performance has to present to the audience and the often dreary, miserable existence of the circus artist. The clown is thus a symbol for human beings in general. Under the engraving of the clown with a sad face in Miserere (no. 8) stands: ‘Who does not wear a mask?’46 In Rouault’s time, prostitution was a theme in French literature and painting. Rouault’s depiction of prostitutes is different from that done by his contemporaries.47 Unlike Constantin Guys, who emphasises the picturesque quality of prostitution, unlike Edgar Degas who accentuates the sensuality of the prostitute, unlike Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec who represents the prostitute as dignified in her profession, Rouault highlights the tragedy of her existence. He is not a moralist but sees her as the victim of society. In one of his paintings on this subject, he has the prostitute looking into a mirror. Her face is dull, and her gaze that of a humiliated person (Fille au miroir, 1906) [Fig. 5.38]. And why does he portray a woman from the higher social circles (engravings nos. 16, 17, 50)? The expression of her mouth shows her complacency on engraving number 16 which includes the caption: ‘Lady from higher social circles believes she has a place reserved for her in heaven.’48 In another engraving (no. 39) we see a lower middle-class couple with the caption: ‘We are fools.’ Rouault here exposes lower middle-class complacency.

In 1926, André Suarès, Rouault’s friend, wrote to him in a letter: ‘everything you make is religious, even your clowns, even an unhappy prostitute, the poverty of sensuality ….’49 With that, he touches on the heart of Rouault’s religious work. Apart from Christian themes like The Flight to Egypt (ca. 1938), Holy Faces, Jesus’ crucifixion, Rouault paints daily human existence as having a religious dimension for him. Just as Van Gogh experiences God in nature as creation (4.3), so, along with Pascal, Rouault places Christ in the midst of life with all its misery: Jesus in agony until the end of the world. The Holy Face or Veronica no. 33 thus has a place in Miserere: with her veil of compassion, Veronica is still on her way. This is also explained 46 47 48 49

‘Qui ne se grime pas?’ B. Dorival, Cinq études sur George Rouault, chapter 2; Dyrness, Rouault, chapter 12. ‘Dame du Haut-quartière croit prendre pour le Ciel place réservée.’ Courthion, Georges Rouault, 382.

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by the words ‘and then in your heart. Print the image of the Holy Face’.50 Rouault underscores this once more when he quotes the gospel of John under engraving no. 31: ‘Love one another’ (John 13:34). The View of Christ à la Dostoyevsky In the two Holy Faces by Rouault discussed above Christ is placed in the present in his connection to the suffering human being today. The Holy Face (1946) shows, after all, the suffering Christ. The crown of thorns and some red indicating blood on Jesus’ temple can still be seen. I explain this Holy Face (1946) from the perspective of Miserere. This series ends, as stated, with a Holy Face that includes the caption below: ‘through his stripes we are healed.’ The Holy Face (1946) also shows a Christ who suffers until the end of the world. In this respect, there is a strong affinity with Dostoyevsky’s view of Christ: Christ can be found among the outcasts like the prostitute Sonya and the murderer Raskolnikov.51 As stated above, Venturi remarked about Miserere that Rouault makes a journey through hell but with a belief in redemption. That can be seen in the Holy Face, which is shown in the series as a recurring motif in engravings 34, 46, and 47 with a glimpse of hope for redemption, as no. 47 shows, with the title De Profundis … [Fig. 5.37].52 These engravings show death as a consequence of (the) violence (of war): the Holy Face hangs, like an icon, on the wall where Christ’s face is wreathed by rays that light up the black of the engraving. We can see something similar in the Holy Face (1946): the golden yellow around the face of Christ points to faith in redemption. With this golden yellow colour, Rouault here shows that God’s glory is not ‘the splendor of otherworldly superior power but the beauty of love which empties itself.’53 5.4.3 Lefteris Olympios: A Political Veronica Rouault confronts the suffering of this world, the violence of war, and social injustice with Christ who suffers in agony until the end of the world. The Cypriot artist Lefteris Olympios, who lives in Amsterdam, shows the extent to which Veronica with her veil of compassion is still among us with his Veroniki or the Absent (1999) [Fig. 5.39]. He builds on the tradition of the Eastern icon in his own way. And that is special 50 51 52 53

‘[P]uis dans ton coeur. Imprime l’image de la Sainte Face.’ Dyrness, Rouault, 142-143; Courthion, Georges Rouault, 389. For the term motif in distinction from theme, see 4.5. J. Moltmann, Theology of Play, 41.

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for a painter who comes from Eastern Orthodoxy with its rule that the representation be repeated as faithfully as possible. At the end of 2014, Olympios had an exhibition in the Cathedral (Domkerk) of Utrecht of an iconostasis for which he had painted the icons of his home country in his own unique way. What do we see in Olympios’ Veroniki or the Absent, inspired as it is by the Veronica? Olympios takes the Veronica as his starting point. We see a woman dressed in the clothing worn in northern Cyprus. She is holding a cloth in front of her with a depiction of a face, like the face we can also see on the Veronica by Hans Memling and Zurbarán’s Veronica. If we look at the woman with the cloth in front of her, we could ask who is depicted on that veil. It is not Christ but Evagoras Pallikarides, a wellknown freedom fighter from Cyprus who was hanged by the English, the colonisers of Cyprus. He represents all those who died in the struggle for justice on Cyprus and elsewhere. That is what the background in the painting points to – a background that is composed of a number of small figures, all women with a veil in their hands. Like Veronica, they hold their veils with the portrayal of the victims before them. Looking at the painting is shocking. Just as the Christ in the traditional icon looks at the viewer, so both the woman and the victim on the veil look straight at us. An image of the foolish women in Argentina who stood up for their loved ones who had disappeared looms up before us.54 Olympios reproduces this by means of the theme of the Veronica. The veil with the depiction of the disappeared (or dead) loved ones functions in a twofold way for the woman: not only as a protest against an oppressive regime but also for herself as the contact with the deceased. The loved one is present in an absent way on the veil. In this way, the painting assumes the original function of the Veronica, and Olympios manages to calibrate the old meaning of the Veronica in the contemporary world situation. 5.5 Continuity or Discontinuity in the Holy Face? A Fusion of Horizons Is there continuity or discontinuity in the representations of the Holy Face that are presented in this chapter? With respect to the question of origin, there is a difference between the Mandylion and the Veronica on the one 54 Alejandro Restrepo’s Video Veronica could be seen at the Venice Bienniale (2007). The artist had projected photographs of civilian victims of the then ongoing war in Columbia on to the screen (M. Barnard & G. van de Haar (eds), De Bijbel cultureel, 543).

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hand and contemporary depictions of the Holy Face on the other. The images of Christ by Jawlensky and Rouault do not claim to be original as imprints of Jesus’ face. In other words, they are not indexical signs but images as iconic signs (1.4). They do not function as relics; they are not cultic but devotional images (1.2). Werner Haftmann remarks: ‘Jawlensky, fully cognizant of the modern means, preserved the religious meditation painting for contemporary culture.’55 He considers Jawlensky’s images – and the same is true, in my view, for Rouault’s – to be convincing images of Christ for the contemporary period. The question, however, remains as to what precisely the relationship is with the original Holy Faces. There is no canonical image of Jesus because we do not have any image of him ‘not made by human hands’. The spiritual descriptions of Jesus in the New Testament are, as stated above, the orientation point for an answer concerning continuity or discontinuity. That can best be explained by the term fusion of horizons, a term borrowed from the hermeneutics of the philosopher H.-G. Gadamer. In making an image of Christ, the artist – viewed from the perspective of hermeneutics – starts from an ‘original horizon’, an image of Christ in the New Testament (or in the Christian tradition of the community he comes from) and fuses that with his own horizon.56 That ‘original horizon’ will be partly determined by the tradition of the community to which the Christ image belongs. The artist’s own horizon concerns not only his own time with its specific views of Christ but also techniques and media that the artist employs. Because such a fusion of horizons occurs again and again in history, we can speak of a reception history. A specific depiction of Christ refers not only to Scripture but also to the context of the lifeworld of the artist or religious community with its (pre)judgments and its reception history or its Wirkungsgeschichte, as Gadamer calls it. A person like Jesus is inexhaustible and is constantly given different accents with a view to what people see in him with respect to liberation and salvation. One can think here of how Jesus is perceived in Africa, Asia, and South America.57 In this connection I would like to point to current discussions on the questionability of depicting Jesus as white, as, for example, Werner Sallman does in his Head of Christ, 1940. Rembrandt acknowledged this problem and chose Jewish figures from his 55 W. Haftmann, Malerei im 20. Jahrhundert, cited by Rattemeyer, From the Large Figural Representations to the ‘Meditations’, 19. 56 H.-G. Gadamer, Truth and Method, 301-306; 367-371. 57 See, for example, M.E. Brinkman, The Non-Western Jesus.

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neighbourhood as models for his portrait of Christ: Rembrandt, Supper at Emmaus (1648); Head of Christ (1648).58 As far as the New Testament is concerned, one can say that the Christian tradition elaborates in word and image on various ‘original images’ of Christ. The question is how one’s own horizon relates to the ‘original’ horizon, the Jesus image from the New Testament. We can speak of a successful or unsuccessful fusion of horizons, depending on the extent to which justice is done to the ‘original horizon’ that functions as a test. If it has to do with a successful fusion of horizons, I call that an addition. By addition, I mean a new depiction of a biblical given – in this chapter a representation of the person of Christ as a deepening of one of the various views of Christ in the New Testament in new contexts. As a (theologically) successful transformation of the depiction of Christ, addition contrasts with deletion and substitution.59 Examples of such additions could be seen at the Verspijkerd en verzaagd exhibition (18 February – 5 June, 2017) in the Noord-Brabants Museum in ’s Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands. Let me mention here Spijkerpiëta (1968) by Jacques Frenken [Fig. 5.40]. The traditional image of Mary with her dead son regains its sharpness by the spikes that Frenken has nailed into it. Deletion entails that a depiction of Christ is used but it is stripped of its religious meaning. We will see an example of this in the following chapter in Francis Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) [Fig. 6.53]. Substitution refers to the Jesus figure from the New Testament or the Christian tradition being used but given an idiosyncratic meaning. A well-known example of substitution is Albrecht Dürer’s Self-Portrait (1500) [Fig. 5.41]. Dürer depicts himself with a beard and hairstyle like Christ in the Veronica. Is Dürer suggesting that his self-portrait as the Veronica image of Christ is a true likeness, an authentic image? Does Dürer want to model the God-man after the image of the human being or, conversely, is Dürer presenting the human being here as the image of God? Koerner points out that Dürer has transplanted the quasi-magical power of the Holy Face to the, at that time, new subject in art history: the self-portrait. In his Self-Portrait of 1500, he portrays himself as the acheiropoiētos of Christ in order to show that art is the perfect image of its maker.60

58 De ongelovige witheid van Jezus, Trouw (a newspaper) 19 December, 2020, 10-11. See also Bas Uterwijk, Jesus of Nazareth (2020). 59 For this distinction, see P. Claes, Echo’s, Echo’s. 60 J.L. Koerner, The Reformation of the Image, 14.

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The Holy Face of Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios I see the Holy Faces of Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios discussed above as additions, as deepenings in new contexts of various views of Christ from the New Testament. Jawlensky’s Holy Face goes back to the mystical image of Jesus in the gospel of John. Aside from the ‘I am’ sayings, Jesus also speaks in this gospel of the unity between him and the Father (John 10:30). Like the icon of Christ, the Mandylion of Eastern Orthodoxy, Jawlensky is searching for the original image with his Faces, the pictorial archetype of Christ and of those who want to be like him. Rouault’s Holy Face (1946) is related to the accent that Luke places on Jesus’ acts of service, the diaconal Jesus. He shares with Mark’s gospel the simplicity of Jesus. Olympios’ Veroniki or the Absent is inspired by Jesus’ notion of substitution regarding standing up for the weak or those who have been treated unjustly: ‘whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me’ (Matthew 25:40). His painting is a political interpretation of these words of Jesus. This chapter has dealt with the depiction of Jesus as person. He is imaged anew in the twentieth and twenty-first century with the descriptions of Jesus in the New Testament as the orientation point. The next chapter will discuss the depiction of Jesus’ life and work. The incarnation of God in Jesus is, as we will see, imaged anew as Christ who is a human being of flesh and blood.

6. CHRIST AS A HUMAN BEING OF FLESH AND BLOOD

6.1 Introduction The previous chapter discussed God who became human in Jesus of Nazareth and acquired a human face in him. This chapter will give some salient examples of the depiction of the life and work of Christ. Many contemporary depictions of Jesus’ life and work, especially those by Catholic artists, emphasise the physical nature of God’s incarnation.1 Not only does God become a face, but he becomes a human being of flesh and blood. In reference to his art on God’s incarnation in Jesus, the American Catholic artist Paul Thek says: ‘the incarnation of God not only substantiates the divine sphere but also includes the physical dimension of being human.’2 That accent on the body involves not only the artwork itself but also the way in which the viewer responds to a work of art in an embodied experience. The philosopher Merleau-Ponty calls the human being a body-subject: one does not only have a body – one is a body. That insight has been translated in art into installation art, art that one does not view from outside but can enter and participate in it. The reader can see an example of this in Thek’s installation Die Krippe, which calls forth an embodied experience of the participant. As an example of religious body art, we will first look at the performance of Rosemberg Sandoval and then the flesh and blood works of art: Thek’s Technological Reliquaries and Marc Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand [Wall of Flesh]). We will first direct our attention to Thek’s interpretation of the Christmas event without the traditional Christ child. He did that in his exhibition Die Krippe in Duisburg (6.2). Then we will look at an example of Jesus’ acts of love and righteousness as depicted by the Columbian artist Rosemberg Sandoval. With his challenging performances Baby Street and Dirt, he takes up the cause of the marginalised in his society (6.3). Marc Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) is completely different from the traditional representation of the crucifixion of Christ. His canvases of 1 See A. Greeley, The Catholic Imagination (2001); E. Heartney, Postmodern Heretics (2004); B. Baert (ed.), Fluid Flesh (2009). 2 According to M. Franke, Be Abstracted, 151.

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flesh and blood will be compared to Thek’s Technological Reliquaries and Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) (6.4). I will close with the portrayal of the cross by the Cypriot painter Lefteris Olympios. His work The Messenger represents Christ’s body being taken down from the cross in such a way that we see that this is not the end of the Jesus story. In my conclusion I will show how these modern works of art are connected with pre-modern images ‘before the age of art’ (6.5).

6.2 Christmas as a Cosmic Event: Paul Thek In his art, the American artist Paul Thek (1933-1988) reaches back to art before the Renaissance, doing that for the first time in the 1960s with his Technological Reliquaries (1965-1967). That is a renewed continuation of the relic tradition, which we will discuss later in this chapter (6.4.2). Thek also reaches back to the pre-modern forms of works of art, the installation. During his stay in Europe, from 1968 to 1976, he was primarily engaged in constructing environments. The space of the museum was temporarily turned into a space that was part of the installation, which consisted of everyday objects like newspapers, photographs, chairs, a boat, or something from nature like animals, plants, trees, sand, and water, etc. He thus made large exhibitions with installations in Europe (often in collaboration with artists like Frans Deckwitz and Ann Wilson). I will mention a few exhibitions: The Procession/The Artist’s Co-op (1969), Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam; Pyramid /A Work in Progress (1971-1972), Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Ark, Pyramid (1972), documenta 5, Kassel; Ark, Pyramid – Easter (1973), Kunstmuseum Luzern; Die Krippe (1973-1974), Lehmbruck Museum, Duisburg. The exhibitions were continued in Philadelphia in 1977, in Venice in 1980, and in London in 1981, and in other places.

The series of exhibitions began in 1968 in the M.E. Thelen gallery in Essen with the ironic title: A Procession in Honor of Aesthetic Progress: Objects Theoretically to Wear, Carry, Pull or Wave. The title refers to the religious procession in which holy objects are carried by the faithful throughout a city or town. Components of the one exhibition are used in the following exhibition in a different setting.3 Words like ark and pyramid 3 Zelevanksy describes the objects exhibited in the Thelen gallery as follows: ‘everything was built to be carried or waved. A series of sculptural chairs and another of

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repeatedly appear in the titles of his exhibitions, which points to the fact that they are ‘A Work in Progress’. The accent in his art lies more on the process of making than on the final product. Thek’s art is transient art, to which the yellowed newspapers or burned up candles in his installations quietly testify. Given the use of perishable materials, only a few objects remain. The installations no longer exist, except for A Station of the Cross from 1972.4 The choice for environments also entails that the visitor to his installations cannot be passive. It is an art that requires an answer from the visitor; it has to do with what is known in literary criticism as ‘reader response’. Such an environment has to be experienced, entered, or walked through. I will describe one of these installations, Die Krippe, the exhibition in Duisburg (1973-1974).5 I will do that by means of the visitors’ brochure, written by Siegfried Salzmann.6 Die Krippe has the visitors participate immediately in the Christmas event. This is a different process than looking at a painting of the birth of Jesus. Die Krippe We enter the basement of the Lehmbruck Museum, the exhibition area, via a stairway. The entrance is formed like a collapsing wall of a tomblike structure made of newspaper and cardboard boxes. We enter a different world, a subterranean, dark room, lit only by candles and work lights. There is something in front of us that looks like a litter and a throne, in colours of fiery red and tree green [Fig. 6.42]. One is reminded here of the throne of an old, unknown divinity or of the story of Moses at the burning bush. On the wall on the left is a swan that our ancestors venerated as a soul bird. We reach a narrow box-like passage – Thek will explain that further on – and step onto two wood paths made of birch tree branches that have been fixed in place by ropes. It is like walking over a bridge or using a raft to reach the other side. Everything looks different because the walls are open, changed into trees and foliage through which we look into a head boxes were equipped with shoulder braces and adorned with wax chunks of ‘meat’ (L. Zelevansky, Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries, 15). 4 Museum Folkwang in Essen. 5 This exhibition is called Die Krippe or Art, Pyramid-Christmas. I will use the first title. 6 For this and what follows, see Guide, Please Take One with You!, 53-64.

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room. We see cupboards and an open drawer. There are photos of various individuals like Rimbaud, C.G. Jung, Lehmbruck, and others. The cupboards contain the registration details about people and things; above is sand with broken pottery, objects from prehistory like mammoth teeth and prehistoric barrels. All this comes from the history of the earth and of people. A paradise of green and blossoming plants, symbols of life in nature and the cosmos, grows over these remains from history. We pass a continuous stream of water, a basin that resembles a baptismal font, and enter the main area via a pyramid structure. Does that journey recall that of the wise men from the East who wanted to worship the child Jesus (Matthew 2:1-2)? We do not see the child Jesus in the crib but something else: we see the central motif of Die Krippe at our feet: a blue globe on straw. This is how the earth looked to astronauts in space: ‘there it is, the earth, like a newborn baby in its unblemished purity, preciousness, and beauty, an earth that not only has to be preserved but indeed saved.’ We see the globe on the exhibition’s poster as well, a processed astronaut’s photograph of the earth. The globe on the straw lies under a ceiling and is seen through a misty piece of glass. From the position we take, we see ourselves together with the globe in the mirror, which reflects the whole scene. We go up a few steps to another pyramid, where benches are set up and visitors are invited to sit in order to let the atmosphere and quiet of the space and what is present there affect us. The brochure makes us aware that the millions of stars – to which our earth also belongs – have their own lives, are young and grow old, come into being and pass away. Thek makes us aware of this ‘eternal’ situation of change by showing us the whole environment in a form that is still not entirely finished. That contrasts with our increasingly perfect everyday world. Thek wants to point to the essential and elemental. There is sand that, formed like waves of the sea, seems to be moving. There is the blue of a morning sky on the walls of the main room and the unceasing murmur of water, pyramids whose shapes resemble that of many religious buildings in the world. We see the paper of newspapers from Duisburg, with general information and current events, and birches as a sign of a new beginning in the spring. And, before we enter the main area, the two wood paths made of birch tree branches can be experienced – through our looking continuously in numerous mirrors – as walking the way of suffering (way of the cross). Other things can also be seen: a Torah scroll with mementos from children, the Ark of the Covenant from the Old Testament with a gilded

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cobblestone, yoga positions, wood carvings of Indians, numerous signs and symbols from many cultures. The brochure comments on that as follows: [The artist] is seeking to activate the mythic and magical forces in us and gives us a sense of the incomprehensible unity of all things in the cosmos.

When leaving the exhibition, the viewer can take an apple from a basket, which refers unmistakeably to the globe. The visitor’s attention is still drawn to drawings of water and the sea by schoolchildren from Duisburg and to photographs that connect locations from the Holy Land with squares and churches in Duisburg. The visitor exits into the Atrium of the Lehmbruck wing where there is a Christmas tree under a birch tree pyramid. One could undoubtedly say more about the objects arranged in this environment, and a different explanation of what the objects symbolise is possible.7 An explanation given by Thek himself concerning his installations like Die Krippe will suffice here. Harold Szeemann interviewed Thek about his installations while the exhibition was being held in Duisburg in December 1973. Szeemann remarked that the public, even though it was unaware of the meaning of his symbols, responded to his work ‘as if they were in a chapel or a holy place.’ He asked Thek whether this was because he chose symbols that have their own dynamic, as the psychologist Neumann had described in his well-known book The Big Mother. Thek answered: More often than I choose the symbols, the symbols choose me. Art is liturgy; and if the public responds to their sacred character, then I hope I realized my aim, at least at that instance.8

In the interview, Thek says about the symbols in his environment that the (narrow, box-like) entrance means a place of concentrated energy, the way through the womb, the way of the cross, a rite of passage. The trees refer to growth. The pyramid is the cathedral of his time. For Thek, the pyramid is never complete. He leaves the top unfinished in his installations. The completed pyramid is, namely, only what can be seen with ‘the eye of God.’ And the sea of sand? About this Thek says: ‘It’s water that you can walk on; it’s time.’

7 8

See, for example, M. Franke, Paul Thek, Die Krippe, 13-35. For this and what follows, see H. Szeemann, Interview with Paul Thek, 83.

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Medieval Modern Although I myself could not experience this installation by walking through it, the description is, in my view, sufficient to get an impression of a work of art based on a concept of art completely different from that of art as an aesthetic object, i.e., the concept of art in the ‘Grand Narrative’ (1.5.1). With his collage work, Thek follows Robert Rauschenberg, whose collages were composed of newspapers, postcards, clothes and furniture, improvisational, transient, animated by personal stories. Thek’s use of ordinary and fragile material is attributed to the influence of arte povera and where it concerns the balance between chance and the organisation of Thek’s installations to the influence of Joseph Beuys’ installations.9 This art can also be characterised as camp, using kitsch-like elements from popular culture. It is open to the double meaning of things, such as ‘Everything is beautiful and everything is ugly simultaneously’.10 It is art that – to quote the title of Alexander Nagel’s book – is Medieval Modern, art that takes up the premodern tradition of the environment again, i.e. art embedded in life itself – art that is intended to impress the visitor without using a proper artistic form. I view the installation Die Krippe as a depiction of the Christmas event in a revitalised form. The work is undeniably linked to the church year. Thek’s Catholicism became more explicit in his art and daily life at the time.11 The exhibition opened in December, before Christmas. Before the opening he had organised a Christmas play with children from the orphanage in Duisburg. They could place their gifts before the child at the crib. The unusual placement of a globe of the world in the Christmas crib is a contemporising interpretation of the Christmas story. Above, I cited Salzmann’s view of the earth as a new-born child, that it needs not only to be preserved but also to be saved. Here the artist shows the Christmas event in a cosmic way by bringing the Christ child into connection with the illuminated globe. This yields a cosmic Christology. Elsewhere, Thek says: ‘Religious art is simply a visual theology ….’12

9

Franke, Be Abstracted, 152. G. Baker points to this and even calls Thek’s art an aesthetic of intensity, an art that is open to contradictions, an aesthetic of incongruity, of extremes, of pure difference (Paul Thek: Notes, 192-193). Zelevansky speaks about Thek’s work as a mix of apparent contrasts (Zelevansky, Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries, 10-11). 11 Paul Thek, Selected Confessions: A Narrative Biography, 188-189. 12 Cited by Franke, Be Abstracted, 151. 10

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And how are we to understand the symbols from other religions that are also present in the spaces? For Thek, Jesus is central. Zelevansky speaks of Thek’s continuing engagement with Catholicism alongside periods of Dionysian excess.13 Perhaps the symbols have the function of dialogue with other religions. We will see an example of this in an installation by the Dutch artists Derk Thijs and Chris Brans who have been unmistakeably influenced by Thek (11.3.1.). The problem is that some symbols are difficult to interpret: what should one do with the carvings by the Indians? Thek’s symbolism is very personal and therefore difficult to decipher. One could speak here of private mythology. An important aspect of Thek’s environment is that the position of the viewer changes. It is an embodied experience. A journey through the installation Die Krippe can be compared to the pilgrimage to the Holy Face in Rome or contemporary pilgrimages to holy places. Just as people prayed before the sacred portrait, so here benches have been placed before the crib so the participants can feel the effects of the event. What Linda Weintraub says in general about Thek’s installations certainly holds true for Die Krippe: his installations are intended to have an effect on the visitor. ‘They are sacraments to be enacted, not owned.’14

6.3 Deeds of Love and Justice: Rosemberg Sandoval Baby Street and Dirt Baby Street (1998) by Rosemberg Sandoval is a performance carried out in a museum of modern art in Bogotà (Columbia). This was recorded in a video, stills of which are still available [Fig. 6.44]. One can see how Sandoval washes the feet, hands, and face of a street child with towels and some alcohol. He then hangs the towels with the imprints of the dirt on the wall of the museum and afterwards burns them. The burning is a ritual act of radical purification. The performance here is intended to produce a moral reversal among the public with respect to their attitude towards the morally filthy, unjust society of Columbia. The artist uses two references to the Christian tradition in this work. The performance refers first of all to Jesus’ washing the disciples’ feet shortly before his suffering (John 13:1-17). 13 14

Zelevansky, Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries, 14. L. Weintraub, Paul Thek, 235.

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Joseph Beuys had done something similar in his performance Celtic in Basel during Holy Week in 1971.15 He washed the feet of seven people in an enamelled dish. After every washing, the dirty water was thrown out and new water poured in. Using a number of symbolic actions, Beuys carried out his own baptism. As far as the act of washing is concerned, the performances resemble each other. Beuys wants to indicate the ‘Christ impulse’ as the creative aspect in the human being that, in his view, is no longer present in the church. That element is, in Sandoval’s performance, present in the act of washing. In that performance it is also linked with the history of the Christian image of the Veronica: there are imprints of the dirty feet, the hands, and the face of the street child on the towels. With the imprint of dirt, the towels are central to the performance. They are, after all, hung up on the wall of the museum and then burned. The dirt of the street child is the painful wound of Columbian society that is not able to get rid of inequality, violence, and injustice. Sandoval does something similar in his performance Dirt (1999).16 He carries the homeless Oswaldo Narvaez on his shoulder to the museum in Cali and then uses the man’s body as a brush on the white wall of the museum so that the dirt of the clothes leaves an imprint on the wall. Here as well Sandoval draws on the Veronica tradition. The imprinting of the man’s dirt on the wall reminds one of the imprint of Jesus’ face on Veronica’s veil. The act is very powerful. The homeless man is used as a brush that impresses a line of pain and dirt ‘not made by human hands’ on the white wall. Again, Yves Klein (1928-1962) had done something similar with his shroud anthropometries (Anthropométries Suaires). In a performance he had naked female models smear themselves with his patented ‘International Klein Blue.’ They were rolled over the cloth or paper which left the imprint of parts of their bodies behind. Sandoval and Klein both emphasise the physical in their art by using the body as a brush but with differing intentions. Just as Jesus’ imprint remains on Veronica’s cloth (or on Jesus’ shroud, like that of Turin, according to another tradition), so vague forms of torsos and thighs of anonymous women’s bodies remain behind on the cloth or paper of Klein’s shroud anthropometries. With Klein, the attention shifts from Christ to the vague imprint of anonymous bodies of women. Marcel Barnard’s commentary on this is as follows: ‘the focus is no longer on the rational, intellectual, and male, 15 16

G. Rombold & H. Schwebel, Christus in der Kunst des 20. Jahrhunderts, 124-128. P. Martin & G. Alzate, On Rosemberg Sandoval’s Performance Actions, 512-513.

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but on the vital and the sensual, the life-giving female power.’ There is an ‘expectation of presence’.17 Art and the (Re)presentation of Violence The audiences of Sandoval’s performances are confronted with the social inequality that exists in Columbia. His art was performed in the context of extreme violence. Columbia was bowed down under the weight of the violence of the army, guerrilla groups, and drug dealers. People were killed or disappeared. Aside from the many homeless people there were also many street kids who barely received food, clothing, and health care. In his art, the artist used the human body, worn-out clothing, and hair from deceased victims. He poured out human blood in his performance Caquetá.18 About his use of human material, Sandoval says that this material has a history and that is why it acquires social meaning.19 His art can be criticised for being in conflict with good taste, but that would be a mistake. Here the problem is that of the (re)presentation in art of the immoral violence of a society. There is a discussion in European art on this issue in connection with the question of the (im)possibility of art about the Holocaust.20 There are two ways, I think, to (re)present violence in art with a view to confronting the public with it in a moral sense. That can be done by deliberately blurring the moment of violence itself so that the public can arrive at its own ethical position. Gerhard Richter does that with his painting September (2005), which shows the 9/11 event as blurred. That allows him to prevent the viewer from being petrified by a realistic image of the event; that what happened through the TV footage – shown repeatedly worldwide – of the two hijacked airplanes that flew into the Twin Towers. Instead of evoking any emotion about the terrible event itself, Richter’s painting calls the viewer to ethical and political reflection through the technique of blurring. The violence is represented in the painting and not shown as it really was.21 Sandoval, who chooses realism and presence in his art, does the latter. That makes his art shocking and confronting. The possible criticism is not whether it is against ‘good taste’, but whether the public is not too petrified by emotion or whether 17 18 19 20 21

M. Barnard, Lijkwade van Mondo Cane (1961), 542. Marin & Alzate, On Rosemberg Sandoval’s Performance Actions, 519-520. Marin & Alzate, On Rosemberg Sandoval’s Performance Actions, 513. W. Stoker, The Representation of Violence as Evil in Contemporary Art, 433-436. Stoker, The Representation of Violence as Evil in Contemporary Art, 437-441.

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this art fails to achieve its goal – bringing about a moral transformation of the public. The performances Baby Street and Dirt are closer, in their realism, to the Veronica than to the Holy Faces of Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios that were discussed in the previous chapter. Those were paintings of Christ’s face. Here it is a question of the image as indexical sign, as relic. The imprint on the cloth in Baby Street and on the wall in Dirt were events to which the public were eye-witnesses. Each is a vera eikōn of the world of the marginalised. It should be remembered that this is art as distinguished from life itself. In his performances Sandoval creates a second and fictional reality precisely in order to critique daily reality. But the boundary between art and life becomes quite small if the artist confronts his public with undesirable, hard reality by using blood, hair, or used clothing of deceased victims in his performances. And the image is literally the depicted (street child) in the performance Baby Street. Empirical research could show if Sandoval has succeeded in his intended moral transformation of his public. Sandoval’s work continues themes from the Christian tradition in its own way. Just as Jesus performed his acts of love and justice out of compassion for the marginalised, so Sandoval, who is himself a Christian, does this as an artist.22 6.4 The Cross: Humiliation and Exaltation The first viewing of Raphael’s Mond Crucifixion (1502-1503) [Fig. 6.46] and Grünewald’s depiction of the crucifixion, the Isenheim Altarpiece (1512-1516) [Fig. 6.47] makes the differences between them immediately apparent. Raphael gives a beautiful representation of the crucifixion and thus emphasises the redemption that the cross brings. The angels collect the precious blood ‘shed for us’. The women and John are close by, somewhat aloofly devout. Aside from the wound in his side and the nails in his feet, it is not apparent that Christ is suffering. The body of Jesus hanging on the cross is a beautiful one. His loincloth is the same colour as the clothes of the people near the cross. The dark red colour points to the shed blood. The painting is an example of what Catholic theologians call the beauty of the cross23 and that is emphasised even more by placing the cross against a blue sky. 22 23

Rosemberg Sandoval im Gespräch mit Nóra Lukács, 140. R. Viladesau, The Beauty of the Cross.

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In contrast, Grünewald’s altarpiece depicts Christ’s death on the cross as his humiliation. The crown of thorns on his head, thorns in his body, the nails in his hands and feet are enlarged, just like the feet and hands themselves. The fingers, curled in pain, point towards the ink-black heaven. Broken by grief, Mary Magdalene kneels beside the cross, her fingers showing her emotional stress, and she is looking at Christ’s face. Mary, supported by John, has fainted. The depiction of John the Baptist with the lamb seems to be a kind of didactic addition to this dramatic moment of the crucifixion. His relaxed, calm facial expression shows that he is not a participant in the crucifixion event but is depicted as a witness to Jesus as the Messiah. He points to Jesus with his finger: ‘Behold, the Lamb of God’ (John 1:29). His proclamation is reinforced by the sacrificial lamb from which blood flows into a chalice. Two contrasting moments play a role in the view of the cross of Christ as a sacrificial death for the salvation of humankind: humiliation and exaltation. On the one hand, his death was a humiliation, the crucifixion of a slave or criminal; on the other hand, the cross was also a victory over evil and the sign of redemption: the cross as exaltation. On the one hand, there is the ugliness of suffering; on the other, the hope of resurrection and glorification, which is called the beauty of the cross. In Raphael we see the ugliness of suffering subordinated to the beauty of the redemption. In other words, the suffering is spiritualised and its physicality obscured.24 In Grünewald, the moment of physical suffering itself is emphasised. But he does not forget that other moment of redemption. That is why he adds the depiction of John the Baptist with his witness about Christ as the lamb of God. Raphael chooses the classical method of interpreting situations that cause us pain in a poetic way. Homer had also described the physically and morally ugly Thersites in a beautiful way in the Iliad (II, 212-214). Raphael applies this poetic method to visual art: ugly things can be portrayed in a beautiful way. The philosopher Hegel argues against this view when he remarks in his aesthetics: ‘Christ scourged, with the crown of thorns, carrying his cross to the place of execution, nailed to the cross, passing away in the agony of a torturing and slow death – this cannot be portrayed in the forms of Greek beauty ….’25 The ‘ugly’ aesthetic form was used in the 24 On this topic of beautiful and ugly with respect to Christ, see also: D. Brown, God & Grace, chapters 1 and 4. 25 Hegel, Hegel’s Aesthetics: Lectures on Fine Arts, vol. 1, 538.

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twentieth century as an accusation against society by painters like Kirchner, Nolde, Kokoschka, Schiele, Grosz and Dix. The philosopher Adorno points out that art has to appropriate what has been rejected as ugly: ‘In so doing, art should not try to integrate or mitigate ugliness, or seek to reconcile it with its existence by employing humour, which is more repulsive than all the ugliness there is. Instead, art has to make use of the ugly in order to denounce the world ….’26 In the twentieth century, with his The Crucifixion (1946) [Fig. 6.50], Graham Sutherland opted for an expressive depiction like Grünewald’s. We see a rectangular vertical oil painting on hardboard: Jesus’ open hands with bent fingers are misshapen, and his ribs are visible. He wears a crown with long thorns on his head, which hangs down, and blood is trickling from both hands and feet. The background is blue with a long rectangle with the complementary colour orange below in the centre. The whole displays the dramatic nature of Jesus’ crucifixion. That is emphasised once more by Jesus hanging there alone without his mother and faithful disciples. Marc Mulders goes a step further. In works like Siena (Vleeswand) (1988) [Fig. 6.51] he no longer shows a cross, like Sutherland does, but depicts Christ’s body as that of a dead human being of flesh and blood. We will see that, despite the representation, the work does justice to the hope of resurrection. Lefteris Olympios’ The Messenger (2015) depicts the humiliation and exaltation of Christ in a different way (6.4.4). 6.4.1 Paintings of Flesh and Blood: Marc Mulders Marc Mulders’ early work shows life as perishable, depicting hares, geese, and pheasants in various stages of decomposition. Corpoli di Napoli (1989) features a dismembered sheep’s head. Mulders made various works about suffering and the death of Christ, such as Ecce homo I (1989) and Grond in Christus (1987). The latter shows bones with flesh on them, dark and coloured light red and white, against a grey background, with the outline of a floor plan at the top. Like Ecce homo I (1989), the painting is a critique of the church. Mulders says about Grond in Christus (Ground/ Foundation in Christ): The Church has now raped the Bible as it were, let it deteriorate into dogma. In my painting Grond in Christus, I included the floor plan of a cathedral, with the idea that the Church has contaminated its own ground by becoming 26

T.W. Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, 72.

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an institution …. By using a system of white spots I rearranged the floor plan. A dismantling of the institution.27

Crack L.A. II (1989) [Fig. 6.52] shows pieces of meat hanging on a wire above a table. The representation draws on Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper, but there is no trace here of Jesus and his disciples. In Siena (Vleeswand) (1988) we see three long rectangular forms of whitishyellow and red pieces of meat, arranged like bricks in a wall. If one looks at the painting for the first time, it is not immediately clear that it is about the body of Christ. Mulders explains this as follows: “My work is very serene. The meat is a metaphor, a metaphor for life. I want to use it to depict the suffering of human beings.’28 The meat here literally represents Christ’s body, his sacrifice: it is about his intense physical suffering.29 The representations are shocking and confuse the viewer. These depictions of the crucifixion are quite different from the usual. What are these depictions intended to convey to the viewer? Thea Figee reacts with irritation in Kunstbeeld (1991) to Mulder’s Vleeswanden (walls of flesh) and other works. She does not consider his ‘paintings … [to be] immediately likeable’: She is even irritated by the brutal violence with which the oil paint seems sculpted on the dead, grey, greasy material in which each painter struggles with the representations of pietàs, flesh walls, oxen ripped open up to and including crucifixions seems lost.30

I will continue my exploration of Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand). To do so, for the sake of comparison, I will refer to other contemporary art that features meat, body parts, or blood. A parallel with Paul Thek’s Technological Reliquaries can be seen, as well as and in a very different way with Francis Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965). 6.4.2 A Comparison with Paul Thek’s Technological Reliquaries and Francis Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) Paul Thek, Technological Reliquaries In 1963, Thek and his friend the photographer Peter Hujar visited the catacombs of the Capuchins near Palermo. They were deeply impressed 27

M. Mulders, Verf als een opengelegde spier, 9. B. Stigter, NRC Handelsblad, 22 November, 1991: Marc Mulders over religie, CNN en de Renaissance; Ik schilder altijd lijdende voorwerpen. 29 According to the interpretation of J. de Wal, Kunst zonder kerk, 161. 30 T. Figee, Marc Mulders ‘intelligent’ schilderen, 22. 28

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when they saw the remains of the deceased piled up along the walls, the deceased waiting for their resurrection from the dead. Hujar took photographs of the dead, some of whom were standing erect in their glass coffins and wrapped in a black cloth. His Portraits in Life and Death (1976) include not only the dead in the catacombs but also the portraits of the living, of himself and friends of Thek and himself. Susan Sontag, who was a friend of both Thek and Hujar, wrote in her preface to Hujar’s photography book how photography turned the living into the dead. The living are fixed in one moment while time continues on and the person in the fixed moment stays in the past. ‘Photography also converts the whole world into a cemetery. Photographers, connoisseurs of beauty, are also – wittingly or unwittingly – the recording-angels of death.’31 Thek processed his impressions of the catacombs in his Technological Reliquaries (1965-1967). This series includes sculptures like display cases of plexiglass with realistic pieces of meat. It is a series of modelled wax forms of his own body parts behind plexiglass, such as a leg, an arm, and face, placed in display cases like religious relics [Fig. 6.48].32 Thek does something similar in The Tomb (1967), a cast of his own body, together with some objects laid in a tomb – a tower that is shaped like a ziggurat, a temple tower. Thek says about his Technological Reliquaries that the work was a reaction to the emotionless minimalism of his time. In an interview with De Volkskrant (April 1969), he pointed out that there was a strong tendency in art in New York towards ‘the minimal, non-emotional, even the anti-emotional’. That is why he wants to say something ‘about emotion, about the ugly side of things.’ He wants to bring ‘human fleshliness’ back into art. The tomb of his Tomb also includes a text that is a parody of minimalism. The coldness was, for him, very present in Pop Art. That is why he also added a piece of meat to Warhol’s Brillo boxes in his Meat Piece with Warhol Brillo Box (1965).33 The Technological Reliquaries are more than simply a reaction to minimalism: Thek is making a link with the veneration of relics. Wouter Prins compares this work with the valley of the dry bones in the book of Ezekiel in the Bible: Thek attempts to animate the material again as a visual answer to Ezekiel’s prophecy about the spirit of life that God will 31 https://www.brainpickings.org/2016/07/22/susan-sontag-peter-hujar-portraits-in-lifeand-death/. 32 Delehanty, Paul Thek/Processions, 6-7, 2. 33 Paul Thek, Selected Confessions: A Narrative Biography, 186.

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bring to the dry bones by providing them with sinews and clothing them with flesh (Ezekiel 37). A Dutch friend of Thek, Ton Lenders, says of the Technological Reliquaries that they, like the relics of saints to which the work alludes, recall the mortality of the saint and can also ‘serve as a travel document that will lead to eternal life’.34 This commentary is striking, for it refers to an old tradition of the connection between relics and the resurrection of the dead. Relics, remains of a saint, were placed in altars in churches. Canon Constantius had gathered relics in the St. Cunibert Basilica in Cologne (13th century) and had a letter placed with the relics containing this text: ‘so that they lead me to eternal rest at the last day and give me a pure life in this world.’35 Thek provided a symbol of the resurrection with Fishman [Fig. 6.49] at the end of the 1960s as a follow-up to The Tomb. Again, this is a cast of himself. The eyes are closed, the body covered with fish and the hands stretched out above his head like a diver preparing to dive. The title and the fish on the body refer to the biblical saying: ‘I will make you fishers of men’ (Matthew 4:19) and the ichthus symbol of the early Christians.36 Thek says about Fishman: he flies, held up by the fish. Fishman thus seems to point to belief in the resurrection, and Thek’s conversations with Susan Sontag also point to that. In those conversations they discussed Norman O. Brown’s Life against Death, in which Brown refers to Christian eschatology and hope for a bodily resurrection. Sontag later discussed Brown’s book in her Against Interpretation.37 In short, I view Thek’s Technological Reliquaries as an innovative art form in which the image functions as a relic in the expectation of the resurrection from the dead. Francis Bacon: Crucifixion (1965) Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) [Fig. 6.53] will make many viewers uneasy. The triptych shows three images. In the middle panel is a flesh-coloured/ white body that is ripped open, hanging upside down. Is it a human being or an animal? On the right panel we see a flesh-coloured/white naked man assaulting someone violently. He has a red band with a swastika on his arm, and his hair is combed straight back. The victim with an almost 34

W. Prins, Het dal der beenderen, 254. Cited by E. den Hartog, Relieken en hun invloed, 59. 36 Zelevansky, Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries, 15-16; Delehanty, Paul Thek/Processions, 59. 37 E. Sussman, Photography in Life and Death, 32. 35

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invisible flesh-coloured/white bodily form has red blotches of blood that are also present on the arm of his attacker. The victim wears a cocarde, the sign of freedom worn during the time of the French Revolution. Is this scene a reference to Germany’s domination of France during the Second World War? The green shadow under the victim is mysterious. Is this the shadow of the attacker or of the victim? Shadows are caused by a light source that shines on something, but that is not the case here. On the left there are figures wearing hats and sitting behind an elongated table that resembles the table in the middle panel. What are they looking at? In any case, they are not looking at what is happening behind them. On the left panel we see a flesh-coloured/white figure lying on a bed, whose face is decomposing. One sees the eye sockets and the mouth in which the teeth are clearly visible. The dark-red blood above and next to the figure indicating that he has died because of violence. Obviously, the figure lying here is the same as the victim on the right panel who has died of his wounds. Both, after all, are wearing the French cocarde. Further away is a naked woman. Her shape – especially her face – is distorted in the same way that Bacon often depicted himself and other people, such as his friends or the pope, as distorted. The three depictions form a triptych – an important form in Christian art for depicting Christ’s crucifixion.38 Bacon views the triptych as a series of images. He does not intend his paintings to provide narrative representations.39 But the three panels do form a whole: on all three we see a light-brown floor with an orange-red wall in the background. That suggests that it is the same space on all three panels. If we accept that the three panels belong together, then we look – other than at the traditional triptych – from right to left: someone is attacked. He is hung up like a slab of meat at the butcher’s and then lies stretched out on a bed like a cadaver. At first glance, Crucifixion, whose title points to the cross of Christ, is a puzzling work. Bacon views the depiction of Christ’s crucifixion in Western art to be so powerful that he, as an atheist, uses it as a model to show something else. For him, ‘it’s a magnificent armature on which you can hang all types of feeling and sensation.’40 He added that he himself was not religious; he used the crucifixion because he had found no other 38 For example, Rogier van der Weyden, Kruisiging (ca. 1440), V. Gamper, The Motif of the Crucifixion in Triptych Format, 329-332; J. Zimmermann, Francis Bacon Kreuzigung, 10-11. 39 D. Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 23, 25. 40 Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 49.

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form to help him to focus so intently on specific areas of human feeling and behaviour. I interpret Crucifixion (1965) as a deconstruction of the representation of human reality. The term deconstruction – which J.-L. Nancy also used in his deconstruction of Christianity (2.3.1) – is borrowed from Derrida, who deconstructed the Western philosophical and worldview tradition on a number of points in his philosophy, something that Heidegger had already done in his own way. The point of deconstruction is not destruction but transformation by correcting the traditional view of human reality.41 Bacon uses the crucifixion as a model to show what human reality fundamentally is. A passage in the interviews that David Sylvester had with him is important in this context. For Bacon, the mystery of painting in his time was how a painter could produce an appearance.42 That can be done by taking a photograph or making an illustration of something: ‘But how can this thing be made so that you catch the mystery of appearance within the mystery of making?’ Bacon agrees with Sylvester’s description of making ‘the mystery of appearance’: ‘… you’re trying to make an image of appearance that is conditioned as little as possible by the accepted standards of what appearance is.’ It is a kind of magical moment ‘to coagulate colour and form so that it gets the equivalent of appearance ….’43 That is why we see all kinds of distortions in Crucifixion (1965): that distortion is there to portray human reality as it fundamentally is according to Bacon. The two men behind the table pay no attention to the act of violence that is going on just behind them. They look attentively, but their gaze is not fixed on the figure hanging in the middle panel, for they cannot see it from their position. They look beyond the dead body on the bed. Are they looking, like voyeurs, at the naked woman beyond? The men are separate from the world of the act of violence portrayed on the right panel, separate from the figure hanging in the middle panel, and separate from the dead figure on the mattress. They are isolated from what is truly happening around them. It seems that the woman does not want to have anything to do with the violence either. She passes by and does not see it. She looks, namely, in the direction of the wounded or dead figure on the 41 Van Alphen also uses deconstruction in his analysis of Bacon: E. van Alphen, Francis Bacon and the Loss of Self. See also my Over het kijken naar schilderijen, 91-104. 42 For this and what immediately follows, see Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 122-123. 43 Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 136. For the creative process regarding Bacon, see G. Deleuze, Francis Bacon, chapters 11 and 12.

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mattress. Her mouth is wide open – is she screaming in fear like the pope as depicted by Bacon in Head VI (1949)? However that may be, the three figures, the woman and the two men, display a behaviour that contrasts sharply with that of the witnesses to Jesus’ crucifixion in Grünewald’s Isenheim Altarpiece who are standing near the crucified Jesus, full of empathy for him. Bacon deconstructs human reality here. Using the ideal-type model of ‘crucifixion’, Crucifixion (1965) shows that human reality is fundamentally violent. Bacon does that by distorting the figures and through his use of colour. It should be noted that the man with the swastika armband, the woman, the victim, the hanging, ripped open flesh, and the figure on the bed all have the same flesh-coloured/white tone. Bacon describes it as ‘flesh coloured whitewash’ that gives a sense of ‘highly-polished steel’.44 He was familiar with Soutine’s meat paintings and Rembrandt’s The Slaughtered Ox. Soutine’s painting has a warm red colour and refers to human suffering and torture.45 In particular, its difference from Rembrandt’s Slaughtered Ox with its dark-coloured meat is great.46 The death of the animal also represents the death of the human being, the death that produces grief and sadness. As stated above, that is different in the case of Bacon: the hanging flesh in the middle panel and the corpse in the left panel have the same flesh-coloured/white colour like the living people in the three panels. Death takes place in life. Bacon explains that he used the theme of the crucifixion to depict the situation of the slaughterhouse. He views human beings as ‘meat … potential carcasses’.47 That is why the living and the dead have the same flesh-coloured/white colour. Above, I pointed to the question whether the figure in the middle panel is a human being or an animal. That makes little difference to Bacon. In his view, the human being is an animal. On the right panel of another painting by Bacon, Three Studies for a Crucifixion (1962), we see a distorted head: the head seems to be that of a man, but the two large tusks are those of an animal. The face here is not one with a gaze directed at another, a theme in religious art that we see in Marion and Rouault (chapters 3 and 5). The ‘other’ has disappeared in Bacon, just as in Crucifixion (1965) the two men and the woman do not react to the violence. Aside from the face of the woman, the two men’s faces are also distorted by their large lower jaws.48 44 45 46 47 48

Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 122, 130. C. Soutine, The Carcass of Beef (1925). N. Bryson, Bacon’s Dialogues with the Past, 51-52. Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 53. For the deconstruction of the face, see Deleuze, Francis Bacon, chapters 11-13.

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Bacon calls his style of painting realistic. But this not a realism based on mimesis. He deconstructs the mimetic representation of human reality in his paintings. He wants his Crucifixion (1965) to show human reality in its depth. And, according to Bacon, it is a violent reality. The form in which he depicts this is impressive. Bacon himself speaks extensively about this creative process of his work.49 That is more a case of feeling and instinct than an approach to reality thought out rationally beforehand. It is a form that emerges, as it were, from violent reality itself. The form is not imposed from outside. In addition to the distortions, the choice of flesh-coloured/white for both the living and the dead, I would also like to point out the mysterious green shadow under the victim on the right panel. It cannot be the shadow of the attacker or the victim, since there is no light source, and its form seems to be that of a woman. Is it the shadow of someone walking past outside the picture like the woman on the left panel?50 It does seem that Bacon wants to disturb the viewer’s perception when looking at this non-rational world of violence. Just as for Nietzsche, for Bacon God is also dead. The alternative is nihilism, a world in which the will to power is dominant. That is what Crucifixion (1965) shows the viewer. Here a nihilistic universe is sketched in which the one person is a wolf to the other.51 This is a terrifyingexpressive work. 6.4.3 The Deconstruction of the Beauty of the Cross: Marc Mulders Flesh, blood, or death are depicted in contemporary art with very different intentions. Mulders’ painting Siena (Vleeswand) differs in form from Thek’s Technological Reliquaries that form an art object. Both works are symbolic expressions of a dead body. Thek’s fabricated body parts represent the dead body and the hope that it will be re-animated sometime. He links up with the tradition of the relic. That is different in Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) [Fig. 6.51]. As the remains of a dead body, it is not to be seen as a relic. The meat here literally represents Christ’s body before his sacrificial death on the cross, as stated above. Because of the chosen depiction of flesh and blood, it deviates, however, from traditional 49

Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 122-125; Deleuze, Francis Bacon, 11-13. Thus Zimmermann, Francis Bacon Kreuzigung, 20. For shadows in Bacon in general, see Van Alphen, Francis Bacon and the Loss of Self, 82-88. 51 Zimmermann, Francis Bacon Kreuzigung, 58-59, 85. In the interview with Sylvester, Bacon says that he is indifferent towards the suffering of others (Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon, 143-145). 50

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crucifixion scenes that, regarding the figuration, are clearly recognisable as the suffering Christ on the cross. How is this to be interpreted? From a formal perspective, I see a correspondence with Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) that I explained as deconstruction. Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) is also, in my view, a deconstruction. Whereas Bacon, using the crucifixion as a model, presents a deconstruction of human reality as fundamentally violent, Mulders presents a deconstruction of the Western depiction of Christ’s crucifixion. Mulders deconstructs a spiritualised depiction of Christ’s crucifixion like Raphael’s Mond Crucifixion [Fig. 6.46]. He dismantles the portrayal of the beauty of the cross, inverts the arrangement, and emphasises the physical, embodied character of suffering. This deconstruction is a transformation of the spiritualised image of Christ’s suffering. Mulders himself underscores the seriousness of suffering in this world: The Holocaust, the nuclear age, this period – I want to see this in my work. That explains perhaps the meat, the pietà, the Last Supper. The intrigues of the Supper still occur …. Actually, I do the same as was done centuries ago, it has to do with drama, the human drama …. The last thing I want is resignation to the state of the world. I attempt to approach a truth by showing a body in dismantled form, without skin. The flesh shows more truth because it is also dismantled life.52

Because suffering and death are presented in a physical way as that of flesh and blood, Mulders avoids the shortcomings of the traditional depiction of the cross in which the ugliness of suffering is subordinated to the beauty of redemption. But does Siena (Vleeswand) also show that moment of exaltation, of the prospect of liberated life, in its depiction of the dismantled life? The oil paint is applied in a brutal way on the canvas, as Figee remarked, but that does not alter the fact that the meat is still arranged in Mulders’ painting. What the artist says of Bloemen Maesta I and II can also be applied to Siena (Vleeswand), namely, that he took over the arrangement from Duccio’s Maestà, a late medieval altarpiece in which the life of Christ is depicted in many scenes placed next to and above each other. Mulders says about this: ‘For order is one of the possibilities for remaining religious.’53 And what he says about Crack L.A. II also applies to Siena (Vleeswand): ‘I try to provide the meat with dignity by 52

Mulders, Verf als opengelegde spier, 14-15. For this and what immediately follows, see Mulders, Verf als opengelegde spier, 10 and 15. 53

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arranging it in a grand way so that it appears in a serene state. To that end I force it into a straitjacket, into a rhythm and order and thus lift it out of the chaos.’ Here Mulders is speaking about the classical view of the beauty of order and proportion, as Joost de Wal remarks: ‘The ordering is an intervention that reveals the classic form of beauty in the repugnance of suffering and that adds the idea of hope to an image of pain.’54 And, especially concerning Siena (Vleeswand), the artist says in the same interview: ‘I wanted to take meat out of its morbid state and see it as an important wall before me; the one moment still at rest and the other moment showing itself as a muscle laid open.’55 Mulders thus also objects to the term ‘meat paintings’ in reference to his art. He wrote to me: ‘I don’t have meat paintings; I didn’t want to make them. I wanted to paint, to touch the vulnerability of Jesus, He who was so tortured, thus I wanted to touch the Body of flesh and blood through painting ….’56 What is dominant for the viewer of the canvases of meat and blood like Crack L.A. II or Siena (Vleeswand): the repugnance of flesh and blood or the beauty of order and rhythm? One person will comment that one cannot, as a believer, pray in front of such a painting, it does not evoke any empathy with the suffering and crucified Christ. Someone else will point to the beautiful colour of the meat and to the beauty of the ordering of the ugliness of the dead Christ, which opens up the prospect of his resurrection. I call Sutherland’s Crucifixion (1946) and Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) sublime. The artists have chosen a form that presents the tragedy of the scene with a spark of hope at the same time. Grünewald did this by including both the lamb and the chalice of the Last Supper on the Isenheim Altarpiece. Sutherland’s Crucifixion depicts hope via the blue background and Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) by arranging the pieces of meat in a specific order. The term sublime directs our attention to what is painful but nevertheless fascinates us.57 Christ’s death through torture is of course horrible as such, but, because of the hope of his resurrection in the work, the cross is also a sign of hope. That is different in Bacon’s Crucifixion: this painting depicts a reality that is fundamentally violent without the prospect of change. That is why I do not call that the aesthetic form of that painting sublime but horrifyingly expressive. 54

De Wal, Kunst zonder kerk, 161. Mulders, Verf als opengelegde spier, 11. 56 Marc Mulders, email to Wessel Stoker (15 December, 2018). 57 E. Burke, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1757), 36-37 (Part One, section 7). 55

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I thus reject the tradition that speaks about the ‘beauty of the cross’ or a ‘terrible beauty’ in connection with Christ’s suffering and death. ‘Terrible beauty’, in my view, is a contradictory term.58 The beautiful is pleasing to see or to hear. It represents form, harmony, and unity. In short, Mulders’ paintings such as Siena (Vleeswand), here interpreted as the deconstruction of a too easily spiritualised depiction of Jesus’ crucifixion, can cause a healthy shock in the viewers so that they will not rest in the situation of the world in which evil has the upper hand. 6.4.4 The Descent from the Cross: The Messenger by Lefteris Olympios Rubens’ Descent from the Cross (1611) in the cathedral of Antwerp is famous. Although Lefteris Olympios knows this painting, he gave his own unique accent to a series about the descent. First, from 1992 to 1994, he painted descents from the cross that do not present the cross as such but a pole to whose upper part Christ is tied with his head bowed. That makes the viewer think: A pole and not a cross? Does that make any difference? His series on the descent from the cross varies in colour and in differing effects of light and dark. If we look at the Olympios’ The Messenger (2015) [Fig. 6.54], we see only the bottom part of the cross from which Jesus’ body has just been removed. Two figures are carrying the dead Christ, and a third is still on the ladder. As often in Olympios’ paintings, they are painted abstractly. They are more contours of individuals than clearly recognisable people. After all, a religious painting is not a photograph. Three women are standing in the foreground with their hands covering their faces in a gesture of grief.59 Are they the three Marys who were present at Jesus’ crucifixion (Matthew 27:56)? The human figures are depicted in an abstract-figurative way, in a grey-green colour, with sharply visible black lines as their contours. The painting is coloured grey, and this turns into the black of night via the green horizon, a darkness that is interspersed with lighter vertical stripes. As far as composition is concerned, the diagonal, vertical, and horizontal lines are striking. The green and the gesture of grief by the women indicate the dramatic character of the scene of Jesus’ body being taken down from the cross. But do the women see what is coming? 58

W. Stoker, Het schone en het sublieme. Here, Olympios took as his example the gesture of grief of the women who had lost loved ones in the Turkish-Cypriot War (1974). 59

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Quite surprisingly, we see an angel approaching in the background. The title of the painting is not Descent from the Cross but The Messenger. The angel is painted in a dimmed white colour and thus stands out against the dark, grey colours of the painting. The dead body of Christ is also painted in a dimmed white colour, as are some steps of the ladder. Undeniably, the angel is to bring the news that Christ will rise on the third day; above him the heavens are opening and allowing rays of light through. Here, white is the sign of the light of God and his messenger. One should remember that in ancient Greek, angel (ángelos) meant ‘messenger’. But … the women are standing with their backs to the messenger. The painter weaves the message of the angel to the women on Easter morning together with the event of the descent from the cross. Olympios had done that already in the above-mentioned series about the descent from the cross. In one of those paintings, we can see Mary Magdalene climbing the ladder and Jesus, who would be taken down from the cross, is bending towards her and seems to console her. It is an old tradition in religious painting to weave two stories together. Raphael did that in his Transfiguration (1518-1520), bringing the story of the transfiguration of Jesus on the mount together with what happened after: the healing of a demon-possessed boy. Olympios’ abstract-figurative depiction of the scene of the descent from the cross with the grieving women, together with the dominant grey-green, grey and black emphasises the tragedy of Jesus’ humiliation. A glimpse of hope of a future is provided by the dimmed white of Jesus’ body and of the angel in the background. This painting is not part of the tradition of the beauty of the cross, like Raphael’s. It is a dramatic-expressive work with a glimmer of hope brought by the dimmed white. It is a sublime or, better, surreal painting that is intended to do justice to the cross as both humiliation and exaltation.

6.5 Conclusion What is the relation between the images of Christ’s life and work discussed in this chapter with the tradition of art with Christian themes? They are examples of a fusion of horizons as addition, as the exploration of images of Jesus in the New Testament (see 5.5) in contemporary contexts. Thek’s Die Krippe is not really a re-enactment of ‘the worship of the wise men from the East’. He transformed the journey to the crib by an allusion to Paul’s cosmic Christology (Colossians 1:15-23). He did

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that by placing the Christ child in the contemporary context of the preservation and saving of our earth. In his performance, Sandoval enacted a scene alluding to Jesus’ washing of his disciples’ feet (John 13:1-20). Mulders gives a radical interpretation of Christ as human being who is able ‘empathize with our weaknesses’, who ‘has been tempted in every way, just as we are’ (Hebrews 4:15) and of Christ’s words, ‘Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends’ (John 15:13). Olympios combines two scenes in his The Messenger: that of the descent from the cross and that of the angel as the messenger of the good news at Jesus’ grave. Thek’s Fishman is an allusion to Jesus’ resurrection from the grave. Some works rely on forms from the history of the pre-modern image. Thek and Sandoval provide site-specific religious art. The space of the museum becomes an environment through Thek’s Die Krippe, and Sandoval carried out performances. These works show a connection with pre-modern ‘art’. After all, installation art has its roots in the tradition of the pre-modern visual language in chapels and tomb architecture.60 One can think here of Thek’s The Tomb (1967), for which the artist constructed a tomb (6.4.2). Sandoval’s performances Baby Street and Dirt were performed in the museum as site-specific. His performances made use of the function of the Veronica: the image as relic, as indexical sign, physically connected with or caused by its referent. The dirty body of the street child was part of a performance. Thek also used the image as indexical sign in his Technological Reliquaries. Both artists provide modern art inspired by pre-modern ‘art’. Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) apparently shows a relic via the painting; it gives a representation of flesh and blood as connected with the sacrifice of Christ in a quasi-physical way. I view it as an iconic sign, for it is a painting and has, according to the interpretation given above, a very different function than a relic. It is a deconstruction of the traditional depiction of Jesus’ crucifixion. Mulders comments on his Siena (Vleeswand): ‘it is a ridiculous painting if you think about it. A century ago, such a form was not yet one of the possibilities.’61 And what can we conclude about Olympios’ image of the descent from the cross? It is not an image as iconic sign, in which all emphasis lies on visuality. It depicts a reality of death and resurrection that lies beyond our reality. Nor is it an indexical sign. I called it abstract-figurative – a figuration that is pre-eminently suited to express transcendent reality. 60 61

A. Nagel, Medieval Modern, 18-19. B. Stigter, NRC Handelsblad, 22 November, 1991: Marc Mulders over religie.

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7.1 Introduction Part II began with the question of how the non-imageable God can be depicted (chapter 4). Then we looked at the visible of God in Christ. First, Christ as person was central – the Holy Face (chapter 5) – and then the work of Christ as a human being (chapter 6). This present chapter discusses the Holy Spirit and the future and completion. We will begin by looking at the depiction of the new life that begins with Easter and ends in God’s future as described in the New Testament. In this the Spirit – the third person of the triune God – is important as ‘the power that connects heaven and earth’.1 The Holy Spirit, the third person of the triune God, came up in our discussion of the Trinities of Rublev and Masaccio (4.2.1 and 4.2.2). Traditionally, the Holy Spirit is depicted less often than Christ. Striking twentieth-century depictions are Emil Nolde’s Pentecost (1909) and Anselm Kiefer’s Send Forth your Spirit (1974).2 To introduce this chapter, we will look at Kiefer’s work on the Spirit. Anselm Kiefer, Sende Deinen Geist aus (1974) Anselm Kiefer’s Send Forth Your Spirit [Fig. 7.55] does not limit the Spirit to Pentecost but shows the Spirit as ‘the power that connects heaven and earth’. This watercolour contains a dove descending with the words from the liturgy of the Eucharist ‘Send forth your Spirit’, and the almost illegible words on the left: ‘(and) everything will be made new’. Behind the dove, the rays of the sun, with a bluish centre, illuminate a dark sky. The yellow form with red-brown strips is that of a painter’s palette. The Spirit does not descend on people but on animals in the field. Just as the earth cannot exist without the sun, so it cannot exist without God’s Spirit. The painting shows that the Spirit is now definitively connected with the 1 That is the title of a work on the Spirit (‘de kracht die hemel en aarde verbindt’) by Jan Veenhof, former professor of dogmatics at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. 2 It is striking that the title Andy Warhol gave to one of his works on the Last Supper mentioned the Spirit explicitly: A. Warhol, The Last Supper (Dove) (1986).

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earth. In my view, by placing the Spirit in the frame of a painter’s palette, Kiefer points to the connection between art and religion. An Outline of this Chapter This chapter consists of a number of case studies of the depiction of Christian expectations regarding the future. These studies represent a selection – we are not providing a history of the image but a study in the theology of art with some examples of the depiction of the triune God in modern and contemporary art as our starting point. We could have chosen other works. The media used in the work are very different: a painting, two stained glass window installations, a tapestry, a watercolour, and a lithograph. Because these works deal primarily with the future from the perspective of Easter, a question arises here that also concerns the works in the previous chapters: How can the invisible of divine reality appear in a visible image? Whereas one could still point to the connection of God with the world for religious transcendence in the works we discussed earlier, here we are dealing with the future, with something that can be said or shown only on the basis of expectation. That is why I will discuss the religious character of these works explicitly. We will begin with Paasmorgen (Easter Morning) (1996) by Gijs Frieling. This is an example of a contemporary painting about Christ’s resurrection. We will see how Frieling depicts a reality beyond empirical reality, such as the Easter mystery. In Alfred Manessier’s stained glass window installation in the church in Abbeville, the window of the Holy Spirit has a central place next to that of Easter. Just like the Easter icon of Pentecost, its theme is the continuing presence of the God in the world. This installation shows the Trinity in a new visual language in abstract form and colour. In Christian art, the future is depicted as the reign of Christ, the final judgment, and the coming of the reign of peace. The classic icon of Christ in the East is Christ Pantocrator, which in the West is called Christ in Majesty. Such depictions of Christ were often derived from representations of ruling Caesars or kings, such as the portrayal of Christ on a throne. That is no longer a convincing portrayal. Graham Sutherland made a new depiction of the reigning Christ in Coventry Cathedral with the large tapestry Christ in Glory (1962) based on John’s vision of the throne scene in Revelation but without the throne (Revelation 4:2-7). The Dutch painter Marc Mulders used another representation of Christ from

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the fifteenth century in his stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel (The Last Judgment) (2006): Christ wearing a loincloth and sitting on a rainbow. Marlene Dumas depicts the Jesus figure in her Jesus Serene (2007) in the midst of other people. The intriguing question here is what the relationship between Jesus and the others in this watercolour is. Finally, we see a very personal, humorous lithograph by Max Beckmann on the new heaven and the new earth.

7.2 Gijs Frieling: The Easter Mystery When recounting Jesus’ resurrection, the Gospel narrative relates that ‘two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning’ said to the women who came to Jesus: ‘Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!’ (Luke 24:4-6). The Gospel is silent about the event itself. It is an event beyond the boundary of death. Despite this silence of the Gospel narrative, in the late Middle Ages, depictions of the resurrection began to appear. In Resurrection (ca. 1485), Piero della Francesca portrays Christ rising from the grave like a classical hero with the banner of the cross in his hand as a sign of victory. It is thus depicted as an event that takes place in our empirically observable world. The invisible God the Father is, however, removed from the visual eye, and that applies just as much to the event of Christ’s resurrection. The Easter icon of the Eastern Orthodox Church does not depict the event of Jesus’ resurrection, and rightly so. The Eastern Orthodox Easter icon is the depiction of Jesus’ descent into hell. The icon shows the gates of hell being smashed and Christ liberating the believers of the Old Testament period from death, with Adam and Eve as the first. Another of the Eastern Orthodox Church Easter icons is that of the women who went to the grave with spices, but the resurrection itself is not portrayed. The painting Paasmorgen (1996) [Fig. 7.56] by Gijs Frieling does not portray the resurrection either. In addition to what it represents, Paasmorgen, just like his painting Kruisiging van Christus (Crucifixion of Christ) (1996), [Fig. 7.57], is striking because of its colours. In Kruisiging van Christus the sky is blood-red transitioning into black. Christ on the cross is painted in a deep black colour, with cypresses in the background, bathed in the white light of the (unseen) moon. The cross itself is green, like the blood and sweat on Jesus’ body. Thus, the cross is to be seen as the new tree of life, and the green blood – an oxymoron in word

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and image – as a sign of the giving of new life. A woman cloaked in red, Mary Magdalene, stands near him. With these colours, Kruisiging van Christus gives the crucifixion a double meaning in a twofold way. On the one hand, the cross is viewed as humiliation and exaltation: the black of the sky and of Christ himself point to the humiliation of the death on the cross; the green drops of ‘blood’ point to exaltation and hope. The cross event has yet another double meaning, however. It is a historical event in space and time – the event (the cross and Mary) and its situatedness in a landscape point to that. But at the same time, it has a suprahistorical meaning because the landscape is painted in a surreal way. The colours do not reproduce the event in a realistic way, and because of that Golgotha is more than a historical moment in history. This is more than the death of a mere human being, and his death is more than that of a martyr. Here heaven and earth meet. Something similar can be seen in Frieling’s painting Paasmorgen. The colours, the forms of the angels and the blossoms of the blue wisteria and the lack of perspective give the Easter event a surreal feel. In a conversation with me on this issue, Frieling said: I structure my paintings in a completely schematic way according to a method that is also used in various folk art traditions: the transition of colour in the background, the contrast between atmospheric, transparent layers of colour, and pronounced calligraphic, figurative elements. I do not use any perspective either, and I place everything next to each other so there are no overlaps in the representation. That is something very fundamental: that everything occurs alongside one another in one two-dimensional space.3

We see Mary Magdalene kneeling at the grave, with her arms lifted up. The opening of the grave is deep black. There is the angel (or angels) on the right with golden rays emanating from them and with feathers like those of birds, speckled with small red signs. Both trees are light green, with cluster-like blue flowers that merge into the blue of the sky. The sky, the blue wisteria, and the edges of the angel(s) are blue: that colour often indicates religious transcendence. The Easter mystery is protected against curious eyes. It is depicted abstractly as a black square where the opening of the grave is. Frieling thus respects the mystery of the resurrection on Easter morning. The colours – light green and red, white and black, and the blue, especially that of the sky with blue in various shades – can evoke joy in the viewer. 3

W. Stoker, In gesprek met G. Frieling, 42.

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The viewer may be surprised to see a skeleton outside the grave. Is this a representation of Paul’s statement, ‘The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable’ (1 Corinthians 15:42)? Another explanation is that the new Adam, the new human being, is raised up on the bones of the old Adam. According to the gospels, the women at the empty grave reacted to the explanation of the angel(s) in very different ways. They were ‘afraid yet filled with joy’ (Matthew 28:8), ‘[t]rembling and bewildered’ (Mark 16:8); ‘[i]n their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground,’ and they remembered Jesus’ words about the resurrection of the Son of Man (Luke 24:5, 8). John relates that the two angels ask Mary why she is crying, and immediately afterwards she encounters Jesus (John 20:13-18). What emotion do Mary’s uplifted arms express? If Mary was depicted here with her hands before her face, that would point to her despair or sorrow, like that of the three women in Olympios’ The Messenger [Fig. 6.54]. Her arms are painted, however, as raised in an attitude that, in Christian iconography, refers to worship. Her posture resembles somewhat that of prayer in which the opened hands are raised to ear height. I see Mary’s uplifted arms as an expression of her Easter experience. Frieling’s representation of the resurrection respects the mystery of the resurrection by painting Mary in worship at the black square. One could write Jesus’ saying underneath this painting: ‘blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed’ (John 20:29). It is not enough to say that this is a religious painting because it portrays a biblical narrative. After all, many artists readily use Christian iconography for secular purposes (chapter 2). That this work is religious is due primarily to the way in which the resurrection is depicted here. The choice of colours and the surrealistic forms of the landscape and the angel(s) evoke a reality beyond our reality.

7.3 Alfred Manessier: ‘Ode to Light’ (The Triune God) When one enters the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Abbeville (northern France), one can see in the choir of the church, which is oriented to the east, these three abstract stained glass windows [Fig. 7.58]. With the two windows on either side, they show dancing rhythms primarily in red and blue but also in off-white and light yellow, whereas a deep red colour rises up from below. In the morning, the rising sun makes the window shine. Looking around, one can see a total of 31 such abstract stained

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glass windows in various colours. The brochure informs the reader that the windows in the choir are called The Joy of Easter in the Early Morning of the Resurrection. The approximately 300 square metres of abstract stained glass windows are the masterwork of Alfred Manessier, constructed in the years 1982-1983. The theme is victory over death, and the whole is an ‘Ode to Light’. The work itself has no title, but I call it that, following J.-F. Cocquet and P. Dhanaut, because it characterises the installation in a particularly apt way.4 Just as Rothko’s 14 paintings in the Rothko Chapel in Houston are an installation in that they cohere closely with each other, so is Manessier’s ‘Ode to Light’. The position of the windows corresponds to the structure of this Gothic church; they are placed in such a way that the light of the rising and setting sun is taken into consideration. The centre window of Easter (on the eastern side of the church in the choir) is opposite the window on the west side of the church. That is the window on which the contours of a cross can be seen with, on the left, a window depicting Peter’s denial, portrayed abstractly with a red stripe down the middle, and, on the right, a window in which Mary, with the other women by the cross, is depicted in a non-figurative way. The Holy Spirit Manessier portrays Christian salvation as the new life that begins on Easter morning. The church contains no windows of Christ in glory, the Last Judgment, or the coming Kingdom of Peace. Manessier limits himself to the salvation event from Maundy Thursday up to and including Easter morning, Christ’s path from death to life. He places it in the larger framework of God’s involvement with the world. The Holy Spirit has a central role here: the large window on the south side of the church is that of the Holy Spirit, The Announcement of Pentecost [Fig. 7.59]. It is done in warm colours, with red-tinted tongues of fire that fall on the earth with its green and yellow vegetation. The light blue seems to suggest water: it shows God’s presence in the world after Jesus’ death and resurrection. In his final discourse, Jesus spoke about his dying in order to make room for the Spirit: ‘[T]ruly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you’ (John 16:7). Using this statement, Manessier places this window in the midst of his other windows of Maundy Thursday. On one 4 The title of the book by J.-F. Cocquet & P. Dhanaut on this stained glass window installation is Manessier: Hymne à la Lumière: Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville.

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side of this window on Pentecost, one can see the smaller window of the bread and that of the wine on the other, reminding us of the Last Supper on Maundy Thursday. The window of the Spirit, on the south side, is opposite that of Holy Saturday on the north side of the church [Fig. 7.60]. With respect to size, both windows are the largest in the church – 8.24 metres high by 3.58 metres wide and 8.55 metres high by 3.9 metres wide respectively – and simply because of that draw attention. The windows are related to one another as in an installation. The window of The Announcement of Pentecost and the window opposite it, of the dead Christ on Holy Saturday have their place on both sides of the choir with the windows of Easter morning, the victory of death. Thus, Manessier depicts the Spirit here as the power that continues to connect heaven and earth after Jesus’ resurrection. A Narrative Trinity Manessier shows us the Trinity in an innovative way. The classic representations of the Trinity – such as Rublev’s [Fig. 4.20] and Masaccio’s [Fig. 4.21] – portray Father, Son, and Spirit in a kind of group portrait. Manessier shows us the triune God in a narrative way, i.e., via the Gospel story. The Spirit (with the large window) and Christ (the windows with his suffering and resurrection stories) are depicted in an abstract way in the windows of the installation. And God the Father? The Father is present in the light that falls through the windows. The stained glass window itself is the medium of the light. Light has traditionally been the symbol of God. God the Father is implicitly present in the windows of the Jesus narrative and of the pouring out of the Spirit. Light is dominant in this work, which has not been called ‘Ode to Light’ for nothing. There is even some light in the window of Holy Saturday. It is deep blue, almost purple: ‘A great and gentle nocturnal light will fall softly from above to below. Like a long, irresistible sleep.’5 Liturgical Art Because of the context of the church, the placing of the windows in the church, this installation has become an example of liturgical art and can also constitute part of a liturgical celebration. It depicts the triune God in 5 The comment is from Manessier himself, cited in Cocquet & Dhanaut, Hymne à la Lumière, 56, 88.

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colour and abstract form. The image functions here as a medium of communication; the word is present only in the background. The church’s brochure refers the visitor to the titles of the work – which is necessary for the viewer to orient herself. Knowledge of the Gospel story is needed for a good understanding of this ‘Ode to Light.’ But that does not detract from the fact that Manessier’s work demonstrates in an impressive way that an image communicates to the viewer in a different way than words do. The image has something extra that cannot be expressed in language, in words. It shows something, and showing is not the same as saying. That raises the question of the relation between image and word. I will go into that in more detail below (11.2). With Thek’s Die Krippe, the visitor stepped into the work of art (6.2), and that is the case here as well. Thek staged that by creating an environment; here it happens as a matter of course because the 300 square metres of stained glass windows surround the visitor as long as he or she is in the church. If the visitor allows him- or herself to be taken up into the story of Jesus’ suffering and death, shown here in colour and form, they will remember the Jesus narrative in a way that contemporises that narrative and their own place within it.

7.4 Graham Sutherland: Christ in Glory When one enters the newly built Coventry Cathedral – constructed next to the ruins of the old cathedral destroyed in the Second World War – one can see the enormous tapestry, Christ in Glory in the Tetramorph (19511962) [Fig. 7.63] (22.76 metres high and 11.58 metres wide). It hangs on the high wall in the ‘East’ behind the high altar. The tapestry depicts Christ in full, surrounded by an oval form, a mandorla, with the hands and feet showing the red signs of the wounds of the crucifixion. His expression is both gentle and sublime. As Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, said at the jubilee service on 25 May, 2012, ‘The first thing this building teaches us is to see Jesus.’6 Christ is seen from every point in the church. The visitor’s attention is drawn to the large figure of Christ as well as to the colours: the off-white of Christ’s robe, the grey tints in the yellow mandorla; the yellow that is repeated in the great triangle on the work and the framing of the four evangelists, and especially the green outside the mandorla. The tapestry is an integrated 6

Journey into the Light, 19.

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element in the whole of the church – itself architecturally a work of art – that contains many other contemporary works of art. Near the baptismal font – a rock from Bethlehem – there is a large stained glass window that displays an outpouring of God’s glory through the interplay of sunlight and the large area of yellow glass in the centre of the window.7 Christ in Glory owes its existence to a church commission given to Graham Sutherland, one of England’s most prominent modern artists. The work was developed in close collaboration with Sir Basil Spence, the architect of the cathedral, with the church commission and the weavers from the area around Aubusson (France) who carried out the work. The commission’s brief concerned making a work of art that represented ‘Christ The Redeemer, in the glory of the Father, shedding His Spirit on the Church’.8 It was not carried out in every detail: the apostles as representative of the church are missing – Sutherland did not want to make it too much of an ecclesiastical image (33-34). A Renewed Visual Language Christ in Glory is a twentieth-century ‘sacred portrait’ of Christ that goes back to the icon Christ Pantocrator of the East and to the Christ in Majesty of the West. The Eastern icon Christ Pantocrator depicts Christ as divine majesty and redeemer. In this icon Christ Pantocrator (second half of the nineteenth century), Christ lifts up his right hand in a gesture of blessing [Fig. 7.61]. Both raised fingers point to the divine and human nature of Christ. The three folded fingers refer to the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The double lines in the halo refer again to the two natures of Christ. The abbreviation ho oon (Greek) – barely visible here – means ‘he who truly is’. The initials of Christ IC XC are found in the upper left- and right-hand corners. Christ is holding an open Bible in his left hand, with a shortened text from Matthew 11:27-29, and the word Pantocrator is written in Church Slavic in the background.

The Western counterpart to this, Christ in Majesty, can be found in a church close to Coventry Cathedral. What I saw in the medieval Holy Trinity Church a few hundred metres away from the cathedral was surprising. High up in the church is a rare 7

Journey into the Light, 41-46. A. Révai, Christ in Glory, 90. The process is extensively described by Andrew Révai in conversation with Sutherland: A. Révai, Christ in Glory. The references in the text are to this work. 8

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late-medieval mural of Christ in Majesty judging the living and the dead (1430-1440) [Fig. 7.62].

Sutherland saw himself confronted by the question of how he could translate a living image for the Middle Ages into one for the secular society of the twentieth century (16, 79-80). The medieval Christ in Majesty in the nearby Holy Trinity Church shows Christ with raised hands that have the signs of the wounds of the crucifixion, sitting on the globe of the world as the judge at the Last Judgment.9 Marc Mulders gives a different version of this, drawing on a fifteenth-century painting of the same event (7.5). In Sutherland’s Christ in Glory, the hands of Christ are raised, whereby it is not clear what the gesture means. It is not a gesture of blessing (2930). At first glance, Christ seems to be sitting, but some assert that he is standing. Above Christ is an opening with rays of light directed towards him, and there is a dove above the opening as an indication of the Spirit (32). Christ is clothed from head to foot in a robe that is oval-shaped from the waist down. What is striking is that a human being is depicted between his feet, something that has the aesthetic value of filling up space. Sutherland derived this erect figure from old Egyptian art (32). Below that figure is a Eucharistic chalice with a snake in it. This was not included in the commission but was put there at the initiative of Sutherland himself. It was originally a symbol for the apostle John (37).10 The word Tetramorph in the full title of the work refers to the symbolic ranking of four elements: according to the chapter 4 of the book of Revelation in the Bible, John saw four creatures (animals) in front of and around the throne in heaven. In the later tradition, they were portrayed as emblems of the four evangelists, with Matthew depicted as a human figure with wings. Sutherland finds that too much of a cliché (106), however. He does take the four traditional figures as his starting point but portrays them in a lifelike fashion. In the upper left we see a human figure, Matthew, who seems to be stepping out of a window and looking in Christ’s direction. In the upper right is the eagle (John), in the lower left the bull (Luke), and in the lower right the lion (Mark). Sutherland wanted to present the animals as symbols of creation (40-41). Thus, Christ is surrounded by creatures, by humans and animals. 9 The Last Judgment: the Coventry Doom Painting and Holy Trinity Church, brochure Holy Trinity Church Coventry, n.y. 10 Révai spoke about the chalice with a dragon in conversation with Sutherland and points to Revelation 12:3-11 (Révai, Christ in Glory, 37).

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The whole seems to be strongly symmetrical, apart from a few details. On the right, there is a representation of the angel Michael fighting the dragon, called Satan (Revelation 12:3-11). This was added on request because this church is the cathedral church of St. Michael. There is also a sculpture St. Michael and the Devil by Jacob Epstein that hangs on the outside of the church. Suffering and Power On the lower part of the tapestry, one can see a crucifixion that is stylistically influenced by Picasso’s Crucifixion (110), with the sun and the moon on either side.11 That could be surprising because the theme is after all Christ in Glory. Sutherland commented on this choice by saying that he had reason enough to include a tragic and sombre element on the lower part of the tapestry in contrast with the rest. He did that against the background of the concentration camps of the Second World War and all the other violence of the 20th century (82). But how does an artist image a powerful Christ in glory after Auschwitz? Sutherland wants to depict Christ as the God-man: a figure with great vitality, like the priest who raises his hands during the Eucharist, with his arms held close to his body in order to emphasise the power of the host. Aside from Christ’s humanness, Sutherland also wanted to show the aspect of power in his figuration of Christ insofar as Christ is also God (27). He was not intending to depict a wise man but a being that created everything through his power. Sutherland’s tapestry, together with the cathedral, made a deep impression on me. A picture cannot do that, nor can the explanation I gave above. The artist does not turn the divine figure into a Hercules, like Michelangelo’s God of The Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel (4.2.3). In this respect, Sutherland’s representation of Christ’s face with a beard is closer to the Byzantine tradition. His earliest study of the head of Christ was borrowed from a reliquary in Limoges (103). Révai points correctly to the relationship of Sutherland’s chosen style to the Easter hieratic (sacred) style that can also be found in Ravenna or in Sicily. The composition has a hieratic quality: the figure of Christ faces us; the composition shows symmetry and is rectangular, whereas the oval mandorla and the oval lower part of Christ’s robe break through this (43). At the same time, 11 For the influence of Picasso on Sutherland, see G. Régnier & A. Baldassari, Corps Crucifiés, 117-125.

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there are also ‘realistic’ elements in Sutherland’s Christ, such as his feet. Sutherland does this in order to create contrast in the style. He starts from the traditional representation of Christ in Majesty but makes it contemporary through his artistic vision. Sutherland therefore stops short of a complete symmetry – he thinks the symmetry should be a bit out of balance (61). Along with proportionality, symmetry is an aspect of the classic concept of beauty. Does Sutherland’s deliberate choice for some symmetry cohere with the fact that the world still looks forward with a yearning desire for the ultimate peace that Revelation 20 depicts by means of the classic concept of beauty? Whoever enters the atmosphere of the church – with a rock from Bethlehem as a baptismal font, near the ‘jubilant’ stained glass window and with the Christ in Glory that fills the whole back wall – can experience it as a place where the Invisible appears in the visible. Through its hieratic style, the figure of Christ radiates holiness like an Eastern icon of Christ. Eastern Orthodoxy speaks of the presence of the depicted Christ via the image. Is that the case here as well? That partly depends on the viewer. I will come back to the issue of the presence of the image below (chapters 8 and 9).

7.5 Marc Mulders: Het Laatste Oordeel (The Last Judgment) The stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel (2006) in Saint John’s Cathedral in ’s Hertogenbosch [Fig. 7.64] is, at first glance, overwhelming because of its many pastel-coloured panels with semi-realistic figurations. One gradually perceives the transitions and the depiction of the struggle between good and evil. The window portrays Christ as a judge in the Last Judgment (Matthew 25:31-46). He is not sitting as a king-judge on a throne (the world globe), like the Christ in Majesty of the Holy Trinity Church in Coventry [Fig. 7.62], but on the rainbow wearing only a loincloth. Mulders borrowed his depiction of Christ as judge from Jan Alart Duhameel (15th century), the co-designer and architect of Saint John’s. Duhameel had depicted Christ in a copper engraving as judge, seated on the rainbow as a sign of the covenant between God and human beings, with the sword of justice and the lily branch of mercy.12 In Mulders’ work as well, we see Christ wearing nothing more than a loincloth, as if he has just come down from 12 M. Mulders, The Last Judgment, Marc Mulders Archief, 42. The quotes in the text come from this work.

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the cross [Fig. 7.65]. He sits above the rainbow in soft yellow, surrounded by grey, violet, blue, and somewhat green colours. Violet is dominant in the centre section of the window, and there is a red-orange hue that continues below; in the bottom of the window are dark colours. Grey dominates, but there are also some pastel hues of blue, green, and yellow. The stained glass window has a medieval composition – with heaven above, Purgatory in the middle, and hell below – but their content is indeed contemporary. According to Mulders, hell is to be seen within the context of the Last Judgment, but it is also made contemporary as hell on earth.13 The demonising of our world can be seen depicted à la Jeroen Bosch in the contemporary hell on earth of 9/11, the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York [Fig. 7.66]. Using a silk screen technique, Mulders put a newspaper photograph of 9/11 on the glass (42), in the same way he had previously depicted the attacks in London and Madrid on the Apocalypse window in the Museum Catharijne Convent (Utrecht). Evil is literally shown in all its intensity: we see one of the planes flying into the one of the Twin Towers. Unlike Thek with his personal mythology in Die Krippe, Mulders has included themes or motifs from classic Christian art in the window and processed them in his own way; using the iris flower throughout the whole window. Traditionally, the iris represents purity and is therefore often associated with Mary. More generally, it is a sign of the reconciliation between God and human beings. The leaves of the iris are sword-shaped, and therefore the flower also refers to what Simeon said to Mary: ‘And a sword will pierce your own soul too’ (Luke 2:35), referring to Mary’s suffering during the passion of Jesus. Mulders uses the iris with its leaves in an ingenious way in the various parts of the window. The flower, he explains, forms the connection between heaven and hell: The whole window is marked by the iris, from the upside-down iris below in hell to the half-opened iris in Purgatory, right up to the completely opened petals at the feet of Christ’s throne. It is the iris that shores up the message of the Last Judgment here. (41)

In the upper part of the window under the throne of Jesus, the iris has its petals open giving the impression of worshipping Christ. Below that, the iris embraces the symbols of resurrection: the peacock (resurrection), the fish (ichthus, ancient Greek for ‘fish’, a sign for Christ), and the butterfly (depicted in the three stages of its existence as caterpillar, pupa, and butterfly (41)). 13

Mulders, Het Laatste Oordeel, 15.

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Because the petals of the iris can also be swords, Mulders can use the iris in his depiction of hell. It is then turned upside-down. The petals then form, he explains, a greedy mouth at the end of a green gripper arm. In the depiction of the hell on earth of 9/11, the petals of the iris are ‘swords’ hooked around the photograph on the glass. The lowest two rows of the window depict two other representations, i.e., that ‘the devil has taken possession of the beautiful iris’, such as ‘the bird that, to his alarm, sees the devil in his own tail’ (41) and the Leviathan from the book of Job as the devouring jaws of this sea monster. Aside from the iris, there is yet a second connection between heaven and hell, and that is a ladder that ends at the rainbow on which Christ is sitting. That is the theme of the ‘ladder of heaven’, known primarily because of the Paradise ladder of John Climacus.14 One has to look closely to see the ladder. Mulders explains this as follows: A ladder leads from hell to heaven, as a sign that the human being can climb to the loving Heart. God [Christ] is thus also depicted in moderate dimensions because He is found only by those who seek and are willing to cast their eyes upward …. Accompanied by angels, the good person will ascend, and the bad person, hounded by devils with lances, has to descend. (42)

Nevertheless, heaven and hell are not sharply contrasted with respect to colour. He also uses light colours for the iris in hell. His reasoning is as follows: I have deliberately used the same light colours for the iris in hell. In the end, the external appearance does not matter, but the internal orientation to good or evil is determinative for each living being. Bright colours are also present there as a sign that evil itself can hide in the seductiveness … the upsidedown iris in hell does have beautiful colours, for evil is present there in seductive and self-conscious form. (41, 43)

The form in which Christ is depicted – half-naked, just like he has traditionally been depicted on the cross – in pale yellow points to a different concept of God than that of radical Muslim terrorists who appealed (wrongly) to the biblical book of the Revelation of John to justify their political violence. The yellow points to God-Christ as light; in his halfnakedness he shows himself to be the one who sacrificed himself for humans. There is no violence in this God. He is depicted here as a model of ‘defenceless superior power’ (Berkhof). That defencelessness refers to his way of the cross, here represented by the loincloth. Defenceless superior power does not exclude the active exercise of power in the service 14

C. Heck, L’Échelle Céleste.

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of justice – I remember Sutherland’s Christ in Glory – here symbolised by the sword that Christ wields, in addition to the lily branch as a sign of mercy. Mulders confirms that implicitly when he writes in his explanation about God, humans, and violence. One can never climb the ladder to heaven with blood on one’s hands. The behaviour of those who use religious and political violence is contrary to the biblical message: ‘touch your neighbour and your enemy with the love that is born of the soul …’ (43). All religious fighters, contemporary terrorists as well as, for example, the Protestants and Catholics in Ireland at the time, according to Mulders, ‘think they already know the final judgment of the loving God, take out an advance on that final judgment in their blindness, and that is the earthly hell of shedding blood’ (43). Mulders’ window portrays the Last Judgment as restoring order to the universe. The religious character of this stained glass window is not found only in the representation but in its context as well. The window is located on the western side of the church above the entrance, facing east, where the altar is; the east where the sun rises also points to Jesus as the light of the world. The window confronts the viewer with the question of good and evil. It makes him or her think about his or her own position regarding good and evil. The metaphor of climbing the ‘ladder of heaven’ does not present so much a development in the mystical relationship with God – as was the case with Climacus – as it does an ethical choice.

7.6 Marlene Dumas: Jesus Serene and the (Future) Human Community In the watercolour Jesus Serene (1994) [Fig. 7.67] by Marlene Dumas, we see 21 different faces. Jesus is often depicted in a group portrait at the Last Supper, in which the Jesus figure is immediately recognisable. It is different here. When one looks at all those faces in the ‘light or pale colours of pink, yellow, blue, green, etc.’, it is not immediately clear who among them is Jesus.15 Is the watercolour intended to make clear to us that we do not have any description of Jesus’ face and therefore should not look for any?16 That says too little. The depiction of Jesus’ face is not a question of a physical likeness, but one of a spiritual likeness (5.3). 15

M. Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1996), 108. Thus Den Hartog Jager: ‘[W]hat is nice here is that Jesus can be very well hidden among these men.’ He then states that the viewer can decide, but ‘the truth does not exist’ (H. den Hartog Jager, Zie de mens, 169). 16

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Wouter Prins calls Jesus Serene one of the most interesting attempts to revitalise and reinterpret the image of Jesus. We have a conception of Jesus because of all the images in the Christian tradition, which are often pushed aside as inadequate clichés. According to Prins, however, ‘in the hands of Dumas, [they] can once again seem to have value and even give us the feeling of being able to experience Christ near us.’17 As a viewer of the work, one can ask: Why do we see 21 faces here? If some are borrowed from depictions of Jesus in art history and others from people Dumas knows, what is then the relationship between Jesus and these people? The 21 faces are intriguing. The work is not called Who is Jesus? but Jesus Serene and presents a peaceful Jesus. Dumas had already previously made a Jesus face called Jezus is boos (Jesus is Angry) (1983). In an accompanying text she wrote for Jesus Serene, she says ‘I wanted to see if I could still make compelling images without using the dramatic effects of dark and light juxtapositions’.18 She writes as follows about the content of the work, in which she spoke about Jesus in the plural: Also the expressions of Jesus had to be very absent, as if he looked through you. A don’t-touch-me feeling, because ‘I am not from here anymore and I am not interested in physical sensuality, only in spiritual sensuality’. Yet one had still to feel attracted to this ‘man’, even though he did not want you as ‘a woman’ or as a material presence.19

There is still the question why Dumas’ Jesus Serene shows 21 faces. This work is, in my view, an anticipation of Jesus and the (future) human community. To explain that, I will say something about her view of art and of portraiture in particular. Art and Reality: Realism After having first admired Abstract Expressionism, Dumas opted for realism in painting. Warhol and Beuys were her inspiration.20 She describes her transition around 1983 from Expressionism, which ‘usually deals with undefined feelings’, to realism as follows: I want to be a referential artist. Reference deals with that already named. I want to transfer messages (+readable feelings), e.g., emotions. Emotion is interpreted feeling.21 17 18 19 20 21

W. Prins, Christus (1987), 308. Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1996), Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1996), Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1993), Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1982),

108. 108. 43. 17.

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Realism is an ambiguous term in painting: The various ways in which the term realism is used are already apparent from Courbet’s realism, interpreted by Marion phenomenologically (3.2.3), Jawlensky’s realism, which he replaced by the synthesis view (5.4.1), and Bacon’s realism, which depicted reality in its violence (6.4.2). Helmantel’s contemporary realism, which is classical in light, form, and colour will be discussed below (11.3.5).

For Dumas, realism is something other than mirroring reality. The starting point of her work is found in images and other impressions from daily reality, especially those provided by the media.22 In her works, Dumas gives an interpretation of everyday reality. She shows something of reality by providing an interpretation, a constructed fiction. That is why there is always distance between art and life; she rejects statements like ‘life is art’.23 For her, art and life do not coincide; she transfigures or configures images from life. I interpret this hermeneutically as follows: the reality of human life and the world are changeable and open to improvement. Art shows that in a fictional way, by depicting reality in its true depth in order to enable the public to re-order its own reality or that of the world, if necessary. A triad from hermeneutics is applicable to this visual art. (1) The existing reality is viewed as pre-figuration, as reality in construction; (2) art has a fictional con-figuration, as the making of images with a meaning that shows existing reality in its depth or opens it up for discussion; (3) this fictive con-figuration is done with a view to evoking a response from the viewer. The critical image that art provides as fiction should be an occasion for a confrontation with everyday reality in order to improve it (re-figuration).24

I will look at Dumas’ Het kwaad is banaal (Evil is Banal) (1984) as an example. This is her own portrait, based on a photograph.25 Cheek, part of the nose, chin, and hand are grey, with flesh colour shining through it; the hand rests on the black foreground that appears to continue on around her face. The hair is orange-red, yellow with a bit of grey. The portrait shows a white South African woman. Together with the title, the attractive portrait creates an uncomfortable feeling in the viewer: it is a woman during the time of apartheid and, simply as a white person, responsible for apartheid, even though she did not choose it. The portrait 22

According to S. Klein Essink, Inleiding, 10-11. Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1991), 58. 24 For an application to texts, see W. Stoker, Is Faith Rational?, chapter 4. 25 www.marlenedumas.nl. Het kwaad is banaal (Van Abbe Museum Collection, Eindhoven). 23

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character of the image recedes and becomes – ‘a situation’ – just a white South African woman. She is guilty of the state of apartheid simply by virtue of ‘being there’. The title – Het kwaad is banaal – points to that; it is borrowed from Hannah Arendt who meant the evil hidden in everyday life as the cause of the Jewish genocide. Realism is Dumas’ starting point for Jesus Serene as well. These are images borrowed from the tradition of the Christian image and her own world. Dumas combined these faces of Christ with the faces of men from her environment or celebrities like Francis Bacon and Michael Jackson.26 What ‘messages (+readable feelings), e.g., emotions’ does Jesus Serene convey? For that, I will say something more about her portraiture as a constructed representation. Constructed Representation The Marlene Dumas/Francis Bacon exhibition in Malmö contained works by Francis Bacon and Dumas. The figures by Bacon have greatly distorted faces, while Dumas’ faces often have pale colours and something masklike about them. The difference here with Bacon is great because Dumas does not radically distort the faces. Her faces resemble more the way in which Andy Warhol and Cindy Sherman represent people. Warhol’s well-known Marilyns do not portray Marilyn Monroe as a person but in her role as a star in the world of film. Cindy Sherman does something similar. Dumas speaks in an interview about the relationship of her work to Sherman’s, ‘which poses critical questions about representation, appropriation, and the media in the present and the past’.27 Dumas makes an image as a constructed representation. Dumas’ The Teacher (sub B) (1987) [Fig. 7.68] is an example of this. We see a group photo of a school class with children and their teacher. The children are dressed in school uniforms, as prescribed by the South African school system. The faces of both the teacher and the children are masklike. Clothing and faces are so ‘uni-form’. That sets the connection with the situation of apartheid: people are not persons but are judged according to external characteristics. Thus, Dumas does not only ask critical questions about the representation of a politically sensitive topic: she criticises it like she did already earlier in Het kwaad is banaal. In The Teacher (sub B) she shows that she wants to be a ‘referential artist’; 26 27

Prins, Christus (1967), 307. Coelewij et al., Marlene Dumas, 61.

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she breaks here with the ‘names’ – that are not ‘given/made’ by her – by painting the faces as grotesque, as masklike. In that way she presents her message against apartheid three years before apartheid was abolished in 1990. The class photo is not so much a portrait as a constructed representation. Jesus Serene is a constructed representation as well.28 Jesus Serene: A Constructed Representation Dumas’ explanation of Jesus Serene suggests that the watercolour provides a representation of Jesus after his resurrection. She points to the scene with Jesus and Mary Magdalene in the garden near the grave: ‘Do not cling to me … I have not yet ascended to my Father …’ (John 20:17). That is what Dumas freely quotes in the text I already quoted: ‘Also the expressions of Jesus had to be very absent, as if he looked through you. A don’t-touch-me feeling, because “I am not from here anymore and I am not interested in physical sensuality, only in spiritual sensuality”.’29 How is Jesus depicted in Jesus Serene? Dumas portrays him in the plural. Jawlensky also painted a series of the Holy Face, faces that are not the same. He was looking for the original image of Jesus and engaged in constantly new attempts to portray that (5.4.1). There is a different reason behind the ‘portrait’ of Jesus in the plural in Jesus Serene. Dumas says that she studied the images of Jesus in the Christian tradition closely: I have admired You already through the eyes of others – dead, in Holbein; almost invisible in the veil of Saint Veronica by Zurbarán; Suffering in Grünewald, Seductive in Pasolini … Feverish in El Greco; Questioning in the photographic negative of the Shroud of Turin; Shining in Velázquez; Dismissive in Noli me Tangere by Titian.30

Looking at the works Dumas mentions here, it is striking that all these artists depicted Jesus in different ways, but the depictions are quite recognisable as representations of Jesus through their spiritual appearance. Such representations of Jesus can be found in Jesus Serene: Jesus calm and peaceful in a spiritual sense. It is not a typographical error when Dumas speaks of ‘the facial expressions of Jesus’, i.e., in the plural. The faces most related to the images of Jesus in the history of art are, in my view, the fifth and the twelfth, but the first face and the seventh, which 28 I am using the term representation here in a general sense as a depiction or production and not as I do later in this study where I speak of the work of art as a representational symbol in distinction from the work of art as a presentational symbol (chapter 8). 29 Coelewij et al., Marlene Dumas, 86. 30 Coelewij et al., Marlene Dumas, 86.

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seems to be wearing a crown of thorn, also show similarity to those images. According to Wouter Prins, about half of them are images of Jesus.31 The reason why Dumas depicts Jesus in the plural is that – as she wrote to me – we cannot, nor may we, make a fixed or ‘exclusive’ image of Jesus.32 Jesus Serene is a constructed representation. Jesus (in the plural) is depicted here in relation to other people. The relation of the individual to the other also receives her attention in other works. In her Het Laatste Avondmaal (The Last Supper) (1985-1991), she did paint Jesus without his disciples, whereby she comments: they ‘fell asleep after eating. He knew that he would be alone. All alone’.33 This is the unique situation of Maundy Thursday. And that does not all detract from the fact that Dumas repeatedly pays attention to the individual in relation to others. That applies, for instance, to her work (In Search of) The Perfect Lover (1994), where it concerns the love relationship of people, especially that of women, for the earthly Jesus. (In Search of) The Perfect Lover is a 63-part series of ink and watercolour drawings of crucifixion scenes of Jesus [Fig. 7.69]. A core moment in Jesus’ life and teaching is love of neighbour. This love is usually seen as contrasting with the erotic love of the Song of Songs. Dumas has a different view of that. Winzen comments on (In Search of) The Perfect Lover: ‘With short strokes Dumas restores the physical attractiveness of the Man of Nazareth that had been censured away by modernity’ and adds ‘that the original sin of the church is that it, dominated as it is by the crucified, propagated a love that was not to have any physical, any erotic side.’34 Dumas also depicts Jesus in relation to others in her solo exhibition in London, Forsaken (2011). The exhibition shows five large crucifixion paintings of Jesus in combination with smaller portraits of other people. The starting point is the cross of Jesus and what he says to the Father about his Godforsakenness. The depictions of the cross at the exhibition in combination with the portraits raise the question how those portrayed relate to their fathers. What is the relation of the other people in Jesus Serene to Jesus? It is a true group photo. They look like Jesus: all the faces have a spiritual look about them. The watercolour shows an image of people who live in relation to Jesus. In total, we see 21 faces of Jesus and others. There 31 32 33 34

Email from Wouter Prins to Wessel Stoker (23 December, 2018). Email from Marlene Dumas to Wessel Stoker (12 February, 2019). Dumas in Liter, June 2013. Coelewij et al., Marlene Dumas, 86.

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could have been more. The series could have gone on into infinity.35 Although Jesus is the image of God, it is the destiny of every human being to be the image of God, as John writes: ‘now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is’ (1 John 3:2). This text was already quoted in connection with our discussion of Jawlensky’s Faces (5.4.1). Unlike Jawlensky, Dumas uses the group photo to emphasise the (future) community of human beings in which the relation with the other is restored, a desire to, as a community, spiritually resemble Jesus who is part of the community of the triune God.36 It is a looking forward to a new world in which that is possible, the future kingdom of God that began in Jesus. Although they are different individuals in the watercolour – the faces are all different, after all – they all seem to resemble each other a bit through the fact that their faces, aside from there being something spiritual about them, there is also something masklike about them.37 Here the mask has the function of pointing to the future serene spirituality of the people. The question as to which of these individuals is Jesus is still relevant. People do not become Jesus, but can resemble him spiritually. That is of course not only a matter of the future but also one of the present, as Paul says, ‘Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, that person is a new creation: The old has gone, the new is here!’ (2 Corinthians 5:17).38 Image and Word Without the title Jesus Serene, many would probably not have viewed the watercolour as religious. The Jesus image is less recognisable here than in Rouault or Sutherland. One needs to be familiar with the images of Jesus in the tradition to recognise similar images in the watercolour. My interpretation of Jesus Serene as the (future) community of people is just that – an interpretation. All art is poly-interpretable and different 35

According to Dumas in an email to me (12 February, 2019). I point to a parallel here to Masaccio’s Trinity where the viewers are seen as a reflection of the community of the triune God (4.2.2). 37 In connection with, among other things, the faces in Jesus Serene, Dumas says: ‘Although they are individual faces, and you can see that they differ from one another, they also all have something of a mask’ (Interview with T. Vischer with Dumas: Coelewij et al., Marlene Dumas, 171). Allow me to remark here that in tribal art the mask does not hide but points precisely to the presence of what or who the mask depicts. 38 While Dumas herself sees the group portrait as a matter of the present (email from Marlene Dumas to Wessel Stoker (12 February, 2019)), that does not exclude my interpretation as something from the future. 36

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plausible interpretations are possible. The basis for my interpretation is the coherence of the watercolour Jesus Serene with other works by Dumas. Coming from the Protestant tradition, she considers – unlike Manessier with his ‘Ode to Light’ – the text accompanying the work of art to be important.39 Here the word orients the viewing. My interpretation that the colours here radiate less joy than the other works about the future, as discussed in this chapter, can be rejected. But Dumas writes about her use of colour: For me, darker colours do not necessarily represent greater sadness and light colours more joyfulness and optimism. People can also suffocate in a white cloud. People can hide in black, find warmth. Black can give graphic clarity, and white can leave everything in a vague mist. It can, doesn’t have to ….40

7.7 Max Beckmann: A New Heaven and Earth During the Second World War, Max Beckmann (1884-1950) depicted the Revelation of John in lithographs. He had fled to Amsterdam in 1937, after the Nazi regime had categorised his art as entartet (degenerate). In 1941, Georg Hartmann asked him to make lithographs for a publication of the Revelation of John. Although Beckmann was critical of Christianity, he nevertheless accepted the commission.41 One can see in various scenes from the book of Revelation that he sometimes identifies with the oppressed Christians and sometimes with John who has the visions. The events in Revelation are, for him, occurring in his own time. He viewed Nazism as the evil of the end times. In the first printing of his book with the lithographs, he wrote: ‘[I]n the fourth year of the Second World War, when visions of the apocalyptic seer became a terrible reality, this book emerged.’42 I will look at lithograph 25 on John’s vision: ‘I saw a new heaven and a new earth’ (Revelation 21:1) [Fig. 7.70]. John sees the new Jerusalem descending from heaven; God will dwell among people: ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes’ (Revelation 21:4). John speaks of a new city and of a river with life-giving water (Revelation 22:1). In Beckmann’s lithograph of this, we see Beckmann himself 39

See Klein Essink, Inleiding, 23-24; Dumas, Sweet Nothings (1984), 25. Dumas, Liter 70, June 2013. 41 M. Beckmann, De Apocalypse van Max Beckmann; W. Stoker, Apocalyps zonder God, 43-48. 42 Cited in R.W. Gassen & B. Holeczek, Apokalypse: Ein Prinzip Hoffnung? 163. 40

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lying on a table. An angel, painted in a golden yellow colour (and possibly imaged after his wife (Quappi) is wiping away his tears.43 In the background is a porthole in the colours blue, violet, and white. Looking through the round window, we can see a glimpse of the new heaven and earth, here portrayed as a wide body of water. Beckmann emphasises that we catch at most a glimpse of the new heaven and earth, as through a porthole. For the rest, it continues to be something that eludes our current line of vision. Hans Memling had done something similar in his St. John’s Altarpiece (1474-1479), where we see John sitting on Patmos with a pen in his hand that he uses to write his visions in the book on his lap. Above him, in a round shape like an eyeball, we see the vision of the heavenly throne on which God or Christ is sitting, surrounded by the 24 elders. Memling and Beckmann evoke the suggestion that such a view of the future can only be seen through God’s eye.44 Some people can only get a glimpse of it.

7.8 Conclusion The works on the Spirit, the future, and the completion of salvation discussed in this chapter show religious transcendence in various ways. Kiefer depicts the traditional worldview with God’s heaven ‘above’. Frieling’s Paasmorgen shows religious transcendence through form and colour. That is also the case with Manessier, Sutherland, and Mulders, and the spaces in which their work is given a place reinforces that. Beckmann’s lithograph refers to religious transcendence with respect to content and through the context: after all, the lithograph is part of the publication of John’s Revelation. Religious transcendence is more difficult to discern in Dumas’ Jesus Serene, despite the use of images of Jesus from the Christian tradition. The same is true – though in a different way – of the works discussed earlier: Van Gogh’s The Sower and Starry Night and Reinhardt’s Black Painting No. 5, which can be explained in both secular and religious ways. In Part III, I will explore more thoroughly the question of what makes a work of art religious (chapters 8 and 9). It is not coincidental that almost all works on Christian future expectations radiate beauty. Beauty is an important value in Christianity. That is why the aesthetic aspect of religious art is important. But the beautiful is 43 44

Beckmann, De Apocalyps van Max Beckmann, 74. N. O’Hear & A. O’Hear, Picturing the Apocalypse, 231.

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not the only aesthetic quality of a work of art, as Thek’s Die Krippe, and Dumas’ Jesus Serene show. That requires further reflection on the aesthetic aspect of religious images (chapter 10). The presence of God or the divine has come up repeatedly in our discussions. With respect to the Christ in Glory tapestry covering an entire wall in Coventry Cathedral, Rowan Williams said that this building teaches one to see Jesus. Marion views the crossing of the gazes to be central to religious art. But not all the works of art we discussed concerned a Holy Face, like those of Jawlensky, Rouault, or Olympios. The image as a relic, such as Thek’s Technological Reliquaries, concerns another presence, the image understood as an indexical sign. Moreover, we also saw religious art whose meaning does not lie in presence but in producing a healthy sense of perplexity and confusion, like Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand). The painting is a deconstruction of the traditional depiction of the crucifixion. In what follows, I will thus point to two kinds of religious art: art as presence and religious art with a different aim (chapter 8). When discussing Manessier’s ‘Ode to Light’ and Dumas’ Jesus Serene, we encountered very different views of the relation between image and word. Manessier’s ‘Ode to Light’ portrays the triune God through form and colour. The word – here, knowledge of the Gospel story – is presupposed. For Dumas’ Jesus Serene, the word – the title and the accompanying text – gives orientation to the viewer. That requires a further exploration of the relation of word and image (11.2). The spaces in which religious art is placed appears to be important. Whenever art is placed in a church, that context already invokes of itself a response from the viewer. Many of the religious works of art we discussed hang in museums or were shown in museums either as an installation (Thek’s Die Krippe) or as performances (Sandoval’s Baby Street and Dirt). What does that mean for the religious character of this art? The museum as a place of visual piety will be discussed separately below (10.3). If religious art is viewed as a religious practice as in this study, then the discussion of religious art must be supplemented by explicit attention to the way one interacts with a religious image. The study will conclude with that question in chapter 11.

Part III

Art as a Place to Encounter God

8. RELIGIOUS ART AS SYMBOL

8.1 Introduction Taking a step back for theological reflection lends depth to engaging with (religious) art. To echo Immanuel Kant, looking at and engaging with religious art without having a theory is ‘blind’; and any theory without concern for looking at and engaging with (religious) art is ‘empty’. That is why in this part I will present a theological reflection on religious art. I touched on this in Part II only in connection with specific works of art. Presence is important for the religious image. This obtains not only for the sacred image of the Middle Ages but also for modern and contemporary religious art. To give some examples from Part II: In The Sower and Starry Night, Van Gogh wanted to show God’s presence in creation (4.3), and Thek turned visitors to his Christmas installation Die Krippe into participants in his environment (6.2). I call their works ‘presentational’: the presence of God is important here. There are also religious works in which presence is not an issue, such as Marc Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) (6.4.3) and the stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel (7.5). These works invite us to meditate and reflect on the topic. Each represents important faith content through an image. I call such works ‘representational’. In this chapter we will see how religious art can be both presentational and representational (8.4. and 8.5). I will clarify this by viewing the religious work of art as a symbol (8.3). Before I explain that, I will first say something about art images in general.

8.2 Paint Marks or a Painting? If we look at a canvas with paint on it, it is not always immediately clear if the paint marks are stains or an intentional image. We see spots of paint on a linen canvas or some other material, and we cannot be certain that they represent an organised image. It is possible that what we are seeing is nothing more than the difference between the paint spots and the material they are on. They could also be paint stains that just happen to be there. I had to look closely to perceive the figuration in William Turner’s

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The Arrival of Louis-Philippe at the Royal Clarence Yard (ca. 1844-1845) [Fig. 8.71] in Tate Britain. Technically, a painting is a canvas with some paint on it. We gradually see forms and colours taking shape and we see something of an organised image emerging. There appears to be a difference between seeing the canvas with paint marks and seeing an intended shape. This is sometimes called an ‘iconic difference’.1 In the few strokes of paint we see a figure: it is a question of seeing in. There is a double perception, one of the paint marks and strokes, and at the same time a perception of something in them.2 Maurice Denis puts it in a striking way: ‘We should remember that a picture – before being a war horse, a nude woman, or telling some other story – is essentially a flat surface covered with colours arranged in a particular pattern.’3 Something is seen emerging from the material, the canvas, a piece of wood, or wall. Our eye sees a contrast between the canvas and what is depicted on it. The image reveals itself, thanks to the iconic difference of the image (as stated earlier, eikōn in Greek means ‘image’) in relation to its material basis. Before an image acquires any meaning, it is present in its materiality. We search for its meaning. It reveals something by referring to or depicting something. The iconic thus rests on a distinction that is produced by our perception. A meaning (Sinn) reveals itself to our gaze that is rooted in the material of the canvas. From the paint marks a figuration emerges for the perceiving eye, as in Turner’s The Arrival of Louis-Philippe or a face in Jawlensky’s canvas Meditation: Versunken [Fig. 5.32]. A painting provides a depiction of something. A possible exception to this would be an abstract painting like one of Reinhardt’s Black Paintings. Nevertheless, I would like to speak here of a depiction, but in the sense of a symbol. Thus, through association, the almost image-less canvas acquires a second meaning as a depiction of the image-less God. It will in the meantime have come to the reader’s attention that the way in which a painting comes into existence is not the same as what the legend tells us about how the Mandylion or the Veronica (1.3.1) originated. These were considered to be imprints of, or extracts from, reality. We discussed the question of the origin, the ‘authenticity’ of such images (5.3), and I 1 G. Boehm, Wie Bilder Sinn erzeugen, 37, 48-50, 208-212. For how Marion talks about how a painting comes to be, see 3.2.3; for Francis Bacon, see 6.4.2. 2 R. Wollheim, Art and its Object, 205-226. 3 Maurice Denis, opening sentence of the essay ‘Définition du Néo-traditionalisme’, in the journal Art et Critique, 23 and 30 August, 1890: ‘Se rappeler qu’un tableau … est essentiellement une surface plane recouverte de couleurs en un certain ordre assemblées.’

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pose a similar question here: that of the emergence of the painting as an image organised by the artist. It is not a paint stain; rather, we perceive a certain depiction of reality in the materiality of the paint.

8.3 Religious Art as Symbol What is characteristic of the religious image is that it is not an arbitrary, extrinsic sign of something but a symbol, i.e., a sign that has an intrinsic relation to that to which it refers. That is obvious for the image as relic – it is, after all, physically connected with the person in question. But that also applies to religious material images like icons, frescoes, paintings, installations, etc. They can be viewed as symbols. They have an intrinsic relation with what/who they refer to.4 The religious work of art as symbol concerns the mediation of the divine in and through the work of art. But how does the symbol actually do that? The non-arbitrary relation between sign and that to which it refers can be viewed in two ways, either as association or as participation: 1. The religious image can refer to something via association and ‘gives rise to thought’. 2. The religious image participates in what it symbolises. In the first instance – where it concerns a non-arbitrary relation between sign and signified as association – the power of the symbol consists in giving rise to thought about what it refers to. It leads one to think about God or ultimate reality or an existential life situation. The viewer can be addressed in his life orientation. That is the representational view of the symbol. In the second instance, it concerns a non-arbitrary relation between sign and signified as participation. The power of the image consists in the presence of who/what is depicted. Here, the symbol is a sign of an incarnated meaning; this view was found already among the Greeks. For them, a symbol was, for example, a shard of some crockery as a sign to remember a past act of hospitality. If a stranger showed the shard years 4 My view of the concept of symbol is similar to what can be found in theological and philosophical literature (Van der Leeuw, Gadamer, Ricoeur, Moyaert, Brinkman, etc.). Despite various differences among the authors mentioned, the defining characteristic of the symbol among these authors is its intrinsic bond with what it symbolises. In this study, I use the distinction made in semiotics between indexical and iconic signs (1.4: passim) but not the semiotic view of the symbol: the symbol as a sign that is connected with its meaning through convention (M. Bal, Verf en verderf, 15).

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later and it fit the complementary shard the host had, the stranger would be welcome. Thus, the bond of hospitality could be realised via this symbol. The shard is not an abstract reference but a concrete presence of hospitality.5 The shard fits with the complementary shard. They belong together; the two halves come together again. The term symbol comes from the Greek symballein, which means ‘to throw together’ or ‘to come together’ – here understood as participation. What or whom the image refers to is thus viewed in one way or another as present in the symbol itself. The religious (art) image as symbol entails that God or the ultimate can become present in the material image. That is the presentational view of symbol.6 An example of this is the relic, but the presence can also be of a different kind. An icon of Christ participates in one way or another in Christ, in his presence. Various works discussed in Part II also deal with presence, such as Van Gogh’s The Sower and Starry Night for example, as well as – in yet another way – Rouault’s Holy Face (1946). This has to do with different ways of presence. We will look at this further in the next chapter. According to different theological theories of the image, the religious image should be viewed exclusively as presentational. In my opinion, however, that is one-sided. In Part II we saw, after all, that various works cannot be considered presentational. In the next chapter I will present a theory of the image that allows room for religious art as representational. In connection with that, I will first say something more about religious art as representational symbol and as presentational symbol.

8.4 Symbol as Representational I will give an example from the English language of a word viewed as a symbol.7 Let us take the word stain. Literally, a stain is the defilement of a piece of cloth, for example. The literal meaning invokes a second, figurative meaning: that of the tarnishing of someone’s integrity. ‘That 5 H.-G. Gadamer applies this concept of symbol in his The Relevance of the Beautiful to the work of art: it is not a reference but something in which the (re)presented is physically present (H.-G. Gadamer, The Relevance of the Beautiful, 34-38). 6 Let me point out that I am using the terms presentational here in a stipulatory way. Tillich, for example, understands ‘representational’ to mean what I define as ‘presentational’ (Tillich, Visual Art and the Revelatory Character of Style, 133). 7 I am making free use of Paul Ricoeur’s view of the symbol (see works by Ricoeur in the bibliography).

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casts a stain on that person’s name.’ That person’s reputation is no longer without stain. A second meaning is associated with the literal meaning of spoiling: that of ‘dirt’ in connection with a person’s reputation, his damaged integrity. The literal meaning points beyond itself to a second, figurative meaning that corresponds to the first. The second meaning is not a matter of logical insight but one of association based on a certain correspondence to the first meaning. ‘The symbol gives rise to thought’, Ricoeur says. What it yields (the second meaning) gives rise to thought.8 The sensibly perceived stain gives rise to thinking the second meaning (damaged integrity) that has been acquired through association. I will apply this concept of the symbol to religious art and take as my example the painting Siena (Vleeswand) by Marc Mulders [Fig. 6.51] that was discussed in chapter 6. What we actually see is a painting of a fleshcoloured ribcage. It acquired its second meaning in the explanation of and reference to similar canvasses like Crack L.A. II: Jesus’ body given as a sacrifice for people. The second meaning is acquired on the basis of association with the depicted ribcage. Looking at Siena (Vleeswand) attentively is not a matter of experiencing the presence of Christ’s sacrifice to which the painting refers. It is not like the participation in the Eucharist, in which, according to Catholic doctrine, Christ is actually present in the bread. As a symbol, this painting gives rise to thought; it invites the viewers to reflect on their relation with the crucified Jesus. I will give yet another example of a religious work of art as a representational symbol: Annemiek Punt’s abstract glass wall object in the Protestant Bethel Church in Barneveld (2005 [Fig. 8.72]). This is an oblong bundle of glass. With the colours red, blue, yellow, and green in various shades, the melted glass makes the object look like a painting. The wall object hangs diagonally on the wall behind the pulpit to the left. It draws the viewers’ attention and leads them to think. But to what kind of reflection does this abstract work of art call the viewer? Does the halfvertical line express an ascending or a descending movement? The glass wall object is open with respect to its symbolic meaning. But not everything can be read into an abstract work because the second, figurative, meaning is acquired on the basis of association with the forms and colours of the wall object that are to be described literally, in the context in which the work is hanging. The limits of interpretation are found in the association, in the linking back to the literal description of the work of art. The question is then how the half-vertical placing of the work of art 8

Ricoeur, The Symbolism of Evil, 347-357.

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is seen: as a descent or an ascent. The viewers of the work have chosen ‘ascent’.9 That can be defended already on the basis of the lavish colours of red, blue, yellow and green in various shades that, under specific lighting conditions, are reflected on the wall behind it. These colours are an expression of ‘ascent’. If black or grey had been chosen, that would have undeniably invoked a different reaction. The placing of the line, the way in which the work of art has been hung, also points to ‘ascent’. The low point is on the left and on the right the higher – that is also how we read or write a sentence: from left to right. We can also think of graphs here, which almost always suggests a kind of growth or rise when the line/lines is/are higher on the right than the left. This work in this church thus induces meditation on the ‘ascending’ movement. The viewer can then apply that in reflecting on her or his own life. I do not interpret Ricoeur’s statement that the representational symbol ‘gives rise to thought’ in an intellectualist way or as a matter of theory. The religious representational symbol inspires us ‘to think’ on an existential level, on the level of the experience of the meaning of life and truth. Punt’s abstract wall object and Siena (Vleeswand) by Mulders are examples of this: they inspire us to think in an existential sense.

8.5 Symbol as Presentational The religious symbol has a non-arbitrary relation with that to which it refers. Aside from a relation of association, the relation can also be one of participation. Belting shows how the cult image functioned as a relic in the Middle Ages (1.3.1). Just like Thek’s Technological Reliquaries, the relic is an example of the religious image as a presentational symbol. What is symbolised is itself present in one way or another in the symbol. I will give a few other examples from Part II of works that, although they do so differently than the relic, are also presentational symbols. The visitor to Paul Thek’s exhibition Die Krippe on the Christmas event experiences it as a pilgrimage to the crib (6.2). In his commentary, Thek says that he sees art as liturgy and that he hopes that his audience responds to the sacred character of the symbols that he had set up in the installation. The visitor can experience something of Christmas, of God’s coming into the world. I also recall what Jawlensky wrote in a letter: ‘I realized that the artist must express in his art through forms and colours that within 9

According to Geertje de Vries, in E. de Witt, Annemiek Punt: Passie in glas, 89.

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him which is divine.’10 Jawlensky experienced painting as prayer, as a presence of God (5.4.1). Van Gogh speaks in his letters about his understanding of God’s presence in nature as God’s creation. He wanted to give expression to that in his art. In connection with The Sower (June 1888), he wrote about his yearning for ‘that infinite of which the Sower, the sheaf, are the symbols’ (628; 19 June, 1888). In reference to Starry Night (September 1888), he remarked that ‘life is almost magical’ because of ‘the stars and the infinite … up there’ (663; 18 August, 1888). Jawlensky and Van Gogh experienced these works as presentational symbols. The question is whether the viewers of these works are also able to experience them – including, of course, Thek’s Die Krippe – as presentational symbols. We will discuss this further in the next chapter. What does that entail if what is symbolised becomes present in one way or another in a work of art as a symbol? Theology speaks here of sacramentality. I call Van Gogh’s experience of creation ‘sacramental’. In the broad sense, this term reflects the view that all of reality can share in ultimate reality, in God as creator or in God as Being Itself (Tillich). It refers to a sense of divine grace in, for example, providing the fruits of the earth to feed us, or water to refresh or cleanse us. That is why the church views the water of baptism and the bread of the Eucharist as sacramental. That is the aspect of materiality, the earthiness of the church sacrament.11 In connection with nature as creation, and in connection with art, I am using sacramental in this broad sense. Reality as the creation of God can be a bearer of the holy. It is potentially sacramental, a bearer of divine presence. That presence is there in the material religious image as sacramental presence: art as presentational symbol. Thek’s Die Krippe, Jawlensky’s Faces, and Van Gogh’s The Sower and Starry Night, for example, are to be viewed as sacramental art. Some readers will consider this presentational view of symbol as Catholic and the representational as Protestant, parallel to the difference in their respective views of Christ’s presence in the Eucharist. With respect to this David Tracy distinguishes between an analogical and dialectical

10 Jawlensky’s letter d.d. 12 June, 1938 to Pater Willibrord Verkade, printed in Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941, 117. English translation taken from https://the-paintrist.tumblr. com/post/80865852479/yama-bato-alexej-von-jawlensky-slanted-eyes. 11 M.E. Brinkman, Schepping en sacrament, 169-171.

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imagination.12 The analogical thinking of Catholics assumes that God is present in the world, and therefore Catholics are inclined to view the world and human society as inherently good and as resembling God. Dialectically thinking Protestants emphasise more strongly the difference between God and world, underscoring the ambivalence of reality – of both nature and the human world. Nevertheless, we need to be careful with such a distinction because there are, so to speak, also Catholics who think dialectically and Protestants who think analogically, such as Gerardus van der Leeuw and Paul Tillich. The latter two present a presentational view of the symbol in their theology of art and in doing so assume a sacramental view of reality. Catholicism holds that grace does not abolish nature but perfects it. Protestantism is less optimistic and holds that nature has been affected by sin and thus speaks of ‘sin and grace’ instead of ‘nature and grace’. Van der Leeuw agrees with the Catholic view that grace does not abolish nature. He does reject the view that grace completes nature and he modifies it: grace does not put an end to nature but recreates it. He can thus acknowledge the sacramental character of reality as God’s creation and thus also of art outside the church: The work of God’s creation is built right through nature and culture in its pagan holiness – also in the works of art by people that serve Him.13

Van der Leeuw views the symbol as an intrinsic relationship between the object and that to which it refers. The image of God is not God, but it is more than just something that points to him. Two realities come together in the image: that of God and that of the image. It thus ensures the presence of God. It has creative power. That is why he considers the image essential to religion in general and to the Christian religion as well.14 Divine reality only exercises power over us when it appears to us in a form. ‘We know divine reality only as a “symbol”, i.e., only when it receives a form in our reality.’15 With that, he points to something important: the image as materiality. Before an image has a meaning, it is present in its materiality. I pointed to that above in connection with the painting: the paint on the canvas shows itself and reveals something (8.2). Nancy also pointed to the image as materiality but crossed out the reference (2.3.2).

12 13 14 15

D. Tracy, The Analogical Imagination, 405-421. G. van der Leeuw, Wegen en grenzen, 301; cf. 293, 295, 300, 305-306. Van der Leeuw, Wegen en grenzen, 307-10. Van der Leeuw, Wegen en grenzen, 308.

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We will look at religious art as presentational or representational symbols in the next chapter. Here I will point out that the presentational symbol should not be viewed in a ‘substantialist’ way as an objective, tangible presence of what or whom the image symbolises. In the presentational symbol, it is not a question of presence that is discernible for objective observation, but one of the appearance of a hidden meaning, the ‘epiphany of a mystery’.16 Such an epiphany can take on very different forms, as we will see in the following chapter. The basic idea of religious art as presentational symbol is that reality is potentially sacramental and can therefore be a bearer of divine presence. Catholic, Anglican, and Eastern Orthodox theology speak of creation in its sacramentality. Martien Brinkman discusses this clearly in his Schepping en sacrament.17 It is not only theologians who speak about reality in that way. A philosophical analysis of reality also gives occasion to view it as potentially sacramental. Thus, this view of reality can also be found in the French philosopher Merleau-Ponty in his description of the perception of reality. Here he borrows sacramental terms from Catholic theology and, at the same time, uses insights from painters like Cézanne. I consider his view important for a proper understanding of art as presentational symbol because he shows that our perception of reality is too dulled by our Western ‘scientified’ culture, with the result that we no longer ‘see’ what, for example, Van Gogh still saw in nature. That is why I will look at Merleau-Ponty’s view of reality. Reality as Potentially Sacramental Merleau-Ponty’s theory of perception shows that an intensive perception – like that seen in painters – entails a participative relation with reality. In his Phenomenology of Perception, he uses terms like sacrament and Eucharist to indicate what happens in the interaction between the perceiver and reality. Merleau Ponty gives his phenomenological description of perceiving and the perceived world. The way he does that is too detailed to discuss extensively here. A core point in his thinking about perception is that sensing (sentir) the world is a co-existence in communion, comparable to the Eucharist. What the sacrament of the Eucharist is for the 16 G. Durand as quoted by H.M. Fortmann, Als ziende de Onzienlijke II, 172, cited in turn by Brinkman, Schepping en sacrament, 62. 17 Brinkman, Schepping en sacrament, chapters 3-5.

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believer, the sensible is for the experienced perceiver. He states this as follows: [J]ust as the sacrament does not merely symbolize, in a sensible way, an operation of Grace, but is the real presence of God and makes this presence occupy a fragment of space and to communicate it to those who eat the bread, given they are inwardly prepared. In the same way, the sensible does not merely have a motor and vital signification but is rather nothing other than a certain manner of being in the world that is proposed to us from a point in space, that our body takes up and adopts if it is capable, and sensation is, literally, a communion.18

Here Merleau-Ponty is describing a different attitude towards things than those we are used to in our ‘scientified’ society. Instead of a subject that stands over against an object, he describes a sympathetic attitude of perception that does not place the external things over against itself as objects but ‘enters into a sympathetic relation with them, makes them his own’.19 Linking up with his comparison of the sensible with the Eucharist, he writes: If the qualities radiate around them a certain mode of existence, if they have the power to cast a spell and what we called just now [in the quote above] a sacramental value, this is because the sentient subject does not posit them as objects, but enters into a sympathetic relation with them, makes them his own and finds in them his momentary law.

Merleau-Ponty sees this sympathetic attitude of perception primarily in painters like Cézanne. In his essay ‘Cézanne’s Doubt’ (1945), he writes that, unlike classical painting with its artistic means, Cézanne wanted to return to the object, nature itself. Cézanne does not choose between perception and thinking, between chaos and order. ‘He did not want to separate the stable things which we see and the shifting way in which they appear; he wanted to depict matter as it takes on form, the birth of order through spontaneous organization.’20 ‘“The landscape thinks itself in me,” he would say, “and I am its consciousness”.’21 The material image must, according to Merleau-Ponty, not be viewed as a copy, a second thing. The drawing and the painting are the inside of the outside and the outside of the inside, which the duplicity of feeling [le sentir] makes possible and without which we would never 18 19

M. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception, 246. For this and the following quote, see Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception,

248. 20

M. Merleau-Ponty, Cézanne’s Doubt, 63f. Merleau-Ponty, Cézanne’s Doubt, 67; For Cézanne’s emphasis on perception in his art, see also M. Schapiro, Paul Cézanne, 9-29. 21

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understand the quasi presence and imminent visibility which make up the whole problem of the imaginary.22

In this way the painter points to a chiastic model of mutual transubstantiation of who sees and who is seen in a miracle of the flesh: There really is inspiration and expiration of Being, respiration in Being, action and passion so slightly discernible that it becomes impossible to distinguish between who sees and who is seen, who paints and what is painted.23

In short, every sensible encounter with the strangeness of the world is a ‘pact of birth’ in which the human being and the strange world give birth to each other. Perception is thus a reversible connection between myself and things, in which the sensible gives birth to itself through me: ‘The painter’s vision is an ongoing birth.’24 Merleau-Ponty’s philosophical analysis of perception provides the opportunity to speak about reality in terms of sacramentality.25 That fits with the theological view that reality can be a bearer of the sacred and of the presence of God in or via a work of art. Richard Kearney interprets Merleau-Ponty’s argument in a theological way and speaks of his sacramental view of reality. The vision of the artist, he says, miraculously transforms the bread of the world of perception into the sacrament of art.26 Kearney also points to novels by Marcel Proust, James Joyce, and Virginia Woolf, in which such sacred experiences can be found in the everyday. In Proust, Kearney writes, ‘The Eucharist in a morsel of madeleine. The Kingdom in a cup of cold water. San Marco in cobblestone. God in a street cry.’27 He sees religious transcendence come to light in the novels of these authors: ‘Mystery is preserved, even celebrated … as a mystical affirmation of incarnate existence: Word made Flesh in the ordinary universe.’28 They are ‘epiphanies’ in which an everyday secular moment changes into a ‘sacred time’.29 22 M. Merleau-Ponty, Eye and Mind, 126. On seeing, see also Merleau-Ponty, Eye and Mind, 145-148. 23 Merleau-Ponty, Eye and Mind, 129. 24 Merleau-Ponty, Eye and Mind, 129. 25 In her phenomenological study of the colour blue, W. Uitgeest came to a conclusion similar to Merleau-Ponty’s (W. Uitgeest, Gods nieuwe huis, 85-100). 26 R. Kearney, Merleau-Ponty and the Sacramentality of the Flesh, 152-153. 27 R. Kearney, Epiphanies of the Everyday, in J.P. Manoussakis, After God, 3; R. Kearney, Anatheism, 101-130. 28 Kearney, Anatheism, 102 29 Kearney, Anatheism, 105.

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The American poet Christian Wiman also speaks of an ‘epiphany’ experience. In his My Bright Abyss, he describes an encounter with a falcon that lands on the windowsill. He and his lover at the time look at the falcon but suddenly: A shiver pricked my spine. The falcon turned its head And locked its eyes on mine.30

The one looking becomes the one looked at. These are moments in which, Wiman writes, ‘something in the very act of such attention has troubled the tyranny of the ordinary, as if the world at which I gazed, gazed at me.’31 From such moments, according to Wiman, ‘it is possible to knit a kind of spiritual life together out of these moments for they do restore one’s links to and with the earth; they do propel one forward into time and connections.’32 Coming back to Merleau-Ponty’s view of perception, he himself does not connect God with reality. His view of perception shows only the Eucharistic power of the sensible. Theology offers a framework for understanding this phenomenon as described by the philosopher. Viewed theologically, art can effect a sacramental transformation in the everyday. As an example of that, I used the work of Thek and Van Gogh above as presentational symbols. Kearney gives examples from novels by Proust, Joyce, and Woolf, to which I added Wiman’s epiphany experience. I would call this sacramentality in art a trace of God. The term ‘trace’ does justice to the tangle of references in the description of these everyday experiences. And the concept of trace has the connotation of the sacramental, of reality filled with divine grace.

8.6 Representation or Presence? Do we have to choose between the representational or presentational views of symbol with respect to religious art? Can the intrinsic bond of the symbol with what it refers to be explained as a non-arbitrary association that ‘gives rise to thought’ or as presence? For the time being, 30 C. Wiman, My Bright Abyss: Meditation of a Modern Believer, 44. For commentary, see T.A. Smedes, ‘De werkelijkheid is de enige mogelijkheid van God’, 141-158. 31 Wiman, My Bright Abyss, 78. 32 Wiman, My Bright Abyss, 82.

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I will say that it depends on the work of art (see also 9.6 and 11.3.1-11.3.5 below). Let us recall the examples I gave of representational symbols, such as Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand). This view of symbol cannot be applied to the material image as relic. Presence is, namely, a defining characteristic of the image as relic: a relic functions if the perceiver has a salvific connection with it. I consider both views of the work of art as symbol to be important. As we will see in chapter 11, there are different ways to engage with religious art devotionally. And that also determines whether it is viewed as a representational or a presentational symbol. I will first establish what the religious aspect of a work of art consists in. The description of religious art as symbol requires some supplementation, which will be supplied by the theories of the religious image in the next chapter.

9. THEORIES OF THE RELIGIOUS IMAGE

9.1 Introduction How can art be a place where God can be encountered? How can a religious image show the visible of the invisible God or refer to him? A preliminary answer to these questions is art can do so because of its symbolic character. The symbol has an intrinsic relation with what it symbolises. But secular art can also be viewed in this sense as symbol, such as art in service to nationalism or communism, like socialist realism in Eastern Europe until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The symbol also points here beyond itself, not to religious transcendence but to something this-worldly, the nation or a state ideology. Therefore, what the symbol refers to has to be explicitly named. And in this study that reference is religious transcendence: God, Christ, or the Holy Spirit. Religious transcendence may occur when the art symbol shows the visible of the invisible God or refers to him. How should that be understood? Three theological theories clarify why certain works of art are religious. What has emerged in the previous chapters will be explicitly discussed here. 1. The first theory views the religious image, the icon, as a relic through which one comes into contact with Christ or a saint through physical proximity and touch. The Mandylion and the Veronica are examples of this. The Leuven philosopher Paul Moyaert addresses this in his book Iconen en beeldverering (2007), in which he draws on Byzantine theology. 2. The second theory holds that a personal relationship with God arises through the icon with a holy portrait. Jean-Luc Marion presents this theory as an alternative to the crisis of the Western image (3.3). His theory of the crossing of the gazes will be elaborated further in this chapter, in which we will refer to its Byzantine roots. 3. The third theory, articulated by Paul Tillich, views all art as religious insofar as it is an expression of God as ultimate reality, of the depth of reality. All these theories view symbols in a presentational way but differ with respect to what presence entails. They do not discuss religious art as representational symbol, even though that is, as we saw in the previous chapter, quite important.

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4. The fourth theory I will add applies to both presentational and representational religious art. It further emphasises that engagement with religious art as discussed in Part II is a matter of interaction. It understands the religious character of art as a disclosure event, as revelation.

9.2 The Icon as Relic I saw how presence is experienced in a material depiction in the way the next of kin of slain soldiers interacted with the Vietnam War monument for the fallen in Washington. They touched the name of their loved ones with their hand to experience the absent person as present in the name written on the monument. The deceased were present in and through the monument; their names were written down as a reminder of them. They were near for the next of kin, even though death stands between the latter and the slain soldiers. We can call that iconic presence: in the image – here the war monument – the presence of the absent one is evoked by touching his or her name on the monument. The monument makes the absent one somewhat present but is not the presented reality itself. It is a presence without the actual physical presence of the deceased. The urge to touch what is dear to us is part of human nature. A Platonic approach to images meets that urge because the image is thought to participate in what it refers to. The theory of the material image as involving touch is also rooted in the Christian tradition, as we saw, and is inspired by the Mandylion and the Veronica. In these works people felt they had a true image of the earthly Jesus (1.3.1 and 5.2 and 5.3). It is an image that was imprinted by reality itself, for Christ, according to legend, imprinted his face in the cloth, leaving behind a permanent impression of it. By touching the cloth or the icon, people had direct contact with Christ’s body, and this led to the occurrence of miracles. These cloths functioned like relics. Gregory of Nyssa, a church father who endorsed images, says about relics: Whoever looks at [a relic] embraces as it were the living body itself in all its fullness. They set eye, mouth, ear, all their senses, in motion and then, while they pour out tears of reverence and passion, they address their petitions to the martyr as if he was present alive and well.1 1 Gregory of Nyssa, Patrologia Graeca, 46, col. 740 AB, cited by P. Moyaert, Iconen en beeldverering, 117; translation mine.

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Just as the relic – the term relic goes back to the Latin verb relinquere, which means ‘leave behind’ – makes the material remains of a saint or martyr present, so the Mandylion and the Veronica make Christ physically present to the believer.2 This theory of the material image was given concrete shape by the Byzantine theologian John of Damascus (676-749) during the conflict on images prior to the Second Council of Nicaea (787), which recognised the veneration of the image. This approach meets a human need, as shown by how people interact with the Vietnam War monument. In our time as well, there are many examples of people seeking contact with Christ or a saint by touching objects or material images. The exhibition Relieken in the Museum Catharijneconvent (Utrecht) in 2018-2019 testified to this. Following John of Damascus, Paul Moyaert passionately expounded this theory in his Iconen en beeldverering and provides an anthropologicalphilosophical argument. Before I go into what John of Damascus and Moyaert say about this, I will show how this view can also be found in a philosophical theory of photography. Absence is what gives images life. People want a photograph of someone close to them who has died or is absent. The image is a substitute for what people want to see with their own eyes. The French philosopher Roland Barthes explains why a photograph can meet that need. In his study of the photography, La chambre claire, he compares photographs with the Veronica, thereby emphasising what is unique about the photograph.3 On the one hand, a photograph is a work that requires action. The photographer chooses his subject, the perspective from which it was taken, etc. On the other hand, at the same time the photograph is like a ‘footprint in the sand’.4 A photograph shows the depicted person as presence. It is realistic, the reality of a past moment become set in an unmoved image. Just as the depiction of Jesus’ face was not made by human hands, so, according to the classic theory of photography, the photograph is not made by human hands. Rather, the raw materials of the photograph are light and time. The photograph is a quote from reality that is produced in a mechanical way. Barthes is hesitant to call a photograph an image; 2 Belting, Likeness and Presence, 53, 215, 301-303. Relics, the material remains of a saint, represent his body and are, as it were, the new body of the saint. Just like his attributes, this new body makes the saint present. See also the text by Bernard of Angers (eleventh century) on relics and miracles (Belting, Likeness and Presence, Text 34). On relics, see also P. George, Reliques: Le quatrième pouvoir. 3 I am citing from the German translation, R. Barthes, Die helle Kammer, 92-95. 4 J. Berger, Understanding a Photograph, 66.

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rather, for him, it is a new reality – ‘neither image nor reality, actually something new, something real that can no longer be touched.’5 He points to a photographic portrait and compares who is depicted with the resurrected Christ who appears to his disciples. A photograph of a deceased person shows that he really is the one whom the photograph shows as present after his death. It is not through historical proof that a photograph bears witness but through a new kind of proof: proofs à la Thomas who wanted to touch the risen Jesus.6 John of Damascus In 726, the Byzantine emperor Leo III ordered all religious images or icons to be destroyed. John of Damascus wrote his Three Treatises on the Divine Images (ca. 730)7 during the time of this prohibition against sacred images. In that work, he gives a theological defence of the veneration of icons over against the iconoclasts. John of Damascus writes that he worships the one God and the three persons: God the Father, God the incarnate Son, God the Holy Spirit (I.4). On the basis of the fact that God has become incarnate, he holds that the invisible God can be depicted ‘not as invisible, but as he became visible for our sake, by participation in flesh and blood. I do not depict the invisible divinity, but I depict God made visible in the flesh’ (I.4; italics mine). John compares the icon with the relic. In itself, a garment has no value, but when worn by the emperor, it shares in the honour that belongs to the emperor as well. In itself, a material object is not worthy of veneration but – and one should think here of the wood of the icon – if the one who is depicted is full of grace, then the icon shares in that grace (I.36; cf. III.12). Approvingly, John then points to the story of Abgar and the Mandylion (I.33). According to John an icon is ‘grace-filled matter’ (I.16).8 The material character of the image is central to this view of the image. 5 Barthes, Die helle Kammer, 97 (translation mine). I would like to comment that the classic view of the photograph needs nuancing because of digital technology. A digital image can easily be altered. A tree can be added to the photograph, thereby calling the notion of photographs as realistic into question. The photographer thus resembles more and more the painter who composes his image of reality, for which photography offers new possibilities (C. Cotton, The Photograph as Contemporary Art). 6 Barthes, Die helle Kammer, 90. 7 All references in the text are to John of Damascus, Three Treatises on the Divine Images, unless otherwise indicated. 8 According to C. Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 192, 179, 211.

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As a material object, the icon shares in the holiness of Christ. John places this accent on the material character of the icon in his polemics against the Manicheans who viewed matter as inferior (I.16). Over against them, he emphasises the value of what has been created. He thus holds that all material things that play a role in Christ’s act of redemption should be venerated, such as the wood of the cross, the holy mount of Calvary, or the place of the skull, Golgotha. In that context, he declares: ‘I will not cease from reverencing matter, through which my salvation was worked’ (I.16); nothing that is from God is without honour. In that sense, he holds to matter to the extent it serves salvation. For that he cites from the gospel of John: ‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us’ (John 1:14). On the basis of God’s incarnation, he venerates material things: ‘I reverence it not as God, but as filled with divine energy and grace’ (II.14). We must worship God with material things rather than worshipping him spiritually. In addition to things like light, incense, bread, wine, and anointing oil, he also mentions the tools that played a role in Christ’s death, such as the cross, the sponge, the reed, and the lance that pierced his side. If we venerate these things, then we should also venerate images: ‘Divine grace is given to material things through the name borne by what is depicted’ (I.36).9 Paul Moyaert In his Iconen en beeldverering (2007), Moyaert aligned himself completely with John of Damascus (102).10 He considers the role of icons to be the same as that of relics (18). Both share an intimate connection with reality. ‘Icons and relics are something of the reality represented by them’ (118). What Moyaert means here is made clear by a quote from John of Damascus: ‘I have often seen people who gaze on the clothes of their loved ones, embrace them with their eyes and their lips, as if that piece of cloth was their loved one’ (117).

9 For John of Damascus, participation is central, but he does not provide any explanation for it. He does not make any qualitative distinction between the physical human being who is called the image of God and an art image, a portrait as a depiction of him, and thus he also makes no distinction between Christ himself (a ‘natural’ image of God) and the Christ icon. The difference between Christ himself and the Christ icon is only one of degree (Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 194). See also A. Besançon, The Forbidden Image, 126128, 132. 10 The references in the text are to Moyaert, Iconen and beeldverering, unless otherwise indicated. All translations are my own.

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In this approach to the icon as relic, the central question is that of ‘physical touch’ (190). Icons and relics have power because they are something ‘of the reality represented by them’ (118). That entails that the image is viewed as an imprint or emanation of reality. Like John of Damascus and starting from Christ’s imprint on the Veronica, Moyaert emphasises that the relation of the image to what it represents is an intrinsic (ontological) relation (120). An icon is an image ‘whose likeness is produced by the reality that the image resembles’ (120). A Christ icon is, in the literal sense, an expression of Christ. ‘Christ expresses himself in his icon. An icon is thus not an addition but an extract. Or, more precisely, a self-expression’ (120). Moyaert gives a similar interpretation of the icon by comparing it to a death mask. One wants to touch that as well. ‘The imprint of the face, after all, forms the mould or cast for the death mask’ (122). ‘Icons are not made by oneself but are received reverently’ (134). Whoever is affected by icons, he writes, ‘becomes interested in the truly authentic icon that is closest to the original moment of contact, to the point of origin’ (130). That is why he considers the Mandylion and the Veronica to be important, for in their ‘not being made by human hands’ they give expression to their close relationship with Christ (130-133). Moyaert does point out that an icon provides both distance and nearness. The image does not only bring nearness, as he argues above, but also distance; image and reality are, after all, not the same (116). Such interaction with the image via touch is still current, as Barthes shows in his photography theory discussed above. In Thek, relics had a function in the expectation of the resurrection from death (6.4.2). I will give another example below (10.3) of the relic cult in connection with the exhibition held in the British Museum in London, Treasures of Heaven: Saints, Relics and Devotion in Medieval Europe (2011). Moyaert remarks that icons primarily pass on contact. What is sought is not contact with what is being depicted but contact with the one who is depicted, the original (124). I have already pointed to a similar view of the image in the philosopher Gumbrecht in his Productions of Presence (2.4). Gumbrecht is opposed to the current meaning culture that looks too much for content behind the form perceived by the senses. As in the view of the icon as relic discussed here, he also emphasises the sensory presence of an object. He chooses the physical aspect of the ‘presence culture’ above the referential character of the dominant meaning culture in Western philosophy. The depth is found in the manifestation itself and must be sought in the object.

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I recognise the importance of the material aspect of the (material) image, but the accent placed by Moyaert (and Gumbrecht) is too onesided. Moyaert seems to limit presence in the image to that of the icon as relic and does not speak of other ways of presence. Another important function of the image in the Western tradition is, in addition to meditation, that of education. Moyaert ignores that when he calls the view that the image is the Bible of the unlettered ‘a pale notion that completely denies the sacramental power of the icon’ (125). Moyaert’s view of the image as indexical sign should not be seen, in my opinion, in an exclusive way. Our discussion of the contemporary depiction of the Holy Face showed it is no longer tenable to see a true image of Christ as an imprint of reality (5.3). The defining characteristic of religious art is not whether the religious image is ‘authentic’ but whether it is open to religious transcendence. That obtains not only for the image viewed as indexical sign but also for the image as iconic sign, examples of which were discussed in Part II. The Holy Faces of Rouault and Jawlensky are not ‘realistic’ portraits. The starting point for these Holy Faces is found in the (spiritual) images of Jesus in the New Testament (5.5). The theory of the icon as relic in the sense of indexical sign cannot explain this kind of religious art. But the theory of the image that follows below can do so. This theory views presence in the image differently, especially in the face, in the gaze of the person to whom the icon refers.

9.3 The Icon as Person-to-Person Relationship We encountered this theory of the image already in Marion (3.3), which he presented as an alternative to the image crisis in Western secular culture. This theory has Byzantine roots and was developed by Nicephorus (750-829), the patriarch of Constantinople, and by Theodore the Studite (759-826), abbot of the Stoudios Monastery in Constantinople. The Eastern Orthodox theologian Evdokimov (1901-1970) also used it, and, in the West, Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464) showed what this theory entailed for faith practice (see below 11.3.2). I will explain this theory as presented by Theodore the Studite and supplemented by Evdokimov. I will then look at Marion’s variant. Theodore the Studite Theodore the Studite answers these two questions in his theory of the image:

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1. Can Christ be depicted as the God-man and, if so, how? 2. How should we view the relation between the image and what it depicts?11 The first question concerns the core question of religious art, the appearance of what is invisible in what is visible. Theodore explains that an image depicts a human being as an individual person and not as humankind in general. Peter and Paul share human nature with others, but they differ from each other and from others in their individuality (3A15-3A18, 3A34). He applies this insight to Christ: Christ did not take on human nature in general but as a specific individual (3A18). How is Christ to be depicted as the God-man? God is invisible and cannot be ‘circumscribed’ (paragraphein) and therefore cannot be depicted (1.2; 3A3).12 Christ cannot be circumscribed in his own divinity either, but that does not obtain for his humanity. Precisely here the possibility of depicting the God-man in an image (third refutation of the iconoclasts; 77-114) arises. Christ’s divinity also becomes visible in his physical humanity. That is how the invisible is seen: Christ is depicted in images, and the invisible is seen. He who in His own divinity is uncircumscribable accepts the circumscription natural to His body. (1.2)

He who is invisible becomes visible, and that happens in the incarnation of God. Christ can be depicted in an image as the God-man because, by becoming human (flesh), the Person of the eternal Word becomes the source of this concrete human existence and his specific individuality. The paradox of the incarnation is that the divine Person of the eternal Word can now be ‘circumscribed’ in the individual face of Jesus.13 With respect to the second question, the relation between the image and who is imaged, this theory sees the presence of Christ in the image differently than the previous theory does. The sacred character of the icon is not found in its material aspect. Rather, the icon has power and holiness only on the basis of a correspondence between the imaged Christ and Christ himself (3D6; 3C2).14 11 The references in the text are to Theodore the Studite, On the Holy Icons (1981), unless otherwise indicated. 12 ‘Circumscribe’ (Gr. perigraphein) is a technical term in the conflict about icons and refers to the depiction of someone like this individual person. It concerns the depiction of a person and thus not the depiction of general humankind (C. Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 20-21). 13 Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 223; Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 197. 14 Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 225-228.

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There is a problem here, in my view. Theodore explained above that an image depicts a human being as a specific individual and not as humankind in general. How should we understand the Christ icon as a personal likeness of him? We do not have any ‘real’ image of him, as we saw (5.2 and 5.3), and thus it cannot be a question of a physical likeness. That approach sees the image as imprint, the image as photograph (Barthes).15 Theodore, however, is thinking of the physically risen Christ who sits on the right hand of the Father.16 He points out that, as ‘portrait’, the icon can be of lesser artistic quality, but he does not consider that a problem (3C5). As Evdokimov remarks in his discussion of icons, it has to do with a symbolic likeness.17 It is not a question of a realistic portrait, of a physical likeness to Christ, but a symbolic presentation of Him, of the spiritual personal relation of the icon with the one depicted.18 That is why, according to Theodore, the name of the person must always be written on the icon (2.17; 1.11). Because of the word, the name written on the icon, there is a unity of the image with its prototype, the primal image. Theodore thus writes: ‘It belongs to the nature of the prototype and the image derived from it that it is invoked by the name of the prototype.’19 The Second Council of Nicaea (787) also points to this: the icon bears the name of the prototype (the person depicted) but does not bear or contain the essence of the prototype. Evdokimov notes here that the icon has no existence in itself but is a ‘participation’ – that is, an image that points the way. The icon leads to the person depicted (the prototype) and announces his presence. This is not an ontological presence that is materialised in the wood of the icon.20 It is here that the Christian religious image differs from the Greek images of the gods. In the latter, the divinity was thought to be truly present in the image.21 When we look at an icon, according to Theodore, it is not sufficient to look only with our physical eyes, for then we would only see the external appearance of the person depicted and not the person himself.22 Nicholas 15

Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 194 (193). Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 230. 17 Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 194. 18 J.-L. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 98, note. 15. 19 ‘Es gehört zur Natur des Urbildes und des aus ihm abgeleiteten Bildes, dass dieses mit dem Namen des Urbildes gerufen wird.’ Cited by G. Lange, Bild und Word, 224. John of Damascus also reports this use of the name on the icon (Three Treatises, I.36). 20 Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 196-197. 21 A. Chaniotis, The Life of Statues of Gods in the Greek World, 91-112, and for the development of the images of gods among the Greeks and Romans, see: J.N. Bremmer, The Agency of Greek and Roman Statues: From Homer to Constantine, 7-21. 22 Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 228-229; Besançon, The Forbidden Image, 132; Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 98, note 15. 16

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of Cusa says something similar in his De Visione Dei (1453). One sees the icon of Christ (of God) with one’s physical eyes, but one needs to contemplate the truth with the inner eye: But the invisible Truth of Your Face I see not with the bodily eyes which look at this icon of You but with mental and intellectual eyes. This Truth is signified by this contracted shadow-like image.23

According to this theory of the image, there is therefore no unity of substance between Christ and his image. Unlike the view of the icon as relic, this theory does not position the presence of the depicted in the imageas-materiality. The holiness of the icon is found in the person-to-person relationship of the believer with the one who is depicted.24 The image is not viewed here in its materiality; rather, it is a guiding image that opens up the possibility of an event, an interaction between the believer and the icon in its reference to the one depicted. Evdokimov speaks in this context of the personal presence in the icon as a sacramental event. The icon is a sacrament in Eastern Christianity.25 God’s salvific presence is present in the icon if it has been made according to the rules of the church and has received its place in the liturgy through consecration. That accounts for the respectful treatment of the icon by the believer: praying before the icon, touching it, and kissing it. As a sacrament, according to Evdokimov, the icon does differ from the sacrament of the Eucharist. He cites the Seventh Ecumenical Council: ‘Whether it be by the contemplation of the Scriptures or by the representation of the icon … we remember all the prototypes and we are introduced in their presence.’ The icon is the visual presence of God or Christ, whereas the presence in the Eucharist is not a visual but a material one. With the icon, it is a question of a difference in ‘substance’. An icon cannot be identified with Christ himself as is the case in a certain way in the Eucharist when the bread and wine are changed into the body of the exalted Jesus, according to Evdokimov. The Eucharistic community is ‘substantial’; with the icon, however, it concerns a communion of prayer with Christ and there is a spiritual, mystical communion with the person of Christ. Before I discuss this theory of the icon as a person-to-person relationship as articulated by Marion, I will look at the interpretation the American philosopher and aesthetics scholar Nicholas Wolterstorff gives of the image theory of Theodore the Studite. 23 24 25

Nicholas of Cusa, The Vision of God, VI.19. Schönborn, God’s Human Face, 225-226. For this and what follows, see Evdokimov, The Art of the Icon, 175, 178, 194-195.

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Can Wolterstorff’s Action Theory Clarify Theodore’s Position? Wolterstorff rejects a theory of the image like the one proposed by Theodore the Studite.26 In his view, one cannot speak of presence in the image because an icon is not a ‘rendition’ of the one who is depicted – in our terms, a true image, an ‘image not made by human hands’ (5.2 and 5.3) – but a ‘depiction’ (183-186). With his action theory, Wolterstorff wants to clarify why an image like a Christ icon is venerated. This entails that one act, such as kissing the icon, counts as another, the veneration of the depicted. The act of kissing an icon counts as the completion of another act: the worship of the one depicted (190-194). The role of the icon as image here is that it represents the depicted. It has the function of standing in for the depicted (193). In my view, this action theory falls short. This action theory is concerned only with the subject (the believer), whereas, for Theodore, it is a question of an interaction between the believer and the possible presence of God or Christ via his gaze. Wolterstorff’s theory is limited to the act of the believer, to his or her act towards the icon, and misses the heart of the relationship – the interaction via the icon between the believer and the one depicted, the possible appearance of the invisible gaze via (the visible) icon. A theory of the religious image can, in my opinion, only describe the condition under which it is possible that an event is experienced as a person-to-person relationship with God. That is what Theodore did above. Or, if something does actually occur, it has nothing to do with theory but with practice. Wolterstorff wants to clarify why an icon is venerated. That is too general, given that he does not discuss the question of presence in the image. After all, Theodore is concerned with the person-to-person relationship of the believer to God, and that, in one way or another, presupposes the presence of the one depicted. Wolterstorff ignores that theme of iconic presence (in its different versions) in his chapter on the ‘Social Practices of Art for Veneration’. It is very telling that Wolterstorff views icons as ‘memorials’ (169). They are that, but at the same time they are more: the icon is a presentational symbol according to these theories of the image.27 26

The references in the text are to N. Wolterstorff, Art Rethought. Wolterstorff, who belongs to the Protestant tradition, considers the Eucharist or the Lord’s Supper to be presentational, but not images. Following Calvin, he speaks of the Lord’s Supper as a partaking in Jesus Christ and rejects Zwingli’s view, i.e., ‘a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving on our part’ (Wolterstorff, The God We Worship, 159-160 (146162)). 27

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Jean-Luc Marion Marion takes up Theodore’s theory of the image as a personal relationship. He points to Theodore’s central point: the icon concerns the person of Christ.28 That becomes concrete in Christ’s face. The icon makes the holiness of the Holy One present (77). Moyaert finds it remarkable that Marion pays no attention to the fact ‘that in Byzantine Christianity the physical proximity of and touching icons are an essential aspect of the veneration of icons.’29 As we saw, praying in front of the icon, touching and kissing it, belongs to the reverent interaction with the icon in Eastern Orthodoxy. That Marion omits this aspect of the icon has possibly to do with the fact that he does not view the icon as a sacrament, as Evdokimov does (77). More importantly, there is a difference between the theory of the icon as relic and that of the icon as person-to-person relationship. ‘Physical proximity and touch’ were at the heart of the first theory, and that is precisely not the main issue in this theory of personal relationship. The transition from the one view of the image to the other was implicitly raised in our discussion of the Holy Faces of Jawlensky, Rouault, and Olympios in comparing them with the Veronica (5.2-5.5). As we saw in chapter 3, Marion criticises both the view of the humanas-subject and the way of looking that that view entails. Theodore the Studite already removed the icon from the dominance of the gaze of the viewer: I am seen by the gaze of the Other. Marion formulates that explicitly when he says, ‘In the icon, the gaze walks along itself toward an invisible gaze that envisages it from glory’ (78). He describes the attentive gazing at the icon as an event: the viewer who finds himself before the icon seeks contact with the one depicted on the icon via the crossing of the gazes and thus the loving gaze of God (87). The visible surface of the wooden icon shows a face with two eyes. These painted eyes permit, according to Marion, being pierced intentionally by the invisible weight of a gaze. The convergence of seeing and not-seeing happens in the crossing of the gazes. Through the painted icon, I discover that I myself am visible and seen through a gaze that, although present in the observable world, remains invisible to me (83f.). The icon here is no longer an image I look at but an image in which the invisible God looks at me via Christ; the contact arises not via touch but through the gaze. 28

J.-L. Marion, The Crossing of the Visible, 77; the references in the text are to this

work. 29

Moyaert, Iconen and beeldverering, 120.

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Whereas the image as idol is taken up with its own gaze and absorbed in its own act of looking, the icon intends a face-to-face relationship between conversation partners (86). Aside from the transformation of our gaze that occurs according to this theory of the icon, it is also a correction of our excessively visual culture. Theodore said that ‘the invisible is seen’ in the image of Christ’. Marion points to the invisible gaze of Christ that crosses our gaze (3.3). In the crossing of the gazes via the visible icon, Christ looks at us without losing himself in the visible. ‘In the icon the visible and invisible embrace each other from a fire that no longer destroys but rather lights up the divine face for humanity’ (87). In other words, the icon uses visible forms to let the invisible presence of a divine face shine through it. This theory of the image as a person-to-person relationship clarifies the interaction with the holy portrait such as the modern icon, Rouault’s Holy Face. Rouault’s painting of Christ presents the suffering Christ who looks at us (5.4.2). It also clarifies Olympios’ Veronica. As in Rouault’s painting, the face of Christ here becomes an ethical call to the viewer (5.4.3). This view of the icon as person-to-person relationship is a splendid example of the piety of the psalmists in seeking ‘God’s face’.30 In line with that, I will give an example of the practice of faith by means of Nicholas of Cusa’s elaboration of this theory of the image for interacting with images (11.3.2). The spiritual interaction with the image is, however, more varied than this theory shows. This theory is limited to the holy ‘portrait’ and excludes other religious art, such as the works discussed in Part II – Van Gogh’s landscape painting. This religious art can be clarified by another theological theory of the religious image – that of Paul Tillich: the image as an expression of ultimate reality.

9.4 The Image as Religious Depth: Paul Tillich The Lutheran theologian Paul Tillich does not find his starting point for his theology of art in liturgical or church art. That is because, according to Tillich, the biblical God is the ultimate reality: God is as wide as all reality. For that reason, Tillich cannot limit religious art to art with 30 Psalm 27:8-9a. The theologian Gerhard Ebeling speaks of prayer as the key to the doctrine of God (G. Ebeling, Dogmatik des christlichen Glaubens I (Tübingen: Mohr 1979, §. 9)).

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explicit Christian themes, as I do in this study. My choice for that is pragmatic and not a matter of principle: this limitation of the study prevents it from becoming too broad. This choice does not conflict with Tillich’s understanding of the biblical God as the ultimate reality, a view that I endorse, as I showed in Where Heaven and Earth Meet. All art can be a place to encounter God. Art and religion are places to encounter ultimate reality, as Tillich explains in a lecture that he gave in the Museum of Modern Art (New York) in 1959: The term ‘ultimate reality’ is not another name for God in the religious sense of the word. But the God of religion would not be God if he were not first of all ultimate reality. On the one hand, the God of religion is more than ultimate reality. Yet religion can speak of the divinity only if God is ultimate reality. If he were anything less, namely, a being – even the highest – he would be on the level of all other beings.31

Tillich states that God, ‘Being Itself’, ‘ultimate reality’, is present in a hidden way in secular culture and especially in art that is specifically part of this culture. He points to the ultimate in paintings that we usually view as secular. Picasso’s Guernica evokes the alienation of humans from their true being as a result of their being controlled by demonic forces.32 Everyone has an ultimate concern, according to Tillich, and is engaged with the ultimate. That is why he speaks about God not only in theological terms as the Father of Jesus Christ but also in philosophical terms as ‘Being-Itself’ or as the ‘Power of Being’ or ‘ultimate reality’. Everyone is threatened by destruction, by one form or another of non-being, despair, loneliness, sickness, or approaching death. Being-Itself has, Tillich states, overcome non-being in itself. Being-Itself is the Power of Being from which people draw the courage to be victorious over nonbeing in all its forms of evil, fear, and loneliness. There are all kinds of situations in which people can come into contact with ultimate reality, but art is the preeminent means. Why? Because even art that is usually viewed as secular can be seen as a presentational symbol and because what the symbol shares in is ultimate reality. People sometimes say, ‘It’s just a symbol’, because they think it has less value for reality. The opposite is the case, according to Tillich. A symbol discloses reality that cannot be disclosed in any other way. The symbol is characterised by the presence of what it symbolises. The religious work 31 32

P. Tillich, Art and Ultimate Reality, 140. Tillich, Protestantism and Artistic Style, 119-120.

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of art as symbol entails, namely, that it participates in the power that it makes present.33 By that power Tillich means the Power of Being, God as the Power of Being. I will note here that Tillich limits the symbol – in my terminology – to the presentational symbol and does not discuss the representational symbol in religious art (8.4). Tillich here emphasises the intense reality of the religious material image as symbol. He does not limit the religious image to the icon as a holy portrait. In principle, all art can be religious, and it is religious if it refers to ultimate reality, which the God of the Bible is. Before we see how Tillich argues that all art can in principle be religious, I will first give an example of the way in which ‘secular’ art can be a place for people in existential situations to encounter the Power of Being. ‘Secular’ Art and the Courage to Be In the meditation centre of the hospital in Tiel is a glass work of art by Annemiek Punt. Upon entering this centre, one’s attention is drawn immediately to a large carved rock with two long vertical windows made out of melted glass on either side (2007) [Fig. 9.73]. The windows, the rock, and the white space behind it form one whole. Both windows are black and red on the outside bottom and change into blue and purple. Through their movement and colour – yellow, light blue, and the white of the glass – they point to the rock and the white area behind it. The lines and colours of the melted glass give the windows a powerful sense of movement. They have an expressive style. Both through the colour (dark below and light above) and through the lines directed upwards, the windows guide the viewer’s gaze upward. The rock can have many meanings: intransigent, stubborn, or reliable because of its solidity. In this context of a meditation centre in a hospital, the whole of the installation – the glass windows, the rock, and the white wall behind it – can evoke ultimate reality as the Power of Being for those in an existential life situation. It can give them the courage to be. This artwork is what is called secular art. The symbols used are not explicitly Christian but generally human, such as the rock and the vertical windows pointing upwards. Tillich, however, would see such art as religious. He links the religious not to the subject but to the style of a work of art. The religious character of a work of art is decided by style – rather than by the idea or content. The style must have Gehalt, i.e., religious 33

Tillich, Visual Art and the Revelatory Character of Style, 133. See page 180 note 6.

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depth. Tillich views style as ‘the immediate influence of depth-content (Gehalt) on the form’.34 Style is the special way in which the form of a work of art expresses religious depth. Thus, Gehalt does not refer to the subject or theme of a work of art but to the religious depth or the ultimate that a work of art shows in its style. Another word for depth is ‘expressivity’. Works of art like paintings (to which Tillich – aside from architecture – limited himself) are religious if their style shows religious depth (Gehalt). Much art contains depth, according to him. Art is religious in principle because God is ultimate reality. Especially in German Expressionism (Kandinsky, Marc) as well as in the work of Cézanne and in other painters, Tillich saw that religious depth (Gehalt) breaks through the form (Form) of line, colour, and perspective. He comments on Cézanne’s Still Life with Peppermint Bottle (ca. 1894): ‘With a will to create objectively, Cézanne battled with the form and restored to things their real metaphysical meaning.’35 Something of Gehalt, religious depth, can be seen in paintings whose power breaks through form. Tillich points out correctly that a painting with a religious theme does not always need to be religious. In his view, if a painting is not religious, that is because of its lack of religious depth; ultimate reality cannot break through. Let us recall here Belting’s thesis that Renaissance art with Christian themes undermined the religious character of such art. That is the case for example, according to Tillich, with Raphael’s Alba Madonna (1510) [Fig. 9.74]. The Alba Madonna lacks religious style, although it does have a religious theme.36 It is a masterwork of painting that shows Mary with the two children Jesus and John (the Baptist). It is a good example of a painting whose aesthetic form does not do justice to the religious content. The difference with the preceding theories is that this theory of religious depth in art wants as such to reveal God as ultimate reality. That is Tillich’s important contribution to a theology of art. All art can be a place to encounter God. This theory clarifies why Van Gogh’s paintings like The Sower and Starry Night (September 1888) are religious art: they are paintings that give voice to religious transcendence in an expressive style. Tillich’s response to the Problem of God exhibition in Düsseldorf 34 For this and what follows, see Tillich, Religious Style and Religious Material in the Fine Arts, 51-53. 35 Tillich, The Religious Situation, 68. 36 Tillich, Existential Aspects of Modern Art, 98. Belting has a similar view of Raphael as a painter (Belting, Likeness and Presence, 471, 478-484, 488).

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(2.2) would be that, even if that art with Christian themes is not religiously motivated, it can still be called religious if it displays Gehalt in its style. This theory transcends the opposition between religious and secular art. From a broader view of religion, it indicates the religious aspect of art in so-called secular art as well. Religion is not only limited to organised religion but is also present where people are engaged with their ultimate concern. Art shows that through its style of religious depth. I will make a few comments here. Tillich’s Theory in Discussion Tillich’s theory, as it is worked out, turns out to be somewhat too vague to use fruitfully. That vagueness arises because of the exclusive criterium of style (1) and the imprecise description of what that religious style is (2). With respect to the first, Tillich uses the concept style – the influence of Gehalt, religious depth, on the form of the art work – to determine whether a work is religious. Because he largely ignores the content of the work – after all, style has to do with the form of a work and not with the content – he can only claim that a work is religious but not show clearly enough how it is religious and in what respect it speaks to the existential concerns of the viewer. In my interpretation above of the glass artwork by Annemiek Punt in the hospital in Tiel, I not only pointed to the expressive style and its colours but also to the whole content of the installation, the rock. By also pointing to the installation, I could indicate that the artwork can give viewers in the meditation room courage to be. One could limit oneself to the style of an artwork, but then it is difficult to show in what sense a work is religious.37 That is primarily important for art with Christian themes. The question whether a work of art expresses a certain theme properly requires more than simply determining whether its style has Gehalt. With respect to the second, one could ask what a style of religious depth actually is. There are works that do not have the style of religious depth described by Tillich but are undeniably religious. One example is the Eastern Orthodox icon with its sacred style that includes the element of reverse perspective. That is a different technique for letting the invisible 37 For a more extensive treatment of this question in Tillich, see W. Stoker, De kunsttheologie van Gerardus van der Leeuw en Paul Tillich.

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appear than Tillich’s view of style, which was influenced by German Expressionism. Despite these critical remarks, Tillich’s theory points in a direction that, with respect to art with Christian themes, I will elaborate on after the intermezzo below in a different way.

9.5 Intermezzo: The Image as a Place of Becoming Present What connects the three theories discussed above with each other is that they view the religious object, the icon or the religious painting, as a presentational symbol. If the first two theories speak about God’s presence, they do so in a limited way. The first speaks of Christ’s presence in the icon viewed as a relic, and the second of the icon viewed as a person-to-person relationship with the one who is depicted. Tillich places the focus on the presence of God as the Power of Being in the whole of reality. God’s becoming present cannot, in my view, be determined as precisely as the first two theories do. That is the reason for this intermezzo on God’s presence in the image. God’s Presence in the Image: An Open Possibility What should we understand by the presence of God in the image? As a starting point, I will take the description of the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies in the temple in Jerusalem. The ark was a chest above which two cherubim were placed whose wings touched above the socalled ‘mercy seat’. The space enclosed by the cherubim was called the Shekinah, a term derived from the verb shakan, ‘to dwell as in a tent’. As J. Pohier states, this description of God’s presence is to be viewed as a model for his presence in the world: a presence that is both localised and at the same time cannot be fixed.38 There are countless places of encounter between God and human beings like this open space above the ark. God becomes present, and the human being opens himself to that. ‘God is where He comes, where He makes himself present and where the individual lets him become present through faith.’39 God’s presence is a becoming present in what is hidden. Jesus disappears immediately when those disciples on the road 38 J. Pohier, Als ik God zeg .... I am grateful to T. van Eijk, Tegenwoordigheid en afwezigheid, 83-84, for this reference. 39 Van Eijk, Tegenwoordigheid en afwezigheid, 84.

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to Emmaus recognise him in the breaking of bread: ‘Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight’ (Luke 24:31). Most Christian communities see God’s actual presence in the Word and in the sacraments, especially in the Eucharist or the Lord’s Supper. With respect to presence in the religious image, the three theories pointed to a specific mode of God’s presence in Christ. Because the relic can degenerate into magic and the icon into an idol, we should remember that the medium – the image – is never to be identified with what it mediates, a specific mode of God’s presence. In my view, God is present in different ways, depending on the situation.40 After all, according to Christian tradition, God is the triune God who is present as creator, redeemer, and completer of the world. That also includes what Tillich calls the presence of God as the Power of Being, like Punt’s glass artwork in the meditation room in the hospital in Tiel (9.4). In his comments on his The Sower and Starry Night, Van Gogh states in a striking way that he saw nature, in itself ambivalent, as the creation of a loving God (9.4). Paul Thek sees art as liturgy, and his installation Die Krippe is an example of this. The visitor to the exhibition became a participant in something like a procession. Sutherland’s Christ in Glory can be the passage, the intermediary for Christ’s presence with respect to believers there. A new development regarding presence in art can be seen in video games. Frank Bosman points out that the gamer can insert herself into the creative, redeeming, and completing acts of God. The gamer can take on theomorphic characteristics – the gamer as the image of God in his creating – as well as Christomorphic qualities by imitating Christ in his behaviour. An example of the latter is found in the videogame Metro Last Night (2013). Almost at the end of the game, in a post-apocalyptic Moscow, the player (playing the role of the young hero Artyom) can choose to kill or save Artyom’s worst enemy, Pavl. If the player chooses to save Pavl, the camera pivots to a depiction of the Mandylion above a cupboard that the ‘bad guy’ is lying against. Thus, Christ is present in this game situation where the enemy is forgiven.41 However important religious art may be as presentational symbol, that does not detract from the fact that religious art also exists as representational symbol. The three theories discussed limit themselves to religious 40 41

On God’s presence in general, see I. Dalferth, Becoming Present. F. Bosman, [Player] start: GOD MODE, 249-250.

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art as presentational symbol and pass over art as representational symbol. As examples of this, I cited Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) [Fig. 6.51] and Punt’s abstract wall object [Fig. 8.72]. One can also think of strongly didactic religious art, such as Mulders’ stained glass window, Het Laatste Oordeel, that confronts the viewer immediately with the choice between good and evil [Fig. 7.64]. Finally, I will present my theological theory of the religious image in which I will attempt to correct this omission. This theory accommodates religious art as both presentational symbol and as representational symbol. With the theory of the icon as a person-to-person relationship, I hold that religious art can be an event between the work and the viewer, and I agree with Tillich that religious art can be found in church art as well as in what is usually seen as secular art.

9.6 Interaction and Disclosure The heart of any theory of the religious image is how an (art) image can be open to religious transcendence.42 My proposal is to speak of hints in an artwork that raise the possibility of experiencing it as religious. By hints, I understand elements that make a work recognisable as a religious work. For the Eastern icon, those elements are determined by the rules for making an icon. But such hints can be very different in Western religious art. These can be fixed elements from Christian iconography like a halo. In Van Gogh’s The Sower, a hint is found in the sun portrayed as a halo. The sun is, after all, a designation for God in the Christian tradition (4.3.1). In Mulders’ Crack L.A. II, the hint is the reference in the painting to the table in Da Vinci’s Last Supper (6.4.1). In Dumas’ Jesus Serene, such a hint can be found in the use of mask-like faces in the group portrait to refer to the (future) human community (7.6). A hint can also be a matter of appropriateness: a certain colour or form that fits the religious theme that it wants to express, such as the surrealistic forms of the landscape in Frieling’s Paasmorgen. A hint can also be the title of a work or an accompanying text in a work like those of Van Gogh or Dumas. Although these hints are ‘objectively’ recognisable, that does not mean per se that they function as indications of the religious character of the 42 The parentheses around the word art in the phrase ‘(art) image’ point to the fact that in religion the image as concept encompasses more than the art image or artwork. The theories of the religious image in this chapter apply to the image in the broad sense: to art images and to images in popular culture. I will limit myself in this study to the art image.

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work in question. Hints function only in the interaction between the work, what/whom the work depicts, and the viewer, as we will now see. Disclosure A (religious) work of art cannot be viewed in itself. It acquires its function only in its interaction with the viewer. That obtains not only for music but also for the visual arts, as we will see in the conclusion to this study (11.4). How a work of art is experienced is ultimately a question of the viewer and the work in relation to what/whom is depicted. It has to do with an event, an interaction. Such an interaction always presupposes a disclosure, an unveiling, a revelation. To explain such a disclosure in one’s interaction with a work of art, I will broaden the question: When can we speak of a religious situation in a secularised world? The philosopher of religion Ian Ramsey cites a number of characteristics of religious language that help to designate a situation as religious.43 I will limit myself to the characteristic of ‘odd discernment.’ Religion is characterised by an odd discernment or perception. There are situations that are ‘spatial-temporal and more’. These are situations that, in Tillich’s terms, take on depth and turn a secular situation into a religious one. Ramsey applies that to language and asks: When exactly does secular language become religious language? That occurs when language is used in an odd way as in hyperboles like ‘love your enemies’ or paradoxes like ‘losing one’s life in order to gain it’. One can also think here of the parables that Jesus tells in the gospels that end in a very different way than expected, like the father who warmly welcomes his prodigal son’s return or the workers who start late but receive the same wages as those who start earlier. It is a situation with an ‘odd’ characteristic that indicates the religious aspect of the situation. What is disclosed depends on the situation, the verifiable givens that make language religious language but transcends those characteristics. That is why a disclosure, a revelation, is needed by the person to be able to undergo odd discernment: ‘the penny drops’. For me, this characteristic of odd discernment is one of the keys to clarify that a work of art or an object like a relic, an icon, or a landscape painting functions in a religious way in one’s interaction with it. He or she experiences an ‘odd discernment’ because of the hints in a work and experiences these as religious. 43

I.T. Ramsey, Religious Language, chapters 1 and 2.

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Hints and ‘Odd Discernment’ If I apply Ramsey’s insights regarding religious language to art, ‘odd discernment’ has to do with the hints, the religious characteristics in a painting, certain elements of the image in the whole of the composition. This allows it to be determined whether a viewer experiences a work of art as religious in interaction with it. Even if the hints are very recognisable in a work like Rouault’s Holy Face, Thek’s installation Die Krippe, or Marc Mulders’ stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel, one can still say, ‘I don’t experience such paintings as religious.’ My answer to that is that the religious hints in a work – indeed, as discernible empirical givens but not objective givens – should be distinguished from the disclosure that possibly occurs in the viewer. A disclosure is an event whereby a viewer experiences the painting as religious. And that is not the same as recognising something objective. An expert can establish a hint as an empirical given, but that is not enough for any religious interaction with that work. Some do not experience the works discussed in Part II as religious. That experience cannot be forced; looking at and lingering over a painting can be an impressive experience. The hints in the work point to the potentially religious character of the painting. But whether the viewer experiences it as such, is something else again, and that is a matter of disclosure. In such a disclosure, the nature of time also changes. In relation to religious transcendence there is only one time: the present. Such a disclosure does not concern the past. The past is not reality for those who experience a disclosure: only the present is reality for him or her. A disclosure concerns a contemporaneity that is revealed in or via the work. What we have said about hints and disclosure applies to art as presentational symbol and art as representational symbol. With art as presentational symbol, the disclosure refers to God becoming present. It is an interaction via the image with one of the means by which religious transcendence is presented, that of the relic, the person-to-person relationship, the courage to be, or in any other way in which the triune God becomes present. If the religious work is a representational symbol, the disclosure affects the person addressed by the work in an existential way, as in Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) or Crack L.A. II. The interaction with these works invites reflection on Christ’s offer. There are border cases here. There are, after all, works in which such hints are missing or less recognisable. For Merton and Kuspit, Reinhardt’s Black Painting No. 5 is religious, but not for Reinhardt. This is an artwork that is open to different interpretations and interactions with it. Here

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as well disclosure is decisive in one’s interaction with the work if it is to be viewed as a religious work. In short, religious art is not just an illustration of a biblical story but can be an intermediary or guiding image of a disclosure, a revelation. Religious art does not exist in isolation: a work can be called religious in the interplay between a work with its hints and the viewer and what/whom is depicted on the work only if there is a disclosure. The work of art as an event can also be described as play; on this, see the conclusion to this study (11.4). Of course, the place or situation of the work of art, in a church for example, can also play a role in the religious experience of it. An exhibition in a museum can be set up in such a way that proper justice is done to the religious nature of the works of art in that exhibition. Why should someone not be able to experience art in a public space in a religious way as well (see 10.3)? This theory of the image as interaction and disclosure is broad and does not only apply to art with Christian themes. It also obtains for religious art usually viewed as secular but is experienced by the viewer as an expression of ultimate reality, such as Annemiek Punt’s glass installation in the meditation centre in the hospital in Tiel. The flipside of this range is that this theory is formal and does not indicate whether the work of art as symbol is to be seen as presentational or representational. This theory applies to both.44 One should remember as well that the same artwork can be viewed by one person as presentational but by another as representational. That also depends on the religious practice in which the viewer has learned to interact with images. For the Eastern Orthodox, an icon is a presentational symbol, whereas for many Western icon enthusiasts it is usually a representational symbol. Or, to use another example: How can Reinhardt’s Black Painting No. 5 be seen as religious? For Merton, in his meditative interaction with a Black Painting, it concerns presence. For others, the painting can also function as a work that ‘gives rise to thought’ about God who cannot be depicted. Excursus: Interaction, Disclosure, and Seventeenth-Century Dutch Landscape Painting It is a topic of discussion among art historians as to whether Dutch landscape painting in the seventeenth century is to be viewed as religious or secular. Boudewijn Bakker has provided an important contribution to this 44

I am here supplementing the answer I gave in 8.6.

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discussion with his comprehensive study Landschap en Wereldbeeld: Van Van Eyck tot Rembrandt (2004). He criticises, among others, Gombrich’s influential view of Dutch landscape painting.45 Gombrich judged landscape painting incorrectly as only aesthetic, as art for art’s sake avant la lettre. He did that on the basis of Italian Renaissance views of art of Alberti and Leonardo Da Vinci, and others.46 The everyday landscape is transformed in Dutch landscape painting into ‘a vision of restful beauty.’47 Dutch painters like Simon de Vlieger and Jan van Goyen teach us to see simple things like sailboats and windmills as ‘the picturesque in a simple scene’, according to Gombrich. As a researcher in the field of iconology, Bakker researches Dutch landscape paintings and looks at the views of art held by Flemish and Dutch figures like Karel van Mander (1548-1606), Constantijn Huygens (1596-1687) and Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627-1678), among others. He argues that, already in the period from the fifteenth up to and including the seventeenth century, Dutch painters (and the public) viewed the landscape as religious. They wanted to show the beauty and goodness of God’s creation and his continuing care for it in landscape painting. The landscape contained messages. The four medieval categories of exegesis (historical, allegorical, moral, and anagogical) proved to be well suited for explaining nature and giving it meaning. Bakker also points explicitly to Calvin’s view of nature as creation (218-221). At that time, the public experienced such landscape paintings as religious because of hints and disclosure. The hints were the moral and religious message that people recognised in the painting. The question is whether contemporary viewers can also read those often hidden hints. We are not living in a seventeenth century so heavily stamped by Christianity but in a secular culture. I will give two examples: Rembrandt’s Landscape with a Stone Bridge (ca. 1638) [Fig 9.75] and Jacob van Ruisdael’s Landscape with a Corn Field Near the Sea (ca. 1660) [Fig. 9.76]. Josua Bruyn researched seventeenth-century painting from the perspective of Panofsky’s iconology. By means of landscape paintings by Rembrandt (1606-1669) and Jacob van Ruisdael (1628/9-1682) among others, Bruyn shows that their ‘realistic’ (true to nature) paintings have hidden religious or moral messages (hints).48 Panofsky had already pointed to the hidden symbolism in Jan van Eyck (1390-1441), whose Madonna in the Church (ca. 1438-1440) is a non-realistic, reconstructed painting 45

Bakker, Landschap en wereldbeeld, 15-16; 270-272. E. Gombrich, The Renaissance Theory of Art, 107-121. 47 For this and what follows, see E. Gombrich, The Story of Art, 330. 48 J. Bruyn, Toward a Scriptural Reading of Seventeenth-Century Dutch Landscape Paintings, 100-101. 46

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in that Van Eyck has placed Mary in a church and, in addition, painted her disproportionately large in relation to the church. Both factors are two hints about the deeper religious meaning of this painting: Mary as the personification of the church.49 But should one also look for hidden symbolism, for hints, in paintings by Rembrandt and Jacob van Ruisdael mentioned above? That was usual at the time, but does it also obtain for a contemporary viewer of such paintings that – unlike Van Eyck’s Madonna in the Church – are realistic and sometimes present in something that is localisable? Bruyn interprets Rembrandt’s Landscape with a Stone Bridge (ca. 1638) in an allegorical way as a depiction of the pilgrimage of life. The stooped man approaching the bridge represents the pious pilgrim whose life is approaching its end. In front of him, on the other side of the bridge, one can see a fence and some old trees [Fig. 9.75a]. The fence points to a boundary, to death as it appears in Roemer Visscher’s Sinnepoppen (1614).50 Other literary sources from that time also report convincingly that the landscape was experienced religiously by the public as a whole.51 The hidden symbolism of The Stone Bridge thus functioned at that time for many as a hint to view the painting as an allegory of the pilgrimage of life. In my opinion, a viewer today will look at it differently. Viewers in the twenty-first century have difficulty grasping the symbolism of such seventeenth-century landscape paintings because of its hidden character. In Bruyn’s interpretation, the content of this realistic painting, The Stone Bridge, is separated from its artistic form. Bruyn’s allegorical interpretation rests – when the painting is viewed on its own – on a very free association by means of contemporary literary sources. The art image does nothing more than serve the word of the poet and illustrates a moralreligious truth.52 The moral-religious meaning of this painting is somewhat contrived.53 That is different in Jacob van Ruisdael’s Cornfield Near the Sea [Fig. 9.76]. Ruisdael’s painting shows a golden yellow cornfield on a hillside, illuminated by a burst of sun breaking through the clouds. In the foreground 49

E. Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting; I am using the German edition here, Die altniederländische Malerei, 150-153. 50 Bruyn, Toward a Scriptural Reading of Seventeenth- Century Dutch Landscape Paintings, 97-98. 51 Bakker, Landschap en wereldbeeld, 349, 389, passim. 52 For the relation between image and word see 11.2 of this study. 53 Bakker recognises the problem in seeing such realistic paintings as religious, but he does this himself (Bakker, Landschap en wereldbeeld, 371-374, 380-381). See also R.L. Falkenburg, Calvinism and the Emergence of a Dutch Seventeenth-Century Landscape Art, 343-368; C.R. Joby, Calvinism and the Arts, chapter 7.

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are wild dunes covered by green brown vegetation, and two gnarled oak trees. At the edge of the cornfield one can see some farmers resting from their work [Fig. 9.76a]. There is an impressive Dutch sky, showing some blue with large clouds; the sun is partly visible through the clouds, but some clouds are dark, possibly signaling an approaching storm. In the distance one can see the sea with several ships. The location of the scene has been identified as the shore of the Zuiderzee to the southeast of Amsterdam.54 Such a landscape painting can indeed be seen as secular, as a reference to the growing grain trade.55 For a large part of the public at that time, however, this painting functioned as an ode to God’s beautiful and good creation. The Anabaptist Jacob van Ruisdael moved in circles that experienced nature deeply as religious.56 Unlike The Stone Bridge, this painting itself contains hints for viewing it religiously that a viewer today can also recognise. We see, namely, an impressive natural scene with the contrasts of land/water/sky; high/low, and cultivated/wild nature. R.H. Fuchs thus also considers the painting to be a true speculum naturae: a depiction of nature as a harmonious whole of apparent contrasts. Looking at the painting therefore affords more than simply aesthetic pleasure.57 This painting can evoke a disclosure for a viewer in the twenty-first century as well through its hints. It can produce a religious experience of nature as creation, just as Van Gogh did when he painted his landscapes (4.3), or lead to contemplation of God’s creation. 9.7 Conclusion: Religious Art is Sacred Art Religious art, which is the subject of this book, is holy or sacred art.58 The four theories of the image we have discussed are agreed on that. The terms sacred or holy are used here in the religious sense.59 Above, I called the icon holy – both the icon itself, viewed as relic, as well as that of the person-to-person relationship, although here it has to do with the person depicted. For Tillich, the aspect of holiness is found in the sacramental aspect of reality in its religious depth. Does the term sacred apply only to the presentational view of religious art, which becomes 54 55 56 57 58 59

K. Müller, Jacob van Ruisdael, 118. Müller, Jacob van Ruisdael, 118. H. Leeflang, Ruisdaels Natuur, 21-18. Cited by Bakker, Landschap en wereldbeeld, 283-284. See, for example, G. Howes, The Art of the Sacred. J.-L. Nancy uses the term sacred in a secular sense; see 2.3.2.

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present in the image, or does it also apply to representational religious art, like Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) or Punt’s abstract glass object in the church in Barneveld? The terms sacred and holy refer first of all to God himself,60 and then also to people, times (feasts), spaces (temples, churches) or objects. ‘Sacred’ or ‘holy’ can also be defined in two ways. 1. As being set apart. This applies first of all to God in the sense of God’s being wholly other. It also applies to humans and the world in the distinction between the sacred and the profane. For example, a temple or a church is seen as sacred space in distinction from the profane areas where everyday life is lived. There are specific rules for entering a sacred space. The question is whether an – in my view, unfortunate – dualism has arisen between the sacred and the profane in our secular age. In the previous chapter, I spoke of reality in terms of sacramentality and about reality as the bearer of the sacred, of the presence of God via a work of art. Secular art is also a place where one can encounter God. That argues against the dualism of sacred and profane and for the sacred in the profane. I will come back to this (11.3.1). 2. The object that is set apart has a unique power that evokes awe and fascination. An example of this is the theory of the image as relic. The icon as material object has power, according to this view. The holy as power can also be viewed as non-substantial and as a relational concept. In the view of the icon as a person-to-person relationship, the believer is in a relationship with the holy, the gaze of Christ. For the artwork in the meditation room in the Tiel hospital, it is the Power of Being, the courage to be, which can be experienced in interaction with the artwork. In certain situations, as in the prayer before the icon, or in meditation before the work of art in the meditation centre, the object acquires a sacred character. The presence of God as the Power of Being is, namely, experienced as real. The sacred or the holy here concerns an event of ‘the really real’.61 And can religious art as representational symbol also be called sacred? Here we are concerned with art that gives rise to thought, that addresses the fundamental orientation of our lives. Such representational works can also be called ‘sacred’ (as set apart), and such art also functions as disclosure, be it without the character of presence. 60 I Samuel 6:20; Exodus 15:11; Isaiah 6:3, etc.: E. Jenni & C. Westermann, Theologisches Handwörterbuch II, qds, heilig, 589-609. See also A.L. Molendijk, The Notion of the ‘Sacred’, 55-89. 61 This is how Orsi describes the holy: ‘The key category of the holy is its realness’; R.A. Orsi, ‘The Problem of the Holy’, 103.

10. RELIGIOUS ART: THE AESTHETIC AND THE MUSEUM

10.1 Introduction In the Introduction to this book I argued that art and religion have a family relationship with each other because both deal with questions of human existence. The Western history of the religious image shows that this was not always the case. Belting pointed to a tension between the cultic image in the Middle Ages and the art image in the Renaissance. Because of further developments in the concept of art, art became an independent pursuit and thus separate from society and from the Christian religion. Attention gradually shifted from the image as an object of devotion to the image as an object of aesthetic contemplation (1.5). The concept of art in the ‘Grand Narrative’ gave way in the twentieth century to different views of art. Art can also be viewed as a social practice. As this study is intended to show, religious art finds its function in a religious practice. That still leaves open the question how the aesthetic can be given a place in that view. The Eastern Orthodox, Catholic, and Anglican traditions of the image in Christianity consider beauty to be an important aesthetic value for religious art. Calvin points to the beauty of God’s creation. In this chapter, we will see how beauty is an aesthetic value for Christianity (10.2.1). In the Introduction, I described the aesthetic for the visual arts in general terms as follows: how something appears to us can give us joy or arouse our admiration for the well-chosen form of the work of art. I will clarify the concept ‘aesthetic’ in this chapter. I distinguish between the aesthetic as referring to the value beauty that can be a theme in art and the aesthetic as referring to various forms of a work of art. This point came up already in the discussion of the ‘Grand Narrative’ of art. Art was viewed in a ‘formalistic-aesthetic’ way by James McNeill Whistler [Fig. 1.6] and Clive Bell (1.5.1). This chapter will present an alternative: the aesthetic as beautiful form is to be understood not in a formalistic way but in a functional one, as Hans-Georg Gadamer shows (10.2.2). But Gadamer limits himself too one-sidedly to the beautiful form of a work: it is a misunderstanding to believe art always has to be ‘beautiful’. Sutherland’s Christ in Glory [Fig. 7.63] and Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand)

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[Fig. 6.51] are intriguing and evoke our admiration for the way the form fits the content. I called one hieratic and the other sublime. I will show that there are other aesthetic qualities a work of art can have than beauty (10.2.3). In other words, a work of art can have another aesthetic form than a beautiful form. The issue of the aesthetic also concerns the question of religious art in museums. Most of the works discussed in Part II are in museums. Can the art museum be a place for a religious interaction with the art image? The Western art museum is a secular institution and is the fruit of the Enlightenment, closely connected with the view of art found in the ‘Grand Narrative’ of modern art.1 Much religious art is found in museums. How the museum deals with this depends on how the museum directors think about the relation between art and religion. In the United States in particular, museums have an eye for the original religious character of their collection of art of native peoples and of the world religions, including many works with Christian themes. They want to do justice to that in the exhibitions. The question whether the museum can be a place for personal devotion is all the more important because the phenomenon of practising spirituality outside the traditional institutions is growing: more and more people no longer feel connected with any of the traditional religious communities. Religion is now more broadly present in society than just in organised religion. We will see how the museum can also be a place where devotion can be experienced (10.3).

10.2 The Aesthetic: Art and the Religious Image 10.2.1 A Theological Reflection on Beauty Traditionally, beauty has been one of the attributes of God in the Christian tradition. The church father Augustine invokes God as ‘beauty of all things beautiful’.2 ‘Too late did I love You, O Fairness, so ancient, and yet so new! Too late did I love You!’3 God’s beauty is reflected in the beauty of creation. Heaven and earth are beautiful: ‘You, therefore, Lord, made these things; Thou who art beautiful, for they are beautiful.’4 1

H. Belting, Das Ende der Kunstgeschichte, 23, 137-139. Augustine, Confessions, III.6.10. For beauty in Augustine, see B. Forte, The Portal of Beauty, 1-12. 3 Augustine, Confessions, X.27.38. 4 Augustine, Confessions, XI.4.6. 2

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Calvin speaks in a similar way about creation as worthy of praise (4.2.3). When Karl Barth explains what the biblical expression ‘the glory of God’ means, he also speaks of God’s beauty, of the God who ‘provides pleasure, creates longing, and rewards with enjoyment’.5 ‘God is glorious [herrlich] in such a way that he radiates joy and that he – everything he is – is thus not without beauty but in beauty.’6 Without a doubt, beauty and the aesthetic have their place in theology. The theologian Jürgen Moltmann supplements ethics with aesthetics, the ethical with the aesthetic. His argument here is that God’s creation is not to be traced back to God’s being, to necessity. Nor is it an act of arbitrariness. God’s act of creation has the character of play. ‘The creative God plays with his potentialities and creates out of nothing what is his good pleasure.’7 The non-compulsory character of God’s actions in creation includes the aesthetic element of play and joy. Moltmann speaks also of redemption and future in this context.8 I understand this as follows. God’s gracious acting is also displayed in God’s incarnation in Christ, in what Jesus shows in word and deed, the beginning of the coming of the Kingdom of peace and justice. This concerns not only the healing of the sick but also the new life, the new creation that emerges from redemption. One should respond to that not only with ethics, with acts of service, but also with the aesthetic, with play and joy. There is a limit to play, to be sure: given its seriousness, the crucifixion event can hardly be called play.9 It is for a similar reason that I do not speak of the beauty of the cross.10 From the perspective of Easter, God’s glory rests on the cross because death is not the final end; to the contrary, the resurrection makes a new life possible. The cross and resurrection mark the concept of beauty in the Christian tradition: God’s glory ‘is not the splendor of otherworldly superior power but the beauty of love which empties itself without losing itself’11 Despite all evil and violence, the future is assured: the kingdom of peace and justice, of shalom that includes play, joy, and beauty.12 5

K. Barth, Kirchliche Dogmatik II/1, 734. Barth, Kirchliche Dogmatik II/1, 739. 7 J. Moltmann, Theology of Play, 17. 8 Moltmann, Theology of Play, 25-45. 9 As Moltmann correctly asserts, Theology of Play, 32. 10 Urs von Balthasar and Van der Leeuw each speak in different ways of the beauty of Christ’s cross, a view I have criticised elsewhere: Stoker, Beauty as a Theological Concept, 153-171. 11 Moltmann, Theology of Play, 41. 12 Moltmann, Theology of Play, 33-37. 6

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All that expresses what the Bible calls God’s glory, and that can be viewed as God’s beauty that becomes manifest in creation, redemption, and the joyful future of the Kingdom of peace. Aside from the response humans make in and through their moral actions, they also respond in play and joy out of the freedom bestowed on them. That can happen in liturgy and during the great Christian feasts, but it can also and in close conjunction with liturgy happen in the art that nourishes the aesthetic par excellence. Beauty, the Aesthetic, and Art Moltmann argues for the aesthetic as a value and its importance as an experience in the Christian religion. But this raises a question for theological aesthetics. In the first chapter, I established that the view of art in the ‘Grand Narrative’ can be replaced by the view of art as social practice. Art can function in a religious practice. That still leaves unanswered the question as to how the value of beauty and the aesthetic as the quality or form of a work of art can be given a place in religious art. The artists answer that question themselves with their works discussed in Part II. Van Gogh’s The Sower and Starry Night give explicit expression to the value of beauty. That is also the case with Henk Helmantel [Fig. 11.83; 11.84], as we will see below (11.3.5). For both, beauty is not only a question of the aesthetic form but also of what is being depicted (nature and inanimate objects). Both Van Gogh and Henk Helmantel see the beauty of nature as a value, like God’s good creation. For them, beauty is more than just a beautiful form in art: the subject of the painting, i.e., nature is itself beautiful. Here I will say something more about the aesthetic viewed as the beautiful form of art. The aesthetic is an aspect of much religious art, including contemporary art. I interpreted the beautiful form of works such as Paasmorgen by Frieling (7.2), ‘Ode to Light’ by Manessier (7.3) or Het laastste Oordeel by Mulders (7.5) in a functional way as serving the content. That is another way of interpreting a work of art than simply looking at its pure form in itself – Clive Bell’s formalistic view (1.5.1). Hans-Georg Gadamer provides an accounting of the functional interpretation in his philosophy of art. The way in which Gadamer – whose Truth and Method (Wahrheit und Methode) is the most influential hermeneutical work of the twentieth century – overcomes the formalistic-aesthetic view is fruitful for determining the place of the aesthetic in art with Christian themes. We will

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see how he, in his hermeneutics, puts the aesthetic to the service of the social function of art and connects the beautiful with the true (10.2.2).13 10.2.2 The Beautiful Form in Service to Truth: Hans-Georg Gadamer Gadamer views art from the perspective of the interaction between the viewer and the work of art and clarifies the aesthetic experience as an intense experience of meaning. Above all, it is ‘a mode of self-understanding’ (Sichverstehen),14 and self-understanding always happens by means of something else, such as a work of art (83). Gadamer takes his example from the stage, but he holds that what he says about stage plays also obtains for the other arts, such as the visual arts. The performance of a classical Greek tragedy is an aesthetic experience for the audience. When we look at such a play, we are coming to it from our everyday world with its cultural and religious coherence of meaning. But Greek tragedy also had its own world from which it emerged. Thus, the theatregoer and the work of art each belong to their own respective worlds with their own respective cultural or religious coherence of meaning. How do we understand something that is being performed before our eyes? The director produces a good performance if he is successful in translating the problem of the tragedy – that of human guilt, for example – in such a way that the theatregoer of today recognises himself in the play. The ‘horizon’ of the tragedy, the Greek world of that time, therefore has to fuse with the horizon of the contemporary world of the spectator. Gadamer speaks of the fusion of horizons, to understand a play is to fuse the horizon of the play with the horizon of our own world. I applied this insight in connection with the Holy Face presented by Rouault, Jawlensky, and Olympios as contemporary interpretations of the classic Veronica (5.5). Why an aesthetic experience is an experience of intense meaning is because art provides existential insights, as Greek tragedy does, for example. One experiences truth in a work of art (XXI). That is why Gadamer calls art Aussage. According to Wolters Woordenboek Duits-Nederlands, Aussage means ‘what is brought to expression (in a work of art)’. Gadamer explains this as follows: The Aus in Aussage expresses completeness. The poet’s speaking is a complete speaking, Sage, something that witnesses to itself and needs no verification from outside.15 Art provides insights, particularly insights about life. 13 14 15

For the term aesthetics, see 1.5.3. H.-G. Gadamer, Truth and Method, 83. The references in the text are to this work. H.-G. Gadamer, Über den Beitrag der Dichtkunst, 74-75.

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Thus, the aesthetic experience is a genuine experience that does not leave the viewer of a work of art unchanged. A genuine experience is, namely, ‘an encounter with something that asserts itself as truth’ (483). Viewing art, therefore, can be an aesthetic experience: leaving oneself behind and dwelling with a work of art and then returning to everyday life. That a work of art gives insights does not, however, according to Gadamer, exclude it from being beautiful.16 To the contrary, he connects the two aspects: the beautiful form of the work of art and giving existential insights about life. From the way in which Gadamer describes the aesthetic experience, it is apparent that it is a rejection of the formalistic-aesthetic experience. Such a view, in his opinion, incorrectly separates the form of a work of art from the context in which it functions. Gadamer calls this view of art criticised by him ‘the concept of aesthetic differentiation’ (77). Art is concerned with itself, detached from the world in which it is rooted, separated from every religious or profane function that it ever fulfilled and is judged solely in a formal sense on its beauty (73-74). It thus becomes a ‘pure work of art’ (74). That is aestheticism, a view of art for art’s sake that does not ask the question of the truth of art. That is the view of art in the ‘Grand Narrative’, which Gadamer criticises – as do Belting and Wolterstorff (1.5). Gadamer acknowledges the disinterested nature of beauty in art but combines that with that other aspect of art: the giving of insights (about life). The beautiful stands over against not only the ugly but also the useful. The word beautiful/beau in les beaux arts indicates, namely, that the fine arts are not concerned with the useful.17 The beautiful transcends the necessary. Beautiful things are such that their value is self-evident (472). A characteristic of the beautiful that we still find convincing is that it is supported by everybody through acknowledgement and agreement.18 Gadamer draws on Plato’s view of beauty but gives his own interpretation of it. The beautiful as lustre is not only a matter of the sensory world but also of the mind. ‘[T]he light in which not only the realm of 16 The question whether art can provide truth is answered in various ways in philosophy. Beardsley and I.A. Richards deny this. Others, like Heidegger, Adorno, and Gadamer argue that art can provide truth; while Goodman and Wolterstorff also attribute this ability to art to provide truth, they hold that this is done with qualifications or indirectly (L. Zuidervaart, Artistic Truth, 204, passim). 17 ‘Beautiful … defines art as art, namely, as standing out from everything else that is done for a purpose and used, and what invites one to do nothing other than to look at it’ (H.-G. Gadamer, Anschauung und Anschaulichkeit, 193). 18 Gadamer, The Relevance of the Beautiful, 14.

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the visible but also that of the intelligible is articulated, is not the light of the sun but the light of the mind, of nous’ (477). Both the beautiful and the true will attract the viewer. Both can be found in art. As stated, apart from its meaning, apart from truth, art is also concerned with the beautiful form, with ‘being seen’, with ‘appearance’.19 With respect to the visual arts, the content not only has something to say but also, because of form and colour, wants to be seen. How does the beautiful serve the true in art? A comparison between art and science (and also theology?) will make that clear. In art, the true is expressed in a different way than in science and philosophy. In art, truth cannot be reduced to a concept. In connection with that, I point to what Kant calls an ‘aesthetic idea’. That is ‘that representation of the imagination which induces much thought, yet without the possibility of any definite thought whatever, i.e., concept, being adequate to it, and which language, consequently, can never get quite on level terms with or render completely intelligible.’20 Allow me to remark in passing that, in this respect, theology is closer to art than to science. Gadamer holds that we experience truth through a work of art that is not accessible in any other way (XXI-XXII). Instead of separating a work of art from its context and viewing it in itself as ‘aesthetic form’, we should, as I read Gadamer, take its content, what it depicts, together with the form in which it is found. The two should not be differentiated. Gadamer refers to that with a somewhat less than elegant turn of phrase ‘aesthetic nondifferentiation’ (116). I use the term ‘the functional-aesthetic’ here. Whatever impression the form makes on us must not be separated from what the artwork intends to depict. In art, form and meaning or content are inextricably connected.21 The unity of form and content is proper to art. In the first chapter I pointed to the formalistic interpretation of Whistler’s portrait Arrangement in Grey and Black (1.5.1) [Fig. 1.6]. According to the functionalaesthetic view, the painting should be seen as a unity of form and content. The form serves the content – here the depiction of Whistler’s mother. In its simplicity of form and colour, the painting represents the character of who it depicts. A painting portrays a person, a landscape, a story or a scene with the claim that it concerns something real. In that sense, art is 19

Gadamer, The Relevance of the Beautiful, 20. I. Kant, Critique of Judgement, § 49. 21 My interpretation can be found implicitly in Gadamer’s text, but he himself has something different in mind with ‘aesthetic non-differentiation’, i.e., the interaction with the work of art as play. This will be discussed below (11.4). 20

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Aussage, it gives insight into what reality is at bottom.22 It does that in a different way than science.23 In the unity of form and content, art differs from science. A scientific claim is assessed on the basis of its content, separately from the form in which it is presented and can be paraphrased. In contrast, in giving insights, art cannot be completely paraphrased. When the content is separated from the form, it then loses its power, its Aussage. That obtains not only for the visual arts but also for the poem, the novel, or the play. To view beauty as serving truth is not a contradiction but a paradox. It would be a contradiction if the beautiful were viewed formalistically as ‘ free beauty’: enjoying something purely for its own sake apart from the content of art. Disinterestedness as a characteristic of the beautiful should be qualified. In the formalistic view, the disinterested is viewed as absolute; in Gadamer’s view of beauty, the beautiful in art is form in relation to the meaning that a work of art conveys. In summary, Gadamer argues that art expresses truth in a beautiful form. The beautiful form serves art if it gives answers to life’s questions. The beautiful form focuses our attention on the content of the work of art, which we might otherwise overlook.24 This is how, as stated, I interpret the works discussed in chapter 7 about the Spirit and the future. The form serves the content.25 In Frieling, Manessier, and Beckmann, the form of the work and especially the colour combinations are suited to the theme of the new life, of the victory of good over evil. The theme of Sutherland’s Christ in Glory is also the victory of good over evil, but he did not shape his tapestry into a radiating beauty; rather, he muted the glory of beauty by depicting Christ’s crucifixion at the bottom of the tapestry. Gadamer limits the aesthetic to beauty, but form with regard to works of art involves more than the question of beauty. I called Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) [Fig. 6.51] sublime and Bacon’s Crucifixion [Fig. 6.42] terrifying-expressive. Thek’s installation Die Krippe [Fig. 6.42] and 22 There is an undeniable parallel here with how Marion describes the realism of Courbet, although Gadamer is concerned with insights about life (3.2.3). 23 For the unique character of ‘artistic truth’ in distinction from the truth provided by science, see Zuidervaart, Artistic Truth. 24 Gadamer, The Relevance of the Beautiful, 16. 25 The formalistic-aesthetic view was rejected above (1.5.3) and thus also the formalistic way of viewing art. I choose the contextual-cognitive way of looking. For this distinction, see M. Muelder Eaton, Beauty and Ugliness in and out of Context, 39-50. For a contextual-cognitive view of art, see L.L. Walton, Categories of Art, 143-157.

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Dumas’ Jesus Serene [Fig. 7.67] do not immediately elicit the response ‘that’s a nice work of art’: the aesthetic quality they have is not that of beauty. There are aesthetic concepts other than ‘beauty’ that can be used to indicate whether a work of art is aesthetically good or bad. Beardsley cites a number of aesthetic concepts: unity, complexity, and intensity. I will apply these in broad lines to the religious works of art discussed in Part II in a different way from how they function in Beardsley’s own aesthetics.26 10.2.3 Aesthetic Concepts: Unity, Complexity, and Intensity Beardsley gives three reasons to attribute aesthetic quality to an artwork: unity, complexity, and intensity.27 These aesthetic concepts allow one to judge whether a work is aesthetically good or bad. The advantage of these concepts is that they are general and can be variously specified depending on the dominant style, the signature style of the artist, or the subject of the work. Tastes can differ when assessing these aesthetic qualities. One can judge something to be beautiful or even ugly, but that does not affect the question whether the work has an aesthetic quality or not. The aesthetic concept of unity, for example, can be expressed in quite different ways. A postmodern building like the Groninger Museum displays little coherence and is asymmetrical, while the neo-Gothic Rijksmuseum of Amsterdam expresses strong symmetry. How this is valued is a question of taste. The two buildings display the concept of ‘unity’ in very different ways – for the Groninger Museum, that is certainly a point of dispute – and thus also their own internal logic of structure and style. In applying these open aesthetic concepts to the artworks in Part II, it will appear that their aesthetic quality can be indicated quite variously. Unity. A work is well organised, displays coherence, or is complete. ‘Unity’ applies, in my view, to all the works discussed in Part II. A border case is Paul Thek’s Christmas installation, Die Krippe [Fig. 6.42]. The described world that the visitor enters is so unknown to him that he will not immediately use words like ‘well organised’, ‘coherent’, or 26 Above, I already rejected Beardsley’s aesthetic definition of art (‘an artwork is something produced with the intention of giving it the capacity to satisfy the aesthetic interest’) (1.5.2). Unlike this study, Beardsley places the autonomy of the work of art over against both its maker and the viewer. He also, unlike Gadamer, has a formal view of the aesthetic experience (M.J. Wreen, Beardsley, 232-237); see also Zuidervaart, Artistic Truth, chapter 1 and pp. 204-205. 27 M. Beardsley, Aesthetics, 462-464. See also N. Wolterstorff, Art in Action, 164-168.

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‘complete’ for the installation. Thek shows art in a new, surprising way. To express the ‘incomprehensible unity of all things in the cosmos’, the installation cannot properly meet the aesthetic concept of unity. That fits with his view of art, where the emphasis lies more on the process of making art than on the result. The concept ‘complexity’ is more suitable here. The rich symbolism makes the work ‘complex’: it is internally rich.28 Complexity. A work is internally rich and varied. Examples are the stained glass window installation by Manessier in the church in Abbeville [Fig. 7.58-7.60] and Mulders’ Het Laatste Oordeel in St. John’s Cathedral in ’s Hertogenbosch [Fig. 7.64-7.66]. Manessier’s ‘Ode to Light’ is internally rich; the variation in the different windows is produced by the colours chosen and the abstract visual language, constantly geared to a specific part of Jesus’ story of suffering and resurrection and placed in a broader Trinitarian framework by the window of the Spirit and the whole installation as an ‘Ode to Light’. The whole coheres with the location in the church: the stained glass windows of Easter are on the eastern side of the church (in the direction of the l(L)ight), opposite those of the betrayal and crucifixion on the Western side. This is all done in interaction with the daylight (7.3). Mulders’ Het Laatste Oordeel is internally rich not only through the three layers – the earth as hell, purgatory, and heaven, which are intrinsically connected with each other through the iris and the ladder – but also through the inclusion of other Christian symbols from earlier periods employing different visual languages. Sutherland’s tapestry Christ in Glory [Fig. 7.63] also shows itself to be internally rich through its structure. Old Christian symbols are depicted round the Christ figure, done in Sutherland’s signature style; there is also a deliberate tension between the glorified Christ and the crucified Christ depicted at the bottom of the tapestry. And what can be said about Reinhardt’s imageless Black Painting No. 5 [Fig. 4.26] and Jawlensky’s Meditation: Versunken [Fig. 5.32]? From a superficial point of view, they look simple, but that is not the case if one is familiar with how they have been made and what effect these works have on the viewer when looked at carefully.29 28

For Thek’s work, the issue is whether we should look for other aesthetic concepts than Beardsley’s. Baker calls his work a matter of pure differentiation (see 6.2, note 10). 29 For Reinhardt, see chapter 4, note 77, and for Jawlensky, see Schmidt on Meditation: Versunken, see 5.4.1.

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Intensity. This quality has to do with the concentration of the experience. A work can be vital, powerful, tender, gracious, delicate, ironic, tragic, hieratic (holy), beautiful, sublime, terrifying-expressive, etc. These different predicates capture a large variety of expressive qualities. They concern here the question of appropriateness (decorum): which form is appropriate to the content of a work.30 The form of the work in relation to the content depicted indicates why a work is aesthetically commendable and a good work of art. It was in connection with this that I called Van Gogh’s The Sower [Fig. 4.22] and Starry Night [Fig. 4.23] ‘beautiful’, Sutherland’s Crucifixion [Fig. 6.50], Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand) [Fig. 6.51] ‘sublime’, and Bacon’s Crucifixion [Fig. 6.53] ‘terrifying-expressive’. Jawlensky’s religious faces that reduce the face to its archetypal form and Sutherland’s Christ in Glory have the aesthetic quality of intensity through their hieratic style: like Eastern icons, these works radiate sacrality. I will say something more here about the aesthetic aspect of the other works discussed in Part II. Rouault uses the technique of frames of stripes, thick black stripes recalling stained glass windows. The frame of thick black stripes combined with the chosen colours gives the Christ figure an aura similar to the Christ on Byzantine icons. This Holy Face, like No. 33 from the Miserere series, is a modern example of a hieratic style. Another good example of ‘intensity’ is Dumas’ Jesus Serene [Fig. 7.67]. In her constructed depiction of Jesus’ faces and those of other people she uses mask-like faces. That is one form that is appropriate for expressing the (future) fellowship of people. In African culture, wearing a mask serves to connect one to the other world beyond this one. The work is ‘surreal’, a qualification that also obtains for Olympios’ The Messenger [Fig. 6.54] and Frieling’s Paasmorgen (1995) [Fig. 7.56]. These works depict a reality beyond ours and are characterised by a style that expresses that, each in its own way: Olympios does that via the abstract-figurative figures and the use of grey, grey-green, black and white colours, and Frieling via the surrealistic forms of the landscape, the angel(s), and a colour that expresses a dreamworld. Olympios’ Veroniki or the Absent [Fig. 5.39] and Sandoval’s performances Baby Street [Fig. 6.44] and Dirt can be called ‘delicate’. They are 30

The term decorum, appropriateness, is derived from classical rhetoric. It is the general rule for the speaker: ‘the orator must at all times seek the appropriate (to prepon, quid decet) to time, place, audience’ (M. Kelly (ed.), Encyclopedia of Aesthetics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), s.v. Rhetoric, 4, 152).

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works one responds to with intense feeling. Olympios’ painting makes use of the same tradition as the Holy Face. Instead of the Christ figure on the canvas, we see a resistance fighter. The choice for this icon as a form for presenting victims of a war is delicate in a culture where there are strict rules for making and using icons. At the same time, it makes an ethical appeal to the viewer. Sandoval’s choice of the medium of performance for Baby Street and Dirt is suited to focusing attention on situations of injustice. In his realistic performances, he uses human material such as blood, hair, articles of clothing, in Baby Street a street child, and in Dirt a homeless person (6.3). Beckmann’s lithograph on the new heaven and the new earth is placed next to the passage from the Bible describing God wiping away all tears (Revelation 21:4). Beckmann translates this in such a way that his tears are wiped away by an angel who resembles Beckmann’s wife, Quappi. I call the figuration chosen here ‘tender’. In short, form and content belong together in a work of art. The form serves what it depicts. Unity, complexity, and intensity are concepts that indicate why a work has aesthetic quality and is therefore commendable.31

10.3 The Museum as a Place of Visual Piety Many religious works of art, including those discussed in Part II, have an aesthetic quality and some hang in museums. Before I go into the religious character of such works in a museum, I will first make a general remark about museums. An important question for the museum is what place it can have in contemporary society. Does it not appeal too onesidedly to a certain group in society, the highly educated? Because of that, art and museums run the risk of being elitist. Commissioned by the Mondriaan Fonds, Steven ten Thije devoted his essay Het geëmancipeerde museum (The emancipated museum) to this issue.32 He poses the question 31 The aesthetic concept ‘intensity’ with the rule of appropriateness can also be applied to the other arts, such as music. A musical composition is suited to the situation it expresses. Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition takes the hearer past very different paintings. In the music that is played the sounds of children’s chatter can be heard, first boys and then girls. A bit later we are in front of another painting: the music invokes the sound of the heavy wheels of an ox cart. Through a strongly emphasised pulse, we hear it approaching and then later disappearing into the distance again. Rhythm and melody belong to a particular situation, as also expressed in the funeral marches of Mozart, Beethoven, or Chopin. A funeral march is usually in a minor key and has a rhythm with a syncopation in it to express marching with the coffin. 32 S. ten Thije, Het geëmancipeerde museum.

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how the art museum can also draw ‘new’ Dutch citizens, i.e., recent immigrants. For him, society is primarily political society, and he ignores aspects like the attribution of meaning, religion, and worldview in general. Worldview plays a role of course in politics as well, but that is not made very explicit. The silence around questions on the attribution of meaning and religion in connection with the museum seems to be a missed opportunity because, however important the political reality may be, it is not the ultimate reality for most people. Ten Thije remains too attached to the concept of art as autonomous, a concept that contributed to the emergence of the museum in the Enlightenment. To prevent the museum from becoming elitist and attracting too much of a certain sector of the public, he would have been better off describing art as a social practice that also included attention to questions on the attribution of meaning and religion. Is religious art elitist? Not in my view. The traditional concept of art, which was undeniably elitist, has also lost credibility. As stated, in this study I view religious art as art that functions in a religious practice. Religious art derives its function from the viewers’ interaction with the work. The question of how a museum exhibits a religious work of art is connected with this issue. If a work of art is displayed only because of its aesthetic quality, there is a real danger that religious art becomes elitist. The interaction with the work of art then requires knowledge of the history of art and style. I argued in the previous chapter (9.6) that the practice of the religious image is, however, a matter of interaction and (religious) disclosure, a matter of religion and orientation in life, of being existentially affected. And every living and conscious human being needs disclosure. That is a different interaction with the art image than the formalistic-aesthetic view gives. This religious practice can also occur with an image or object as a medium that is not usually viewed as art, such as the (original) Veronica or the countless devotional or cultic images in churches that, from the perspective of aesthetics, do not have any artistic qualities. Visual piety concerns objects from popular culture as well as the examples of art given in Part II. The limited focus of this book on religious art is not at all intended to exclude the value of images of popular art.

The question is whether a museum setting can do justice to religious art as sacred. The museum has various functions. The question here is not that of the important function of the museum to preserve the religious heritage but whether such art can still have a religious function for viewers.

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Can the museum be a place where one can practise devotion through the images there available? Reservations about Organised Religion For various reasons, the museum can be rejected as a place where people can use the images in a devotional way. One reason is that, as a public space, the museum should be neutral – after all, the separation of church and state is mandated by law. The origin of the museum also plays a role in its custom of keeping its distance from organised religion. The museum is a secular institution, which emerged when the view of art for art’s sake was dominant. In 2010, Isabelle Benoit, research director of the ‘Museum of Europe’ (Brussels), concisely formulated the following statement at a conference on the museum and religion: ‘It is not the mission of museums to explore or communicate the experience of faith.’33 One can imagine how, given such a view, a museum will exhibit its collection of religious art: as a purely historical object from a certain religious tradition or, if it is a reliquary or painting, for example, as a work of art only for its aesthetic quality and with no reference to its religious character. Then the museum is strictly secular, and the visitor quickly sees religious art as a remnant of the past. More interesting are the exhibitions on art and religion in which the intention is to show the effect of art with Christian themes on contemporary secular art. One example of this was the exhibition The Problem of God (2015) in Düsseldorf (2.2). I visited Tate Modern (London) in August 2018, which was exhibiting German art from the First World War and after. A number of religious works could also be seen in a separate room. The text Faith accompanying the exhibits here was, in my view, quite one-sided with respect to religion and religious art in Germany after the First World War: in addition to Rudolf Steiner, the exhibition also mentions Rabindranath Tagore from India, who gave lectures on spirituality in Germany at the time. The scepticism of the art world regarding organised religion was also made clear, but nothing was said about the religious character of Expressionism in Germany at that time. There was next to no reference to religion in the organisation of the collection.

In short, the attitude of museums (aside from religious museums of course) towards organised religion is often reserved – proof of this can be found in the statement by Isabelle Benoit. 33

G.T. Buggeln, Museum Space and the Experience of the Sacred, 43.

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The Museum and the Church: More Openness There is a more open attitude in the United States towards religion in the museum. Gretchen Buggeln (Professor of Christianity and the Arts at Valparaiso University) considers Benoit’s remark to be characteristic of many of her European colleagues who view society as purely secular. As an American, she is more used to the continuing public presence of religion.34 Europe has also experienced a development from a secular to a postsecular society with more openness to religion in the public domain and thus also in the museum.35 Thek’s Die Krippe in the Lehmbruck Museum (Duisburg) (1973) is an early example of this (6.2). Conversely, the church is also showing more interest in art. Since 2013, the Vatican has had its own pavilion at the Venice Biennale.36 The Vatican was also – as stated in the Introduction – recently represented at the Venice Architecture Biennale (2018). Ten architects had designed chapels for that exhibition. One newspaper report called it ‘A wonderful (sensory) experience, this “chapel route”.’37 Paul Tillich had already earlier restored the connection between the Christian tradition and the museum. In 1964, a speech he wrote for the opening of a new addition to the Museum of Modern Art in New York was read by his friend Wilhelm Pauck at that opening because Tillich was already ill. He died a year later. Tillich’s speech spoke of the visual arts as showing something of ultimate reality that cannot be present in any other way: For the arts do both; they open up a dimension of reality which is otherwise hidden, and they open up our own being for receiving this reality. Only the arts can do this; science, philosophy, moral action and religious devotion cannot. The artist brings to our senses and through them to our whole being something of the depth of our world and of ourselves, something of the mystery of being.38

There is another movement from the church to art. Old historical churches that still function as churches open their doors for exhibitions, such as, for example, the exposition in St. Barbara’s Church in Culemborg in the Netherlands: Liefde in de Vrijstand: Een hooglied (curator Anikó Ouweneel). 34

Buggeln, Museum Space and the Experience of the Sacred, 43. Lieke Wijnia argues in connection with the research into the place of religion in the museum for ‘the postsecular’ as more fruitful paradigm than that of the ‘return of religion’ (Wijnia, Beyond the Return of Religion). 36 L. Wijnia, The Museum as Laboratory in the Contemporary Quest for God, Essay 2. 37 Trouw, 26 June, 2018, 13. 38 P. Tillich, Address, 247. 35

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In recent years, there have been a number of exhibitions in the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam (director Jacqueline Grandjean), the content of which is geared to this impressive church building, such as Marinus Boezem’s exhibition in 2016-2017, one by Sarah van Sonsbeeck and Christian Boltanski in 2017-2018, one by Giorgio Andreotto Calò in 2018 and The World After: Conversation Pieces in 2019. Exhibitions on Religious Art If a curator views the aesthetic dimension of a work of art in a functional way as a unity of form and content, then he or she still has an eye for the content of exhibited works in an exposition. The (original) use of such a work by the group in question or society can be respected. How can the museum deal with the religious art of, for example, native peoples or world religions? How can such works be exhibited? That presupposes the view that art is not limited to Western art and art from other cultures is recognised as art. R.L. Anderson makes a good proposal for this by viewing art as follows: ‘Art is culturally significant meaning, skilfully encoded in an affecting, sensuous medium.’39 One can think here of museums that show religious objects made by Indigenous Australians, Native Americans, the Innuit, or the peoples of Africa and Oceania. The museum is confronted with the question how such objects can be preserved with respect in the collection. Advice has been sought from indigenous Australians regarding aboriginal Australian art.40 If a native object or relic is exhibited, the question arises as to how the curator can arrange it so that justice is done to the devotional or cultic character of the object. If he or she is successful, an interaction appears to take place in the museum between the visitors and the object. Depending on the religion from which the objects come, it can be a prayer, kissing or touching the sacred object, or leaving an offering at the shrine.41 I will give an example of a Catholic woman, which I am borrowing from S. Berns. In the British Museum (London), relics were exhibited at the exposition Treasures of Heaven: Saints, Relics and Devotion in Medieval Europe (2011). A young Catholic visitor, Charlotte, had a plastic tube with her containing a red thread. This thread had, according to the label on it, 39 40 41

R.L. Anderson, Calliope’s Sisters, 238. S. Hamilton, Sacred Objects and Conservation, 138. S. Berns, Devotional Baggage, 86-87.

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touched one of St. Theresa’s bones. For Charlotte, the thread had become a relic. She touched it to the relics in the exhibition – relics possess the power to communicate their holy aura to other objects through touch.42 I saw something similar at the relic exhibition in the Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht (2018-2019). There were notices that said people were allowed to touch the relics, and I saw a woman doing that intensely. These are examples of how a religious practice can develop in a museum in interaction with the exhibited objects. The volume by G. Buggeln et al., Religion in Museums, presents a number of examples of how museums are more open today than before to the religious character of the religious works that are exhibited. I will give one example. The curator Gary Vikan has organised several exhibitions of icons in the United States. In his exhibition Holy Image, Holy Space (1988), he arranged the icons in such a way that full justice was done to their religious content. He made the room suitable for preserving the holy character of the art by having one wall in a deep blue colour, a dark environment, impressive lighting, medieval music, and placing the best icons in such a way that they fell completely within the visitors’ field of vision and could affect them emotionally.43 The review in the Times Review confirmed that the Christ icon at the exhibition was just as much a window into Christ as it was in 1400 in the church where it came from.44 Vikan does recognise that there is a tension between the numinous effect of the icon on the one hand and the explanatory texts with information about the icon on the other. Nevertheless, this exhibition was an example of how there was a religious interaction between the icons exhibited and the visitors to the exhibitions. Seeing Salvation In 2000, the National Gallery (London) organised the exhibition Seeing Salvation.45 They showed high points in Western Christian art from its beginning up until the twentieth century. Here as well, it was the intention to do full justice to the religious content of the works shown. The sociologist Roger Homan aptly wrote to the curator that this exhibition went contrary to the trend to strip art of its religious character and welcomes 42 43 44

Berns, Devotional Baggage, 84. G. Vikan, Bringing the Sacred into Art Museums, 207. For this and what follows, see Vikan, Bringing the Sacred into Art Museums, 207-

210. 45

G. Howes, The Art of the Sacred. The references in the text are to this work.

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this warmly. The focus here lies on the artists’ intentions of piety and on their religious themes instead of their technical virtuosity. Empirical research was done via a questionnaire into the responses of the public to this exhibition, which had a very high number of visitors each day for four and a half months. The responses were categorised. While the first two categories, ‘cognitive’ and ‘didactic’, speak for themselves, there was also a category called ‘iconographic’. This covered responses that concerned experiencing the power of the image in itself, such as ‘I am not a practising Christian, but I was moved to tears by many of the images’ (51). Finally, there was the category ‘credal’ as an expression of the Christian faith, with responses like ‘Art drew people to God once – perhaps it could do so again?’ (53). In summary, the visitors saw the works either as part of a religious heritage or as the possibility to have a religious experience. The Seeing Salvation exhibition is, according to Howes, a correction to the view that the museum desacralises. Even in this radically secularised society, people continue to be able to receive intimations of transcendence (58). In other words, the museum can also be a place where the religious character of art is taken seriously. The questionnaire shows the pluralistic character of the public. For some, it is sacred art; for others, it is a matter of becoming acquainted with a religious tradition. That goes together with the shift from organised religion to a looser form of spirituality.46 It also shows – if I limit myself to the Christian tradition – that religious art can be approached in very different ways. That is why we will discuss this question in the following chapter: What purpose does the religious image serve?

46 P. Post distinguishes in this context between the religious-sacred of organised religion and the spiritual-sacred of those who are more or less outside of organised religion (P. Post, Place of Action, 50-51).

11. WHAT PURPOSE DOES THE RELIGIOUS IMAGE SERVE?

11.1 Introduction When I discussed the religious works in Part II, the question of interaction with these works came up indirectly. From the point of view that religious art acquires its function in a religious practice, that is indeed the central issue. Art can be a place of encounter with God. The (re)presentational view of the artwork as symbol and the theories of the religious image already implicitly pointed to the functional aspect of religious art (chapters 8 and 9). That obtains also for the aforementioned view of the relation between aesthetic form and content and the discussion of art as religious art in the museum in chapter 10. Religious art is art in service to religious communities (with each community having its own rules for interacting with images) and of people who practise spirituality outside organised religion. Experts on the image differ with respect to insights about the religious interaction with the image. H. Belting and J.-L. Marion, for example, consider the holy portrait to be central but differ in their views of religious interaction with images. Belting describes the almost physical contact with the cult image as relic in medieval popular piety. This approach to the image still seems to be current, as Paul Moyaert and contemporary exhibitions show in their respective ways (9.2 and 10.3). Marion saw the relationship between the image and the believer as a person-to-person relationship. The works discussed in Part II showed implicitly that the interaction with the religious image has become more varied, if only because religious art is no longer limited to the holy portrait. Van Gogh’s Sower, Thek’s Die Krippe, Sandoval’s Baby Street and Dirt, Mulders’ Het Laatste Oordeel and Dumas’ Jesus Serene each invoke a different response from the viewer. These works of art acquire their meaning in various practices. I will discuss several different ways of engaging with religious art. That will be done via the works we discussed in Part II, supplemented with some others. I will not offer a description of the different religious visual cultures of Christian faith communities. This study is, after all, a theological reflection on what religious (art) images – whether or not they are associated with a faith community – can mean for people in a secular

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age. A certain practice will sometimes be directly connected with that of a certain faith community, and other times it will be more detached from it (11.3). First, we will explore a preliminary issue. In Part II, I interpreted works of art using language. But is it legitimate to use words in interpreting a work of art? The question of the relation between word and image was raised in the discussion of Dumas’ Jesus Serene (7.6). Christianity is a religion of the book, and therefore the Word is indispensable. In addition to the Word, Catholics have always made room for the (material) image in the form of sculptures, frescoes, icons, and paintings. I will explore the relation between word and image more deeply. An image shows something, and that showing is different than saying things with words. We will see that the relation between word and image can be evaluated very differently (11.2). The various practices of interaction with images are very different, as stated above, and that raises the question of what they have in common. Finally, I will look at the question whether play is the proper mode of being for the various visual religious practices (11.4).

11.2 Word and Image In the Christian tradition, the image is closely connected with the word. In the Middle Ages, biblical texts in breviaries were accompanied by beautiful illustrations. Eastern Orthodox icons of Christ must always include the name of Christ written on them. A Catholic believer can say a prayer in front of an image of Christ or Mary. In the Lutheran tradition, word and image are closely associated. Here the biblical word is central, as the altarpiece Christ on the Cross (Weimar Altarpiece) (1555) by Lucas Cranach the Younger [Fig. 11.77; see also Fig 1.4] shows. In the current secular visual culture as well, word and image are closely associated, as is apparent from TV, film, videos, comic books, and internet.1 Works of art in museums are often accompanied by texts that give the title and an explanation of the work in question. This raises the important question of the precise relation between word and image. Roland Barthes cites various possibilities.2 Sometimes, the image is only an illustration of the word. Sometimes, the word – such as a text placed 1 2

J.A. Bateman, Text and Image (2014). R. Barthes, Rhetoric of the Image, 23-51.

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next to an image – guides the viewer into looking at the image in a certain way. That can be a title on the nameplate of the work next to it, or it can be a text that the artist has written about his or her work, such as those by Van Gogh and Dumas that I used in previous chapters. Sometimes, word and image together produce the meaning for the viewer/reader, as in comic books and in film, where the visual act and the dialogue together produce the meaning. Can an image like a painting be reduced to a text or, more broadly stated, to language? The answer to this question determines (in addition to the theological view of the image) how people think about the value of the image in faith practice. If they think that the image can be reduced to a text and that reality is linguistic, then the image has much less value for faith than if they hold that the image offers something extra, something that cannot be expressed in language. No Essential Difference between Word and Image In his Iconology (1986) and Picture Theory (1995), W.J.T. Mitchell, an expert on images, does an extensive analysis of images in relation to texts. He assumes that reality is linguistic and introduces numerous examples to show that the relation between word and image can be viewed as a continuum. Mitchell argues that the modern pictorial image is linguistic in its effect.3 The image has value only because its difference from the word is a matter of degree. The image does not include anything that cannot be expressed in language. This view, i.e., that the difference between word and image is only one of degree, goes back to the classical theory of ut pictura poesis (as is painting, so is poetry). Mitchell holds that this sisterhood of the arts is still current and that there is an interplay between ‘pictorial and linguistic signs’.4 Mitchell shows this using modern art. Since Cézanne, modern art has become theoretical.5 According to Mitchell, modern artists often view their theory as the pre-text of their work. One can think here of manifestos and theoretical texts that are often presented to explain their work. That is also, according to Mitchell, the case with Abstract Expressionism, which rejected precisely the ut pictura poesis position and strove for pure art, independent of influences from its sister art, literature. The desire was to erect a wall 3 4 5

W.J.T. Mitchell, Iconology, 43. Mitchell, Iconology, 43. The references in the text are to W.J.T. Mitchell, Picture Theory.

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between the visual arts and literature (216). Mitchell holds, however, that abstract expressionist painters are nonetheless dependent on language and that what they rejected was just a certain type of verbal contamination of painting. Abstract art is, namely, dependent on the collaboration with another type of verbal exposition than poetry – that of theory: if we summarize the traditional collaboration of painting and literature under the classic Horatian maxim ut pictura poesis, as in painting, so in poetry, then the maxim for abstract art is not hard to predict: ut pictura theoria. (220)

The difference of degree between word and image and the linguistic character of reality is also apparent, according to Mitchell, from the ekphrasis of poets. An ekphrasis is an artistic description in language of an object, usually an art object, as if one is seeing it with one’s own eyes. Homer gives an example of this that has become classic in his extensive description of the scenes on Achilles’ shield in the Iliad.6 In the course of history, there has been much discussion of the question whether the difference between painting and poetry is one of substance or only one of degree. We usually attribute specific properties to a painting, like spatiality, a well-chosen form, materiality, a specific paint, or other materials such as those Anselm Kiefer used in his works. With language one does something else, such as telling stories or arguing. In his Laocoön (1766), Lessing emphasises the difference between painting and poetry: painting has spatial extension and poetry temporal extension.7 Unlike Lessing, Mitchell argues that the properties of word and image are interchangeable: ‘paintings can tell stories, make arguments, and signify abstract ideas; words can describe or embody static, spatial states of affairs’ (160). He claims that, from a semantic point of view – by which he understands referring to, the expression of intentions, and producing effects in the viewer or hearer – there is no essential difference between texts and images. ‘Language can stand in for depiction and depiction can stand in for language …’ (160). In my view, Mitchell undervalues images in his Iconology and Picture Theory.8 The linguistic ekphrasis of the poet can be very true to life, but 6 Homer, The Iliad, XVIII, 478-617. The Greek church fathers also made use of ekphrasis in their sermons as a rhetorical method. They attempted, for example, to present the story of a martyr in such a vivid way as if people were looking at it on a painting or seeing it with their own eyes. (G. Lange, Bild und Wort, 13-36). 7 For Lessing, see Mitchell, Iconology, chapter 4. 8 For the priority of language, see also F. de Saussure, The Linguistic Sign, 24-46. In his What Do Pictures Want? (2005), Mitchell corrects his earlier view as discussed above

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at the same time it misses the presence that the material image evokes in the viewer. It is very telling that Mitchell calls abstract painting a ‘pictural text’ (italics mine). With that, he denies not only the material aspect of a painting in distinction from a graphic reproduction of it in a book but also the notion that a material image like a painting can express something through composition or colour for which there are no words. There appears to be an essential difference between showing and saying, as we will see. Perhaps unnecessarily, allow me to point out that my resistance to linguistic imperialism is not an argument for the imperialism of the image. The recognition of the difference between word and image does not deny a commonality between the two. The Uniqueness of the Image in Distinction from the Word I pointed to the difference between a spot or stain and a painting. A painting is a more or less organised image; it is characterised by iconic difference: the iconic rests on a distinction brought about by perception between seeing the canvas and seeing what is depicted on it (8.2). Images like art images show something, and that act of showing is different from saying. Antony Gormley, famous for his sculptures, remarks that there are things that cannot be verbalised. They can be conveyed in a material way, but there is no striking linguistic equivalent for those things. In his art, Gormley says, ‘I want to start where language ends.’9 I will give two examples. The one shows how the image adds something to language; the other demonstrates that, through form and colour, an image can convey something that cannot be expressed in words. In one of his frescoes in the Arena Chapel in Padua, Giotto gives a narrative presentation of Jesus’ arrest in Gethsemane [Fig. 11.78]. We know this story from the gospels (Matthew 26:47-56; Mark 14:43-52; Luke 22:4752; John 18:3-12). Giotto’s fresco shows something that is difficult to express in words. Look at the position of Jesus’ face while Judas embraces him as the one to be arrested and gives him the kiss of betrayal. Jesus is powerless at the moment of his arrest, but at the same time he shows himself to be superior. His face is presented here as inclined, following and argues that what images want cannot be reduced to language: ‘Pictures want equal rights with language, not to be turned into language.’ They want to be seen as ‘complex individuals occupying multiple subject positions and identities’ (What Do Pictures Want? 47). 9 A. Gormley in: J. Hutchinson, Antony Gormley, 12. See also the similar remark by D. Kuspit in connection with Reinhardt’s Black Paintings (4.4).

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a diagonal line extending from the club of the arresting officer on the left and the pointing finger of the Pharisee on the right. Both literally and figuratively, Jesus is superior to Judas, but at the same time he allows himself to be led away as a prisoner. The art historian Max Imdahl comments on this fresco that there is no word for being submissive and superior at the same time.10 It can be approximated perhaps by the contradictory term ‘defenceless superior power’. But the fresco shows this paradox convincingly in its iconic way. The second example has to do with images that show something through form and colour. For that I point to the stained glass windows by Manessier [Fig. 7.58-7.60] in the choir of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Abbeville, which we discussed in chapter 7. They show the victory of life over death on Easter morning in colour. The title (the word) of the stained glass window does not explain the victory but hints at it and orients the experience of seeing. The colours are chosen in such a way that they fit the event: warm colours as in the window of the Spirit, The Announcement of Pentecost. In contrast, cool colours are used, for example, for Gethsemane, suitable to Jesus’ words, ‘My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death’ (Mark 14:34), and the window for Holy Saturday. The windows do not provide a visual narration, as Giotto’s fresco does. They are, after all, abstract images. They show the event through colour in connection with light and space, the church building. Colour and light make this stained glass window installation deeply religious. Showing Jesus’ journey from Maundy Thursday to Easter morning is different than narrating the Easter event. Together with the window of the Spirit and the whole installation as an ‘Ode to Light’ (God), this work depicts the triune God. For the viewer, a wordless communication with the God of life and light is made possible through interaction with the stained glass windows. These two examples show that there is room for meaning outside language that can be shown via the image. The meaning-generating act is completed in seeing, in the qualitative observation of what shows itself in the image.11 10 M. Imdahl, Ikonik, Bilder und ihre Anschauung, 310-312; Gronert also points to the ‘extra’ of the image: S. Gronert, Alexej Jawlensky: Große Meditation, 85. 11 K. Rahner also points to the uniqueness of the religious image over against the word. He argues for this on the basis of (religious) epistemology. Seeing is something different from hearing. The history of salvation is not only something verbal; it is also visual; it must also be seen. For that reason, he considers the religious image essential for Christianity. See K. Rahner, Zur Theologie des religiösen Bedeutung des Bildes, 348-363.

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The Word has precedence in the Bible: the Word as the salvific proclamation that Jesus is the Christ. That does not exclude the visual, however. Seeing is also important. Jesus says, ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God’ (Matthew 5:8). Early Christianity had its origin in the visionary seeing of the risen Jesus. Paul says repeatedly that he saw the Lord (1 Corinthians 9:1; 1 Corinthians 15:3-8).12 He also points to the future vision of God: ‘For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face’ (1 Corinthians 13:12). In my view, the image makes its own contribution to interhuman communication and communication between humans and God. What cannot be said can sometimes be shown. There is room for meaning outside language. The religious material image, the art image, is an important medium of communication, both for religious communities as well as for those who practise spirituality outside the bounds of organised religion. 11.3 Visual Practices One’s interaction with an image occurs in the context of a visual practice. A visual practice has, according to David Morgan, various components such as a viewer, fellow viewers, the object of their viewing, the context or setting of the object, and the rules for the special relation between viewers and the object.13 The Eastern Orthodox and the Roman Catholic faith communities especially have organised visual practice. I will limit myself, given the non-denominational nature of this study, to the core of the various visual practices that can be practised both in a faith community and outside it as well. I will add a function to the traditional functions of religious art: that of the dialogue between the various religions.14 The following functions of the religious material image are important in the Christian tradition of the past and present: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Dialogue Communication with God or Christ Memory and education Protest art and diaconal art Thanksgiving and praise. 12

See G. Theißen, Erleben und Verhalten der ersten Christen, 124-163. D. Morgan, The Sacred Grace, 2-6. 14 Classic among these is the ring parable by the German writer and theologian Lessing in his play Nathan the Wise (1779). This function of modern art can also be found in K. Lüthi, see H. Schwebel, Die Kunst und das Christentum, 136-138. 13

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11.3.1 Dialogue A dialogue between different views of what people and the world fundamentally are is very much needed in a world in which adherents of different religions or of a secular worldview inhabit the same region. Such a dialogue can be carried out with secular art or with art from other religions or with art that is inspired by different spiritual sources. With respect to secular art, Francis Bacon’s Crucifixion (1965) is a good example of what a world without God could look like (6.4.2). With respect to art from religions other than Christianity, allow me to point to the ‘Five Faiths’ project of the Ackland Museum of the University of North Carolina.15 The exhibition was a contribution to intercultural and interreligious dialogue. A dialogue with the art of (new) spiritual traditions, such as the art of Wolfgang Laib, Marina Abramovic, Bill Viola, Anish Kapoor, Andy Goldsworthy, Antony Gormley, and James Turrell, resulted in surprising insights.16 I will limit myself to two young Dutch artists, Derk Thijs and Chris Brans, who built an environment for an art project that was part of a larger art project, Where Time Has Lost its Relevance in Amsterdam in 2011-2012.17 An Environment by Derk Thijs and Chris Brans Entering the installation, you step through a door into a very dark exhibition room. Above the door are the enigmatic words DAH OSLA DOTHEM.18 You are disoriented for a moment, but as you become used to the light from a few lamps burning here and there, you gradually notice several poles reaching to the ceiling [Fig. 11.79; 11.80]. I thought immediately of the early medieval mosque of Córdoba, the Mesquita, where the space is interspersed by numerous pillars. You slowly notice certain objects and images here and there: a candlestick with an egg, an ‘eleven-sided circle’, a form resembling a foetus projected on the wall. Rocks and animals can be seen on the walls, such as elephants, lobsters, and horses. A cross has been painted on the wall, and juvenile erotic 15

Buggeln, Museum Space and the Experience of the Sacred, 47-48. I refer to M.C. Taylor, Refiguring the Spiritual; D.A. Siedell, God in the Gallery; T. McEvilley, Sculpture in the Age of Doubt; A. Rosen, Art & Religion in the 21st Century. See also W. Stoker, Presence in Contemporary Religious Art: Graham Sutherland and Antony Gormley, 77-89. 17 Where Time Has Lost its Relevance was the third project in the presentation format on art as a mental space by P/////AKT (Amsterdam 2011-2012). 18 The words are a gimmick, as Derk Thijs explained to me in conversation: ‘It sounds magical but also a bit like a child making up a spell.’ 16

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drawings are lying on the floor or on a table. There is also a drawing with the text written on it: ‘if one of the chakras is not in balance, then go meditate.’ My first impression was that of literally stepping into another world, a space in which time stands still and one that completely absorbs you. The question that occurred to me was: Is this a sacred space? If it is a sacred space, what do lobsters, horses, and elephants on the wall have to do with religion? And the drawings? If it is not a sacred space, what kind of space is it then? The exhibition area itself is an integral part of the installation. This work by Thijs and Brans is an environment, like Paul Thek’s Die Krippe. The visitor enters an environment and becomes a fellow performer in the event. What struck me in this environment was the following. 1. The aesthetic form has been minimised to such an extent that it is difficult to tell the difference between art objects and ordinary objects. The lamps and the couches belong to the work of art but they do not differ from ordinary lamps or couches. 2. The minimisation of the aesthetic form corresponds to the change in the role of the visitor. The visitor is no longer a detached observer but becomes a co-performer by sitting on one of the couches. Art is an event here. Its meaning depends on the audience, and that happens here in a special sense because the attention shifts from the objective element of the work of art, the forms of the individual objects, to the space that was created. How can the player participate in this work of art as an event? For that, one has to pay attention first of all to the atmosphere of the space. This comes about because the space is divided into smaller parts by the many poles (60 in total) and is dimly lit. The space, I slowly decided, is a sacred space not only because it resembles the mosque in Córdoba but also because of some of the objects that are on display. The objects come from different traditions: a cross has been painted on the wall, there is a Hindu text: ‘if one of the chakras is not in balance, then go meditate’, a candlestick with seven branches, and an egg. The candlestick has five ‘branches’ in a row, and two others below with hands on them, evoking an association with the symbol of light, the Menorah of Judaism with seven arms in a row. But what is the point of the shape of a foetus projected on the wall, the elephants, lobsters, rocks, and horses painted on the wall, and the erotic drawings in this sacred space? They are things from nature and daily life and are not considered sacred in themselves. In his plan for the exhibition,

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Thijs writes, ‘it had to become … an entire world in itself, that is an (abstract) way of mirroring the richness of the real world’ … ‘a building that is a cosmos in itself, an ungraspable laboratory or an unknown shrine for the world.’ The Sacred and the Profane If I look for a meaning to this mysterious space that is simultaneously secular and sacred, I see a world that is very different from our modern Western world. That world consists of two areas: the sacred and the profane. The world shown in this environment is one: the everyday is religious and the religious is the everyday. That perspective can be found in tribal cultures, in Islam, and also in India. The West distinguishes sharply between the secular and the religious, between church and state. Some have the (in my view) quite implausible – in an anthropological sense – position that religion and worldview should be a purely private matter and not be expressed in the public space. In this environment, the wall of division was broken down, and thus the secular, such as the adolescent erotic drawings, the lobsters, horses, elephants, and rocks can be part of this sacred-secular space. Viewers become participants in an event in this sacred-secular space. They are addressed with respect to their religion or worldview. They start a dialogue with the religious symbols they see. The egg is a symbol of life in the making and a symbol of perfect knowledge. It is a metaphor for the cosmos and appears in all kinds of religious and esoteric movements. And what are we to think of the eleven-sided circle? Along with the triangle and the square, the circle is one of the geometric forms that is often used in art in various traditions. Kandinsky was fascinated by the circle because it is a unity of opposites, the concentric and the excentric. Actually, one cannot speak of an eleven-sided circle: the artists derived this form from the circle. In this exhibition, the ‘eleven-sided circle’ also points to unity, as Thijs explained to me, to the ‘possibility of a “round” worldview, a gesture that embraces everything (summa).’ The egg as a proto-symbol and the eleven-sided circle can give the participant in the environment the impression of undergoing a kind of universal religious experience. That is, the space is not directly connected with a specific religion. The cross does point to Christianity, but the space – as stated earlier – reminds one more of the mosque in Córdoba and the text cited comes from Hinduism. Thus, it resembles a sacred-secular space for all religious people, a pantheon.

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This environment produces a dialogue among the participants about differences and similarities between the religions. Is it a universal religion that can serve as an alternative for the existing religions? That would then be a revival of natural religion as propagated at the time of the Enlightenment in response to the religious wars. The only difference is that natural religion was a common basis then, without the religious symbols that were specific to a certain religion, such as the cross, the Hindu text, and the candlestick here. The environment transcends the sharp line between the sacred and the profane. The aesthetic experience converges with the religious experience in this sacred-secular space. Reality is religious as such. Paul Tillich already argued that (9.4), and Lynda Sexson argues something similar in her Ordinarily Sacred (1992). The holy seems at the same time to be the secular. The environment evokes a situation of ‘art’ before the Renaissance and of other cultures in which there is no sharp dividing line between the sacred and the profane. By making a sacred-secular space, Thijs and Brans make the participants imagine a postsecular society in which the sacred is no longer a separate area but can illuminate our everyday world. 11.3.2 Communication with God or Christ Presence is an important given in the interaction with images. Some treat images as they would relics; for others, the icon functions as a ‘crossing of the gazes’. In both cases, the interaction with the image involves intense communication. With the first, despite the distance, the accent lies on the physical proximity of Christ via the material religious object. Communication is found in the atmosphere of the body, of touch, of contact with the material image. With the title Technological Reliquaries [Fig. 6.48], Paul Thek refers to the relic in a literal sense, a remnant of a deceased saint that emits power. He connected the relic with hope for the resurrection from the dead (6.4.2).19 If the relationship with the depicted is viewed as a person-to-person relationship, the communication then takes place from person to person as in a prayer or in a meditation. Thomas Merton did that in his contemplative interaction with Reinhardt’s abstract painting. Jawlensky painted his Meditations [Fig. 5.32] in a meditative way. They can function in similar ways for both the viewer and 19 For interaction with relics, see the catalogue of the relics exhibition at the Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht 2018-2019: I. Schriemer, Relieken.

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the artist. Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464) and Jean-Luc Marion view the communication via the image as a crossing of the gazes. Nicholas explained the interaction with images as a crossing of the gazes in an exemplary way as such.20 I will present his instructions for the practice of faith from his The Vision of God (De Visione Dei, 1453). They are exemplary for communication with God or Christ via the image. Nicholas of Cusa on the Vision of God Nicholas of Cusa had sent his The Vision of God, a work on the mystical vision of God, to the monks in Tegernsee along with a religious painting, a holy portrait. In his Preface, he refers to various paintings, including Rogier van der Weyden’s Veronica (1440-1445). While it is not clear which painting exactly he has in mind here, in any case, the painting functions like an icon in the sense of being a holy portrait. He calls it an ‘icon of God’ (Preface, § 2). Nicholas shows that the interaction with the image differs from the view of the image as relic. What is special about the painting – the ‘icon of God’ that he sent to the monks – is that the eyes continue to look at them, regardless of the angle from which they look at it. This ‘unmoving face’ moves both from east to west and from south to north (Preface §§ 3-5; I.17).21 Nicholas wanted the monks to use this icon and text, The Vision of God, in their spiritual practices to come closer to God in ‘a foretaste of that meal of eternal happiness’ (Preface § 1). He points to the difference between a limited seeing of God and God’s penetrating gaze: But since Your sight is an eye, i.e., a living mirror, it sees within itself all things. Indeed, because it is the Cause of all visible things, it embraces and sees all things in the Cause and Rational Principle of all things, viz., in itself. Your eye, O Lord, proceeds to all things without turning. The reason our eye turns toward an object is that our sight sees from an angle of a certain magnitude. But the angle of Your eye, O God, is not of a certain magnitude but is infinite. Moreover, the angle of Your eye is a circle – or better, an infinite sphere …. Therefore, Your sight sees – roundabout and above and below – all things at once. (VIII.32) 20 Nicholas of Cusa, The Vision of God. The references in the text are to this work. For the agreement between Cusanus and Marion, see also J.-L. Marion, Seeing, or Seeing Oneself Seen: Nicholas of Cusa’s Contribution in De Visione Dei, 305-331. 21 This rests on a certain painting technique. I had an experience like this when looking attentively at the Eleousa Virgin of Kykkos (ca. beginning of the fourteenth century) in the museum of the monastery of Saint John Lampadistis in Kalopanagiotis on Cyprus, May 2018.

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Here Nicholas points to the literal meaning of the Greek word for God, theos (derived from the Greek verb for ‘to see’), ‘by virtue of the fact that He observes all things’ (I.4).22 For Marion, the essence of the icon is that our intentionality, which leads to the objectification of the other, is breached by the gaze of God’s love that does not objectify us.23 Nicholas connects this with God’s creative power: Feed me by Your gaze, O Lord. And teach me how it is that Your gaze sees all sight that sees, every object that can be seen, and every act of seeing, as well as all power to see, all power to be seen, and every actual seeing that arises from both. Since Your seeing is causing, You who cause all things see all things. (VIII.30)

That is why God’s seeing is his providence (VIII.30) and an expression of his love. O Lord, Your seeing is loving; and just as Your gaze regards me so attentively that it never turns away from me, so neither does Your love …. And since Your seeing is Your being, I exist because You look upon me. (IV.11)

It is a crossing of the gazes: ‘In seeing me, You who are deus absconditus give Yourself to be seen by me’ (V.15) (Isaiah 45:15). Nicholas does point out that now it is, as Paul writes, still a matter of gazing into an imperfect mirror (1 Corinthians 13:12). Referring to the icon, he says, ‘I presently contemplate eternal life in a mirror, an icon, a symbolism …’ (V.13), namely, in this portrait, eternal life in a riddle. The exercise in coming closer to God occurs through looking attentively at the icon, at the image of God. The icon of Christ (or God) is seen with the physical eye, but the truth is seen with the inner eye, the truth that is depicted in the painting (X.40). The icon is nothing more than a means for what Marion calls the crossing of the gazes. Looking at the icon, Nicholas says that the icon is ‘this contracted shadow-like image’ (VI.19) that I look at with my physical eyes, but it involves looking ‘with mental and intellectual eyes’ (VI.19). However much this is a person-to-person contact, it would be wrong to say that this visual piety is egocentric. This search to be closer to God applies to every human being. God’s care and God’s seeing obtains for 22 This is a pseudo-etymological explanation by Nicholas, according to the classicist Dr. Bouke van der Meer. Modern linguists (including Prof. R.S.P. Beekes, a prominent expert in European languages) associates theos not with thea (sight), theein (to run, and theein (to glow) but with the stem dik- (gods; in Armenian and other languages) (email B. van der Meer to me, September 2018). 23 Marion, Seeing, or Seeing Oneself Seen, 314, 330.

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every human being. Because of this exercise in viewing God’s face, one also no longer sees the other as an object but as a reflection of God’s face: O Lord, I apprehend that Your Face precedes every formable face and is the Exemplar and Truth of all faces – and that all faces are images of Your Face (VI.19)

11.3.3 Memory and Education This function of the image as an aid to memory and education has existed in the West since Pope Gregory the Great (ca. 540-604). For Catholics, this function of remembering and teaching exists alongside communication with God or Christ via the material image. Some downplay this function. Marion limits the religious image to the icon with respect to the crossing of the gazes, and Paul Moyaert even rejects the teaching function of images (9.2). But he is wrong here. Remembering is more than refreshing one’s memory. That is why God becoming present in the image should not be placed over against the function of memory and education, nor, by the way, over against prophetic critique and service or thanksgiving and praise. These various functions each give their own expression to the relation between the viewer and the sacred. In the direct communication with God via the material image, the sacred is presented in a spatial way: there is iconic presence, God becoming present in the image. For the image with the memory function, the sacred is presented in a temporal way. The image here is always a narrative presentation. The Christian religion is, after all, historical in nature and refers back to the story of Jesus of Nazareth. This concerns a remembering in which the time of the original event is made contemporaneous. Remembering and commemoration attempt to bridge the gap between past and present and thus produce a convergence between what is happening now and what happened once long ago: Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. This converging of times should not be viewed in a literal sense; it is an event from the past, after all. It is both an imaginatively entering into the story and a becoming part of the story that begins with Abraham and reaches its fulfilment and future expectation in Jesus Christ. That can be clarified in the following way. The pattern of time of an a-historical myth and that of salvation history are difficult to reconcile. The former is cyclical, the latter linear.24 Nevertheless, the historical event of the exodus from Egypt (Exodus 13:17-14:31) 24

M. Eliade, Le mythe de l’éternel retour.

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and that of Jesus’ cross and resurrection have a mythical aspect. The event that begins with the liberation from Egypt has a foundational character in the Jewish religion that is comparable with the arché of the a-historical myth. In remembering in the sense of commemorating, the past is invoked in the Jewish liturgy of the Passover in a way that makes it contemporaneous, in the hope that God will also liberate the present and future generations. The same mythicisation of history also occurs in the Christian community. For that community, the story of Jesus functions as an arché, the beginning of salvation. This event is invoked in a contemporising way in the celebrations of the Christian community.25 The function of remembering and teaching goes back to the Old Testament. It is said about the great commandment of loving God and about the commandments: ‘These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children’ (Deuteronomy 6:6-7). The Hebrew word for remember (zkr) refers not only to a ‘remembering’ of the earlier salvific event. It is only through a contemporising remembering that the later believer can participate in what once happened but continues to have an effect in the present and future. Israel is told explicitly: ‘This is how you are to eat [the Passover lamb]: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover’ (Exodus 13:11).26

The power of the image is that, through the narrative telling, it makes the Gospel visible so that it can be remembered in a contemporising way. An impressive example was Paul Thek’s Christmas installation Die Krippe in Duisburg [Fig. 6.42]. The visitor becomes a participant in Christmas as a feast for the whole cosmos. Kierkegaard demonstrates this function of remembering, remembering in a contemporising way, by means of a painting of Christ’s suffering. In his Christian Discourses, he describes a scene in which someone sits one day by an altar, looking at a painting of Christ’s suffering. Then suddenly everything changes. Suddenly, the painting seems to turn around when that person says to herself: Christ has drained the cup of suffering. He is victorious forever.27 Kierkegaard points here to the difference 25 W. Stoker, Myth and the Good Life, 131-152. The function of memory also overlaps with memorial art in general when it has to do with honour being paid to those who have fallen in war (Wolterstorff, Art Rethought, 140-141). There is also affinity here with Kiefer’s art on the German past. 26 G. von Rad, Theologie des Alten Testaments II, 108-120, translation mine; E. Jenni & C. Westermann, Theologisches Handwörterbuch I, zkr, gedenken, 518. This active contemporising accent on remembering also applies to the Lord’s Supper (1 Corinthians 11:24). 27 S. Kierkegaard, Christian Discourses, 103.

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between truly looking and seeing. Whoever dwells with the painting near the altar suddenly experiences the disclosure that Christ gave his life for him or her. The truth depicted by the painting near the altar of an angel who encourages Christ to face the cup of suffering (Luke 22:43) affects the individual at the altar personally. Christ gave his life for her as well. The painting invokes the memory of the crucifixion so that meditation (Andacht) can begin. The canvasses by Mulders on the suffering of Christ can have a similar function. The visual depiction of Jesus’ physical suffering confronts the viewer with the question of what this suffering means for him or her. At the three major feasts of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, the chief moments of Jesus’ life are recalled. The image here could, for example, also function in Protestant churches like icons in Eastern Orthodoxy do on their feast days.28 In addition to Thek’s Die Krippe, Frieling’s Paasmorgen and Manessier’s ‘Ode to Light’ are also examples for the Western tradition. Mulders’ stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel also has the function of remembering [Fig. 7.64]. Or is this window didactic? It could be viewed as a catechism lesson on the choice between good and evil against the background of the last judgment. Narrative depictions can have a didactic function in general and are used in catechism classes. Mulders’ use of images in his stained glass window is very complex, a complexity that is increased because the window gives a new form to the traditional symbolism of the past. The visual depictions in the stained glass windows in the Middle Ages were already too complex to serve as a Bible for the poor. The stained glass windows in churches were often intended at the time for the clergy to meditate on what the windows depicted.29 Mulders’ stained glass window can function in a similar way for the contemporary viewer, as an invitation to reflect on one’s life and the choices one makes regarding good and evil. 11.3.4 Prophetic Protest Olympios’ Veroniki or the Absent depicts the Veronica with the face of a Cypriot freedom fighter [Fig. 5.39]. The painting confronts the viewer on Cyprus and elsewhere with injustice and violence.30 Sandoval’s 28

L. Ouspensky & V. Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, 145. M.H. Caviness, Biblical Stories in Windows: Were they Bibles for the Poor?, 103-147. 30 Olympios himself also connects The Messenger (6.4.4) with the Turkish-Cypriot War in 1974, which led to the current situation of a divided Cyprus (in the north the Turkish 29

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Baby Street and Dirt also recall the visual language of the Veronica in performances in which he shows the suffering of a street child and a homeless person through ritual acts [Fig. 6.44]. Both works are examples of art as protest against social injustice. These works would fit well in public spaces or in the spaces of an aid organisation or diaconal work. Images do not speak and argue, but they show something. By showing something, the works of both artists make a moral appeal to the viewer. More than words, images like this affect us deeply. Horace expressed this as follows: The things which enter by the ear affect the mind more languidly, than such as are submitted to the faithful eyes, and what a spectator presents to himself.31

What we see with our own eyes arouses more emotion than words do. In addition to the form that the artist chooses for his message – here the moral appeal – the chosen medium is also important: ‘the medium is the message’ (Marshall McLuhan). The medium that is chosen to communicate a message puts its stamp on that message. By way of comparison, I will look at yet another medium: the photograph. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Boris Mikhailov put together a photo series, Case History (1997-1998), of naked or injured homeless people in Kharkiv, Ukraine. Some photographs are inspired by Christian iconography. The postures of the people in the photographs recall traditional depictions of the descent from the cross [Fig. 11.81] and the pietà [Fig. 11.82]. Mikhailov rejects the Russian Orthodox Church because it puts too much emphasis on miracles. He does not see himself as religious, although he does view religion as important. He says: ‘Nevertheless I think that happenstance which can arise as well in the human life as while taking a photo is in a certain sense spiritual.’32 His photo series shocked me especially because of the dehumanising situation these homeless people find themselves in. They show ‘their broken bodies as Christ shows his wounds’.33

Cypriots and in the south the Greek Cypriots). The gesture of mourning is one performed by Cypriot women, he says. Through the messenger, the painting points to a hopeful future (conversation 4 November, 2018). 31 Horace, Ars poetica. 32 Boris Mikhailov in an interview with Nóra Lukács in I. Malz (ed.). The Problem of God, 358 (357-359). 33 Thus Lukács in Malz, The Problem of God, 357.

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There is a difference between Mikhailov’s photo series on the one hand and Olympios’ painting and the videos of Sandoval’s performances on the other. Mikhailov’s photographs reduce a complex problem to its core and in such a way that the viewer immediately sees what the issue is. Mikhailov’s Case History highlights social injustices and makes a moral appeal to the viewer to fight against them. Whether or not one is familiar with Christian iconography is of no concern here. The image is concrete: the focus of the viewer is this naked, suffering woman. She turns her face away in shame (?) to escape the gaze of the viewer. The photograph calls the viewer to serve his or her neighbour and to a struggle against social injustice. Olympios’ Veroniki or the Absent and Sandoval’s Baby Street and Dirt do something similar. Both works are products of the imagination of the artist. They are a translation of everyday reality. Mikhailov’s photograph of the injured woman is, according to the classic theory of photography, a quotation from reality, an ‘extract’ from reality (9.2). The photograph is directly realistic, the reality of a moment in the past is captured in a static image and shows the woman as present to the viewer. The medium of the canvas and the video performance produce a transformation of reality. Because of its realistic character, this photograph makes a direct appeal to the emotion of the viewer. The painting and the video performance take more distance from immediate reality and show an alternative world that subjects the existing world to criticism. Olympios chooses the medium of the painting. That fits with the traditional medium (the painting) of the Veronica. Sandoval’s medium, the performance, creates a fictive reality as a critique of social injustice in his country. The artist uses his own body in the performance. By washing the feet, hands, and face of the street child, he approaches Mikhailov’s photographic realism; the performance is like a quotation from reality. In short, the medium and selected visual language are of major importance in protest art because of the effect they are intended to achieve: to influence one’s view of a certain situation of injustice and through that to call one to moral action. Olympios, Sandoval, and Mikhailov do that in the choice of their medium, each in a different way.34

34 De Gruchy shows how important this social approach is for theological aesthetics: ‘Theological aesthetics does not encourage flight from the world but assumes Christian participation in God’s mission to transform the world’ (J.W. de Gruchy, Christianity, Art and Transformation, 129).

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11.3.5 Thanksgiving and Praise Here is a quote about the why of thanksgiving and praise: The concept, which in biblical usage complements that of God’s dominion, is the glory of God. It is God’s display of splendor, his beauty and his kindness or loveliness. On man’s side, the corresponding terms are amazement, adoration, and praise; that is, freedom which expresses itself in gratitude, enjoyment, and pleasure in the presence of beauty.35

Gratefulness is an emotion that belongs to the Christian faith because life is experienced as a gift. The response of praise and thanksgiving can be expressed in a number of ways: in daily life, in liturgy with its music and ‘songs of praise’, and in the visual arts. Van Gogh depicted the beauty of God’s good creation in The Sower [Fig. 4.22] and Starry Night [Fig. 4.23]. In the sprouting grain (The Sower) and in the couple under the starry sky (Starry Night), he connects beauty with love: the beauty of creation as an expression of God’s love. These paintings are a hymn to God’s good creation. The same can be said of the Dutch painter Henk Helmantel’s (b. 1945) still lifes. Helmantel comments on his Stilleven met schelpen (Still Life with Shells) (2006) [Fig. 11.84]: ‘I see shells as small miracles of God’s creation.’36 His works show both the beauty of the fruits of the earth and that of the simple things like pots, kitchenware, and glassware. Beauty in Henk Helmantel’s Work Helmantel has a different view of the beauty of creation than Van Gogh, and his work on nature as creation differs from Van Gogh’s. Van Gogh inserts a great deal of symbolism into his paintings, as The Sower and Starry Night demonstrate (4.3). It is precisely that that Helmantel does not do. He says in an interview that ‘creation in itself already contains so many secrets within itself that I don’t necessarily have to add anything profound by using symbolism to point to whatever place God has in it. Creation is already a hymn honouring God.’37 Van Gogh shows nature in movement, in its germinative power, and connects this with human life, with love. Helmantel’s work concerns primarily the fruits of the earth, as painted in his still lifes. The artist 35 36 37

J. Moltmann, Theology of Play, 38-39. Helmantel in E. Bos et al. (eds), Henk Helmantel, 146. Interview in De Nieuwe Koers, cited in Trouw, 13 June, 2016.

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arranges the fruit himself and makes his own compositions: Walnoten in bolsters (Walnuts in Shells) (2002), Stilleven met aangesneden meloen (Still Life with Sliced Melon) (2007), Stilleven met kersen (Still Life with Cherries) (2004), Stilleven met druiven (Still Life with Grapes) (2005), Koperen bak met appels (Copper Pan with Apples) (2007), Stilleven met uien (Still Life with Onions) (2013), etc. He also sometimes paints a specific situation in nature. For example, he writes, ‘Suddenly, when you’re visiting your brother, you see that the plums are almost ripe on the tree. Get to work immediately, you then think. Or there’s a dead bird in the garden. Get to it quickly before decomposition sets in.’38 His still lifes also show compositions of objects of everyday use, such as Stillevencompositie (Still Life Composition) (2003) [Fig. 11.83]: a pale red box with a lid resting on the edge, a dark-coloured bottle and a glass, an oblong black iron pan, and a wooden blue and red tray with a blue cloth under it on a table covered by an off-white tablecloth. The background ranges from light grey to almost black. The light brushes beautifully along the carefully positioned objects in this composition. Van Gogh emphasises the interwovenness of humankind and nature. Helmantel’s focus is on the fruits or objects themselves. One can see this as well in his church and monastery interiors. He pays attention to the hushed beauty of the church or monastery interior itself, apart from its use by a community. Van Gogh’s style developed into Post-Impressionism and sometimes went in the direction of Japonism. From his Parisian period on, he depicted nature using bright colours, with carefully chosen colour combinations and expressive forms. After an Impressionistic period in 1970 – an example of which is Stilleven met japanse kers (Still Life with a Japanese Cherry) (1968) – Helmantel chose contemporary realism, classical in light, form, and colour.39 His works show the fruits, objects, or interiors as if they are materially present and one can touch them. This is a presence that, as his teacher at the art academy says, is made visible ‘by the incoming, enveloping diffuse light that brushes the objects.’40 Through the pious light, the use of colour, the arrangement of the objects that evokes rest and stillness as if they are church or monastery interiors, Helmantel’s works invoke an experience among many viewers of a hushed beauty. 38 Helmantel in Bos et al. (eds), Henk Helmantel, 20. See, for example, Roodborstje (Robin) (2011). See Helmantel on his technique in Bos et al. (eds), Henk Helmantel, 23. 39 Helmantel in E. Bos et al. (eds), Henk Helmantel, 27. 40 D. Kraaypoel in Bos et al. (ed.), Henk Helmantel, 40.

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Like Van Gogh’s paintings, one can – whether or not one is religious – experience Helmantel’s works in either a secular or a religious way. There is a difference. Because of his symbolism, Van Gogh’s works contain hints that point to the religious character of those works. This is not the case with Helmantel. He does not want to add anything to creation that already holds so many secrets within it. His works shows reality purely in its religious dimension by the attention paid to the beauty of the ordinary. Despite this difference, both painters show reality in its sacramentality. The dualism between sacred and profane – as is also the case in the environment by Thijs and Brans but in a different way through their use of another medium (11.3.1) – is abandoned in their work, and the sacred shows itself in the everyday: in their depiction of creation as a landscape painting or a still life. Beauty as a Religious Experience of Art To describe the experience of beauty as a religious experience, I will compare it to a secular experience of beauty. A secular experience of beauty is an intense experience of meaning. We are deeply affected by something from outside, something that is beyond our control and strikes us as beautiful. And that beauty can be encountered in all kinds of forms, within and outside of art. Beauty leads us into a state of ecstasy and disrupts the regularity of our lives.41 Sometimes, such an experience of beauty is religious in nature. That is also an intense experience of meaning. It is an experience that is an ‘experience with the experience’ made possible by God, that is, what we experience as beautiful we experience as explicitly referring to God. In other words (and here is the difference with a secular experience of beauty), we experience the beautiful as stamped by the goodness of God’s creation (Psalm 104). Thus, beauty in nature or culture can be experienced as pointing to God’s light and glory. If one experiences Helmantel’s or Van Gogh’s work as secular art, one then looks at the work purely for its beauty. If one experiences it religiously, then one views it as a depiction of God’s good creation. We can have religious experiences of beauty in nature, in the encounter with people or in everyday things, but we can also experience it in art. The religious experience of beauty is thus not a direct experience because the experience is accompanied by a certain view of beauty as its interpretative moment. In the Christian experience of beauty, that interpretative 41

E. Jüngel, Wertlose Wahrheit, 101.

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moment is religious transcendence, the goodness of God’s creation. We should elaborate on that. Beauty and Evil One can wonder if an ode to creation is appropriate, given that creation also has its dark sides, such as destructive natural disasters and, in a different sense, violent wars and social injustice. Let us recall the protest art discussed above (11.3.4). The question of art after Auschwitz was concisely formulated by Adorno: ‘After Auschwitz, writing poetry is barbaric.’ The Christian faith recognises both sides of our reality: the beautiful and the ugly, good and evil. Our reality is stamped by the goodness of God’s creation, but at the same time that creation falls short because of human failures, human evil, and natural violence. Despite moral evil and despite natural evil, we must continue to speak about the beautiful in the world and in art. If we do not do that, the impression could arise that evil has the last word. I cite approvingly what the philosopher Roger Scruton says about the beautiful: The experience of beauty … tells us that we are at home in the world, that the world is already ordered in our perceptions as a place fit for the lives of beings like us. But … beings like us become at home in the world only by acknowledging our ‘fallen’ condition, as Eliot acknowledged it in The Waste Land. Hence the experience of beauty also points us beyond this world, to a ‘kingdom of ends’ in which our immortal longings and our desire for perfection are finally answered.42

The beautiful is an indispensable value, according to the Christian faith because it reminds us that the world is destined for the Kingdom of peace and justice, a place where people are at home and where there is room for all. God’s glory is not the splendour of an otherworldly superior power, but the beauty of love that gave itself (Moltmann). It shows itself in Christ. Rouault shows that in his depiction of the face of Christ who suffers in agony until the end of the world [Fig. 5.36], and Mulders portrayed the sacrifice of Jesus in his canvasses of flesh and blood [Fig. 6.51; 6.52]. This closeness to death can be seen as hopeful only in light of the resurrection as Rouault showed in a golden yellow colour and Mulders by bringing ‘order’, and Olympios’ The Messenger [Fig. 6.54] by the messenger in the background. The theme of Frieling’s Paasmorgen [Fig. 7.56] 42

R. Scruton, Beauty, 145.

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is resurrection. That is God’s act to bring about a better world, the Kingdom of God. Beauty is marked by the cross as depicted in Sutherland’s Christ in Glory [Fig. 7.63]: Christ’s glory is shown in the beauty of a love that is evidenced in his pierced feet. Beauty and the Good We experience the beautiful in nature, in the encounter between people, in daily life, and in art. In addition, there is also the morally ugly, evil. That does not fit with the beautiful. That is, only the beautiful fits with the good (Titus 3:8; 1 Peter 3:3-4). If one has an experience of beauty that is stamped by the goodness of God’s creation and by the sublimity of the cross, that is a source of inspiration then to dedicate oneself to preserving the beautiful as what is vulnerable in our resistance to the morally ugly, to evil. Precisely in a world that has been damaged by the inconceivable evil of Auschwitz, the joyful experience of the beautiful summons human beings to devote themselves to God’s Kingdom of peace and justice. Protest art and art as praise go together. Thus, the words from Moltmann we cited above become somewhat concrete with respect to religious art: God’s overabundance in glory, his beauty, and his worthiness to be loved are answered by ‘a love which does not merely manifest itself ethically in love to the neighbor but also aesthetically in festive play before God.’43

11.4 Visual Practice as Play How is looking at, becoming involved in, and attentively viewing a religious material image to be described? For that, I pointed to interaction and disclosure (9.6). I will elaborate on that here. Understanding is the human mode of being, a mode of being that, in a practical sense, has to do with our interaction with people and things. Observation is also part of this – our approach to things and religious images through looking. Religious art occurs as an interaction between the image and the viewer or a group of viewers, such as a faith community. It can involve very different visual practices. Sometimes a visual practice is part of a liturgical celebration or feast, but often it is not. The place where it happens can be a church, a museum, or at home. There are written and unwritten 43

Moltmann, Theology at Play, 39.

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rules for a specific interaction with the image or installation. The mode of being of the visual practice is that of sacred play. How can we view play in connection with the interaction with the image? The term ‘play’ is used for quite divergent things: religion,44 liturgy,45 art, and football games. The difference between the sports game and the other examples is that, in sports, competition plays a role: there are winners and there are losers. Nevertheless, they are all called play because they have something in common: stepping out of ‘ordinary life’. In his classic Homo Ludens, Johan Huizinga explained play as follows: With reference to form, play … can be called a free action, that is ‘not serious’ and is deliberately outside of ordinary life and which can nonetheless completely absorb the player. It is not connected to any material interest or acquired usefulness. It is done in a specific time and at a specific place, is played according to specific rules, and calls community connections into life that are surrounded with secrecy or, through disguise, emphasised as something different from the world.46

There are major differences between the various activities that we call play, but nonetheless they have something in common. Play constitutes a family likeness between these activities: there are similarities between these various activities. But there are differences as well. Van der Leeuw describes play in connection with the Christian religion as sacred play from the perspective of redemption: For the relationship of God with the human being, of the human being with God, is sacred play, a sacer ludus; if the theological character of dance is found in movement, that of drama lies in movement and countermovement. God moved, he comes to this earth. And the earthly jointed dummies or, if one prefers, the dry bones in the valley of Ezekiel, began to move as well…. The oldest drama, the drama that dominates in the world is that of God and the human being. The great actor is God; we are only his counterparts.47

As in drama, there is movement and countermovement in the play between God and human beings. Aside from liturgy, play is also present in the Christmas pageant and the Passion play, bibliodrama, performances, and pilgrimages. Feasts like Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost also have that character of play. New forms of the religious play are videogames 44 André Droogers views religion as playing with a different, sacred reality (A. Droogers, Zingeving als spel, 155-160). 45 In connection with liturgy, G.J. Hoenderdaal points to the limits of play: ‘Only as anticipation of the Kingdom of God can and may we play’ (G.J. Hoenderdaal, Riskant Spel, 63). R. Guardini also calls liturgy play (Wolf-Withöft, Spiel, 679). 46 J. Huizinga, Homo Ludens, 14 (translation mine). 47 G. van der Leeuw, Wegen en grenzen, 150.

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in which Christian themes are played out, as we already saw (9.5).48 How can we characterise the interaction with the religious image as described in the previous section as play? Direct communication with God, Christ, or a saint undeniably has an element of play, as Van der Leeuw wrote in the quote above about sacred play: God as the ‘main actor’ or ‘protagonist’ and we as his ‘counterparts’. That is what happens in the veneration of relics of Christ, Mary, or a saint, or in the ‘visual prayer’ of the crossing of the gazes. There are limits to play: confessing one’s sins or receiving forgiveness is not play. Movement and countermovement are also explicit in Thek’s environment Die Krippe: similar to taking part in a procession, the visitor to the museum acts out the countermovement in response to the movement, God’s coming to the world. The participant is in the work and actually becomes a part of it.49 There are primarily two elements of play that emerge in the environment by Thijs and Brans: stepping out of the world by entering a different world and by playing with other realities. In Sandoval’s performance, the artist plays the Christ figure by washing the feet of a street child and ministering to his wounds. The intention is that those who witness this become his fellow players and act as the performance shows they should act. Can looking at, for example, Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand), Jawlensky’s Sacred Face or Dumas’ Jesus Serene also be called play? Gadamer indicates that when he calls play the mode of being for a work of art.50 A work of art is indeed a unity of form and content but only finds its completion in its implementation, in the interaction with the viewers. For that, he points to the ritual action, the interaction with the cultic image and religious play: ‘No one will be able to suppose that for religious truth the performance of the ritual is inessential.’51 A work of art is not just an object in itself that a viewer looks at; rather, it exists only in the interaction with the viewer, the fellow player. Gadamer’s thesis is that the mode of being of art cannot be viewed as an object of an (individual) aesthetic consciousness. An artwork is not an object that I can place opposite me so that I can look at it. The aesthetic attitude is ‘a part of the event of being that occurs in presentation, and belongs essentially to play as 48

F. Bosman, [Player] start: GOD MODE, 237-256. According to Christian Boltanski, who also made environments (Boltanksi, interview Tamar Garb, 11). 50 Gadamer, Truth and Method, 120, 102-110, 482. 51 Gadamer, Truth and Method, 115. 49

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play.’52 That interplay is obvious in the case of a stage play or the performance of a musical piece. A stage play has its script, and a musical composition its score that is to be performed. The work exists only in its performance; the performed piece. In Gadamer’s view, that obtains for all art. He looks at the whole process of the performance, which also includes the audience of the performance. The viewers are not spectators who look at or listen to the performance in a detached way, from their own perspective. Rather, they are involved in the process. The interplay is the event in which the spectator becomes a participant. She is part of the performance. That also applies to the examples of religious art we have discussed that are present to us as the completed result of a production process. Here as well, it concerns the interaction, the ‘performance’, the interplay in which the viewer participates. The (religious) art image finds its purpose in the performance.53 As long as the movement – the interaction with the religious art image – continues, it is not complete but in process. Our interaction with an art image is a matter of allowing the meaning of the work to emerge. In this respect, Gadamer refers to the Greek philosophy that speaks of unity of being and becoming.54 The being that emerges from becoming is, namely, the basic experience of art when we say: ‘That’s right! That is the way it is!’ – ‘It is “right” so’ (210). Aristotle used the term energeia for the being that emerges from becoming and thus points to the process character of works of art, to movement. Together with the term entelecheia, it indicates that a work of art is not present to us as a work completed by the artist. What is being moved is still under way, has not yet arrived; we are ‘totally immersed in the matter’ (210). That is the case in our interaction with a work of art as a fellow performer. We do not ask concretely about the result, but we say rather that it comes to the fore (‘it’ emerges). That obtains for the visual art and for poetry; we have an experience, and that is something different from an act. We see or read something in such a way that ‘it’ emerges.

Christian Boltanski articulates this as follows: ‘each time you see a Mondriaan or a Malevich in the same room in a museum, you create a new work with the context.’55 52

Gadamer, Truth and Method, 115. H.-G. Gadamer, The Artwork in Word and Image, 214 (German: ‘Es hat im Vollzug sein vollendetes Sein ...’ (Wort und Bild, 390)); see also Gadamer, The Relevance of the Beautiful, 27-28. 54 For this and what follows, see Gadamer, The Artwork in Word and Image, 209-214. 55 Boltanski in an interview with Jacqueline Grandjean in May 2017 on the occasion of Boltanski’s exhibition in the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam, November 2017-April 2018 (exhibition brochure). 53

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The emphasis on the interaction between the art image and the viewer entails that their relation with respect to time is contemporaneous, not literally but in the sense that what happened then speaks to us in our present: ‘it is the vivid presentness and contemporaneousness of art that constitute and maintain its power.’56 That happens in the celebration of feasts like Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. It also happens in looking at a religious art image. One does not cast a quick glance on it but lingers over it. Kierkegaard thus describes the viewing of a painting of the suffering of Christ as an experience of becoming ‘contemporaneous’ with Christ (11.3.3). Something similar obtains for Mulders’ Siena (Vleeswand). In looking meditatively, the viewer can become ‘contemporaneous’ with Christ, whose sacrifice gives rise to thought. With Jawlensky’s Holy Face, that happens in a somewhat different way because he provides a different presentation of Christ: in meditation one is contemporaneous with Christ and experiences his presence. It is a show in a visual and spiritual sense in which the viewer is a fellow performer. There is movement and countermovement. And what can we say about Dumas’ Jesus Serene? This involves looking as an anticipation of the (future) human community. Here as well, the experience of time is a lingering over.57 One dwells with the religious (art) image so that ‘it’ can emerge and the image begins to speak.

56 57

Gadamer, The Artwork in Word and Image, 200. Gadamer, The Relevance of the Beautiful, 45.

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Wijnia L. Beyond the Return of Religion: Art and the Postsecular. Brill Research Perpectives in Religion and the Arts (Leiden/Boston: Brill 2019). Wiman, C. My Bright Abyss: Meditations of a Modern Believer (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux 2013). Wolf, G. Vera Icon, in: R. Hoeps (ed.), Handbuch der Bildtheologie, III: Zwischen Zeichen und Präsenz (Paderborn: Schöningh 2014), 419-466. Wolf-Withöft, S. Spiel Praktisch-theologisch, in: G. Müller (ed.), Theologische Realenzyklopädie (Studienausgabe). Vol. XXXI (Berlin: De Gruyter 1995), 677-683. Wollheim, R. Art and its Objects (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1980). Wolterstorff, N. Art in Action: Toward a Christian Aesthetic (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans 1980). Wolterstorff, N. Art Rethought: The Social Practices of Art (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2015). Wolterstorff, N. The God We Worship: An Exploration of Liturgical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans 2015). Wreen, M.J. Beardsley, in: M. Kelley (ed.), Encyclopedia of Aesthetics (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1998), I, 232-237. Zelevansky, L. Life is Just a Bowl of Cherries: The Life and Art of Paul Thek, in: E. Sussman & L. Zelevansky (eds), Catalogue Paul Thek Diver: A Retrospective (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art 2010), 10-27. Zimmermann, J. Francis Bacon Kreuzigung: Versuch, eine gewalttätige Wirklichkeit neu zu sehen (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer 1986). Zuidervaart, L. Artistic Truth; Aesthetics, Discourse, and Imaginative Disclosure (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2004). Zweite, A. Jawlensky in München, in: A. Zweite (ed.), Catalogue Alexej Jawlensky 1864-1941 (Munich: Prestel 1983), 47-66.

LIST OF ARTWORKS

Measurements of works are in centimetres (h (× l) × w) unless otherwise indicated. 1.1. Marlene Dumas in collaboration with Jan Andriesse and Bert Boogaard, Altaarstuk, 2015-2017 Oil on canvas on panel Dresden, St. Anne’s Church Photograph: Lothar Sprenger, Dresden Ch. 1 1.2. The Good Shepherd, beginning of the third century Fresco Rome, Catacomb of Callixtus 1.3. Holy Face of Laon, thirteenth century Icon, 44 × 40 Laon, cathedral 1.4. Lucas Cranach the Elder, Wittenberg Altarpiece, 1547 Oil on panel Wittenberg, City Church 1.5. Hans Memling, Saint Veronica, ca. 1470-1475 Oil on panel, 30.3 × 22.8 Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art 1.6. James McNeill Whistler, Arrangement in Grey and Black: Portrait of the Painter’s Mother, 1871-1872 Oil on canvas, 144.3 × 162.5 Paris, Musée d’Orsay Ch. 2 2.7. Paloma Varga Weisz, Corpse II, 1999 Painted limewood, 7 × 64 × 16 Düsseldorf, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen

282

IMAGING GOD ANEW

2.8. Paloma Varga Weisz, Lying Man, 2014 Charred limewood, 23 × 200 × 75 Jerusalem, Israel Museum 2.9. Katharina Fritsch, Display Stand with Madonnas, 1987-1989 aluminium, plaster, and paint, 270 × 82 New York, Katharina Fritsch/Matthew Marks Gallery 2.10. Bill Viola, The Quintet of the Astonished, 2000 Video installation Düsseldorf, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen Photograph: Kira Perov © Bill Viola Studio 2.11. Jacopo da Pontormo, Visitation, ca. 1528 Oil on panel, 202 × 156 Carmignano, Church of San Michele Arcangelo 2.12. Piero della Francesca, Madonna del Parto, 1455-1465 Fresco, 260 × 203 Monterchi, Museo della Madonna del Parto Ch. 3 3.13. Piero della Francesca, Legend of the True Cross, 1452-1466 Sequence of frescos Arezzo, Basilica of San Francesco 3.14. Claude Monet, Water Lilies (Nymphéas), 1914-1926 Wall panel Paris, Musée de l’Orangerie 3.15. Malevich, White on White, 1918 Oil on canvas, 78.7 × 78.7 New York, The Museum of Modern Art 3.16. Gustave Courbet, The Oak at Flagey, 1864 Oil on canvas, 89 × 111.5 Ornans, Musée Gustave Courbet 3.17. Caravaggio, The Calling of Saint Matthew, ca. 1599-1600 Oil on canvas, 322 × 340 Rome, San Luigi dei Francesi 3.18. Mark Rothko Photograph with Seagram murals London, Tate Modern

LIST OF ARTWORKS

283

Ch. 4 4.19. Hospitality of Abraham, fourth century Fresco Rome, Catacomb of the Via Latina 4.20. Andrei Rublev, The Holy Trinity, 1408-1425 Icon, 142 × 114 Moscow, Tretyakov Museum 4.21. Masaccio, The Trinity with the Virgin, Saint John the Evangelist, and Donors, 1427-1428 Fresco, 667 × 317 Florence, Church of Santa Maria Novella 4.22. Vincent van Gogh, The Sower with Setting Sun, June 1888 Oil on canvas, 64 × 80 Otterlo, Kröller-Müller Museum 4.23. Vincent van Gogh, Starry Night Over the Rhône, September 1888 Oil on paint, 72.5 × 92 Paris, Musée d’Orsay 4.24. Vincent van Gogh, Starry Night, June 1889 Oil on canvas, 73 × 92 New York, The Museum of Modern Art 4.25. Ad Reinhardt, no title, 1964 Silk screen, 30.5 × 30.5 London, Tate Britain 4.26. Ad Reinhardt, Black Painting No. 5, 1962 Oil on canvas, 152.4 × 152.4 Liverpool, Tate 4.27. Colin McCahon, Northland, 1962 Oil on canvas, 78.8 × 82.5 Courtesy of the Colin McCahon Research and Publication Trust Ch. 5 5.28. The Mandylion, 2nd half of nineteenth century Icon, 20.8 × 17.7 Private collection

284

IMAGING GOD ANEW

5.29. Alexej von Jawlensky, Saviour’s Face: The Holy Hour – Last Look, 1919 Oil on linen paper on cardboard, 33 × 26 Brabant collection 5.30. Alexej von Jawlensky, Abstract Head: Pain, 1927 Oil on linen paper on cardboard, 35 × 25 Tegernsee: Sammlung Ulrich Pfänder 5.31. Alexej von Jawlensky, Saviour’s Face: Christ, 1920 Oil on linen paper on cardboard, 34 × 24.8 Long Beach: Museum of Art, The Milton Wichner Collection 5.32. Alexej von Jawlensky, Meditation: Versunken, 1934 Oil on linen paper on cardboard, 20 × 16 Wiesbaden: Museum Wiesbaden 5.33. Georges Rouault, ‘Et Véronique au tendre lin passe encore sur le chemin …’, 1922 aquatint, roulette, and drypoint over photogravure, 43.5 × 43 Miserere no. 33 5.34. Georges Rouault, The Holy Face, ca. 1946 Oil, 50 × 36 Rome, Vatican Museum 5.35. Georges Rouault, Veronica, ca. 1945 Oil, 50 × 36 Paris, Centre Georges Pompidou 5.36. Georges Rouault, ‘Jésus sera en agonie jusqu’à la fin du monde’, 1926 Etching, aquatint, and drypoint over photogravure, 58.3 × 41.3 Miserere no. 35 5.37. Georges Rouault, De Profundis …, 1927 Etching, aquatint, and drypoint over photogravure, 59.5 × 43 Miserere no. 47 5.38. Georges Rouault, Fille au miroir, 1906 Watercolour, 72 × 55.5 Paris, Centre Georges Pompidou

LIST OF ARTWORKS

285

5.39. Lefteris Olympios, Veroniki or the Absent, 1999 Oil on canvas, 200 × 70 Switzerland, H.D. Dervos Collection 5.40. Jacques Frenken Spijkerpiëta, ca. 1968 Wood, iron, plaster (pietà, ca. 1900), 55.1 × 53.3 × 27.5 ’s Hertogenbosch, Artist’s collection 5.41. Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait, 1500 Oil on panel, 67 × 49 Munich, Alte Pinakothek Ch. 6 6.42. Paul Thek, Die Krippe, litter/throne, 1973 6.44. Rosemberg Sandoval, Baby Street, 1998 Still from Single channel video, Performance realized in 1998 in the exhibition: “Arte y violencia en Colombia desde 1948”, Bogotá, Colombia, 15:50min, color, sound, Edition of 3, no. 1/3 Courtesy: Daros Latinamerica Collection, Zürich, Photograph: Käthe Walser, Basel, Copyright: The artist 6.46. Raphael, Mond Crucifixion, 1502-1503 Oil on poplar wood, 280.3 × 167.3 London, National Gallery 6.47. Matthias Grünewald, Isenheim Altarpiece, 1512-1516 Oil on panel Central panel (Crucifixion), 269 × 307 Colmar, Museum Unterlinden 6.48. Paul Thek, Untitled (from the series Technological Reliquaries), 1967 Wax, metal, plexiglass, etc., 23 × 28 Cologne, Museum Ludwig 6.49. Paul Thek, Fishman, 1968/1969 Latex 2.28 m. high New York, Stable Gallery Installation 6.50. Graham Sutherland, Study for the Northampton Crucifixion, 1946 Oil on canvas, 90.8 × 121.9 London, Tate Gallery

286

IMAGING GOD ANEW

6.51. Marc Mulders, Siena (Vleeswand), 1988 Oil on canvas, 169 × 279.5 Amersfoort / Rijswijk, Collectie Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed 6.52. Marc Mulders, Crack L.A. II, 1989 Oil on canvas, 150 × 280 Uden, Museum voor Religieuze Kunst 6.53. Francis Bacon, Crucifixion, 1965 Oil on canvas, each panel: 198 × 147.5 Munich, Pinakothek der Moderne 6.54. Lefteris Olympios, The Messenger, 2015 Oil on canvas, 100 × 80 Private collection Ch. 7 7.55. Anselm Kiefer, Sende Deinen Geist aus, 1974 Watercolour, 34 × 24.1 New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 7.56. Gijs Frieling, Paasmorgen, 1996 Egg tempera on plaster, 80 × 120 Uden, Museum voor Religieuze Kunst 7.57. Gijs Frieling, Kruisiging van Christus, 1996 Egg tempera on canvas, 120 × 100 Uden, Museum voor Religieuze Kunst 7.58. Alfred Manessier, Les Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville, 1988-1993 La joie de Pâques au petit matin de la Résurrection (3 windows in the centre of the choir) Each window 6.66 m. × 2 m. Abbeville 7.59. Alfred Manessier, L’Annonce de la Pentecôte, part of Les Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville 8.24 m. × 3.58 m. (surface of window 21 square metres) See 7.58

LIST OF ARTWORKS

287

7.60. Alfred Manessier, Grande Nuit du Samedi Saint, part of Les Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville 8.24 m. × 3.9 m. See 7.58 7.61. Christ Pantocrator (second half of the nineteenth century) Icon, 13.3 × 11.2 Private collection 7.62. Christ in Majesty (The Last Judgment), ca. 1430-1440 Mural Coventry, Holy Trinity Church 7.63. Graham Sutherland, Second Cartoon 1954 and Third Cartoon 1957 Christ in Glory in the Tetramorph, 1962 Coventry, Coventry Cathedral 7.64. Marc Mulders, Het Laatste Oordeel (The Last Judgment), 2006 Stained glass window ’s Hertogenbosch, St. John’s Cathedral 7.65. Marc Mulders, Christus op de regenboog (Christ on the Rainbow) Part of the stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel, 2006 ’s Hertogenbosch, St. John’s Cathedral 7.66. Marc Mulders, 9/11 Part of the stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel, 2006 ’s Hertogenbosch, St John’s Cathedral 7.67. Marlene Dumas, Jesus Serene, 1994 Ink, wax, watercolour, and pencil on paper [21 parts, each 66 × 55] De Heus-Zomer Collection Photograph: Peter Cox, Eindhoven 7.68. Marlene Dumas, The Teacher (Sub B), 1987 Oil on canvas, 160 × 200 Kunsthalle Kiel Collection Photograph: Peter Cox, Eindhoven 7.69. Marlene Dumas, (In search of) the Perfect Lover, 1994 Ink, watercolour, pencil on paper, 58 × 28,2 × 24,5 + 2 × 35 × 31 + 1 × 22 × 21, and 2 each 24 × 18

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private collection, courtesy Hauser & Wirth Photograph: Peter Cox, Eindhoven 7.70. Max Beckmann, Apocalyps No. 25, 1941-1942 Litho, 35.2 × 27cm Ch. 8 8.71. J.M.W. Turner, The Arrival of Louis-Philippe at the Royal Clarence Yard (ca. 1844-1845) Oil on canvas, 128.5 × 158.5 × 90 London, Tate Britain 8.72. Annemiek Punt, Glass work, 2005 Melted glass, 0.50 × 2.20 m. Bethelkerk, Barneveld Photograph: Carlo ter Ellen, Oldenzaal Ch. 9 9.73. Annemiek Punt, two windows, 2007 Melted glass and water stone, 6 parts, 5,8 m2 Tiel, Stiltecentrum Ziekenhuis Rivierenland Photograph: Carlo ter Ellen, Oldenzaal 9.74. Raphael, The Alba Madonna, ca. 1510 Oil on panel (transferred to canvas), diameter 94.5 Washington, National Gallery of Art 9.75. Rembrandt, Landscape with a Stone Bridge, circa 1638 Oil on panel, 29.5 × 42.5 Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum 9.76. Jacob van Ruisdael, Landscape with a Corn Field Near the Sea, ca. 1660 Oil on canvas, 61 × 71 Rotterdam, Museum Boijmans-Van Beuningen Ch. 11 11.77. Lucas Cranach the Younger, Weimar altarpiece, 1555 Oil on panel (centre panel, Crucifixion) Weimar, Town Church St. Peter and Paul

LIST OF ARTWORKS

289

11.78. Giotto, The Kiss of Judas (The Arrest of Christ), 1304-1306 Fresco, 200 × 185 Padua, Arena Chapel 11.79. Derk Thijs and Chris Brans, DAH OSLA DOTHEM, 2011-2012 environment, exhibition Where Time Has Lost its Relevance 2011-2012. Amsterdam, P/////AKT Photograph Artists’ collection 11.80. Derk Thijs and Chris Brans, DAH OSLA DOTHEM, 2011-2012 environment (see 11.79) Photograph Artists’ collection 11.81. Boris Mikhailov, Case History, 1997-1998 Colour Photograph, 236 × 127 Berlin, Galerie Barbara Weiss 11.82. Boris Mikhailov, Case History, 1997-1998 Colour Photograph, 236 × 127 Berlin, Galerie Barbara Weiss 11.83. Henk Helmantel, Stillevencompositie, 2003 Oil on panel, 122 × 180 11.84. Henk Helmantel Stilleven met schelpen, 2006 Oil on panel, 21 × 42.5

INDEX OF NAMES

Aaron 75-77 Abgar 12-13, 106, 194 Adorno, T.W. 138, 224, 258 Alberti, L.B. 17, 214 Alexandrova, A. 37, 39, 45, 47 Alphen, E. van. 143, 145 Alzate, G. 134, 135 Anderson, R.L. 234 Aristotle 262 Arp, H. 32 Augustine 25, 107-108, 220 Bacon, F. 125, 139, 141-145, 145-147, 167, 168, 178, 226, 229 Baert, B. 127 Baker, G. 132, 228 Bakker, B. 213-214, 215, 216 Bakker, N. 89 Bal, M. 23 Baldassari, A. 161 Ball, H. 32 Barnard, M. 123, 134-135 Barney, M. 53 Barth, K. 2, 221 Barthes, R. 193-194, 196, 199, 238-239 Bateman, J.A. 238 Baudrillard, J. 57 Baxandall, M. 24 Beardsley, M.C. 33, 224, 227-230 Beck, R. 118, 119 Beckmann, M. 172-173, 226, 230 Bell, C. 28, 30-31, 36, 219, 222 Belting, H. 4, 9, 10, 12-26, 27, 31, 32, 35, 107, 220, passim Berns, S. 234-235 Besançon, A. 195, 199 Beuys, J. 53, 132, 134, 166 Bloem, M. 103 Boehm, G. 101, 178 Boespflug, F. 78, 79, 80, 81, 83, 8586, 87, 108-109 Boltanski, C. 261

Bosman, F. 209, 261 Braembussche, A.A. van den. 29 Brans, C. 133, 244-247, 257, 261 Bremmer, J.N. 199 Brinkman, M.E. 124, 179, 183, 185 Brown, D. 24-25, 137 Brown, N. 141 Bruyn, J. 214-215 Bryson, N. 144 Büchler, P. 38 Budd, M. 35 Buggeln, G.T. 232-233, 235, 244 Bunge, G. 80-83 Burke, E. 147 Büttner, F.O. 11 Calvin, J. 87-88, 202 Caravaggio 67 Carr, E. 88 Caviness, M.H. 252 Cézanne, P. 30, 56, 67-68, 185-186, 206, 239 Chagall, M. 5, 53 Chaniotis, A. 199 Charlemagne 14, 78 Claes, P. 125 Cocquet, J.-F. 156, 157 Constantine the Great 10 Corris, M. 99 Courbet, G. 59, 61-63, 67-68, 167, 226 Courthion, P. 118, 119, 120-122 Cranach L. the Elder 17 Cranach L. the Younger 238 Dalferth, I.U. 209 Dante (Alighieri) 15 Danto, A.C. 30, 32 De Kesel, M. 41, 43, 52 Deckwitz, F. 128 Delehanty, S. 140 Deleuze, G. 143, 144 Didi-Huberman, G. 20, 31, 32

292

INDEX OF NAMES

Dorival, B. 121 Dostoyevsky, F.M. 122 Droogers, A. 260 Duchamp, M. 22, 31-34 Dumas, M. 1, 165-172, 173, 174, 210, 227, 229, 239, 261, 263 Dürer, A. 17, 19, 125 Dyrness, W.A. 118, 121, 122 Eckhart, Meister 88 Eliade, M. 250 Elkins, J. 2 Evdokimov, P. 20, 24-25, 80-82, 107, 117, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201, 202 Eijk, T. van. 208 Eyck, J. van. 19, 31, 214-215 Falkenburg, R.L. 215 Figee, T. 139, 146 Forte, B. 25, 226 Fra Angelico 20 Francis, F.S. 31 Franke, M. 127, 131, 132 Friedrich, C.D. 88 Frieling, G. 2, 153-155, 173, 188, 210, 222, 226, 229, 252 Fritsch, K. 40, 52 Fry, R. 28, 29-30 Gadamer, H.-G. 32-33, 36, 124, 179180, 219, 222, 223-227, 261-263 Gamper, V. 142 Gassen, R.W. 172 Gauchet, M. 42 Giotto 24, 241-242 Gogh, V. van 36, 56, 67-68, 88-97, 101, 102, 103, 173, 183, 206, 210, 222, 229, 239, 255-257 Goldsworthy, A. 53, 244 Gombrich, E.H. 35, 214 Gormley, A. 1, 53, 241, 244 Greeley, A. 127 Greenberg, C. 28, 30 Gregory the Great 11, 14, 250 Gronert, S. 113, 242 Grünewald, M. 136-137, 138, 147, 169 Guardini, R. 11, 260 Gruchy, J.W. de. 254

Gumbrecht, H.U. 50, 196-197 Guyer, P. 29 Hahl-Koch, J. 112 Hamburger, J. 21 Hamilton, S. 234 Hartog, E. den. 141 Hartog, H. den. 165 Heartney, E. 127 Heck, C. 164 Heidegger, M. 32, 33, 41, 224 Hegel, G.W.F. 32-33, 137 Helmantel, H. 36, 167, 222, 255-257 Hildegard of Bingen 88 Hoenderdaal, G.J.260 Holly, M. Ann 31 Honée, E. 14, 25 Horace 253 Howes, G. 216, 235-236 Hugo, V. 86 Huizinga, J. 260 Imdahl, M. 242 Jackson, M. 168 Jawlensky, A. 110-118, 126, 167, 171, 182-183, 229, 261, 263 Jawlensky-Bianconi, A. 111 Joby, C.R. 215 John Paul II 2 John of Damascus 193, 194-195, 196, 199 Jüngel, E. 257 Kant, I. 28-29, 35, 93-94, 225 Kapoor, A. 53, 244 Kearney, R. 187-188 Kessler, H.L. 11 Kiefer, A. 43, 151-152, 173, 251 Kierkegaard, S. 35, 38, 251 Klein, Y. 134 Klein Essink, S. 167, 172 Koerner, J.L. 117, 125 Kuspit, D. 101, 212 Leeflang, H. 216 Leeuw, G. van der. 69, 179, 184, 221, 260-261

INDEX OF NAMES

Lessing, G.E. 240, 243 Levinas, E. 66, 70 Lippard, L.R. 98, 99 Lossky, V. 69, 78, 105-107, 117, 252 Lubbock, J. 24 Luther, M. 116-117 Lüthi, K. 243 MacGregor, N. 15, 107 Malevich, K. 60-61, 64, 66, 263 Malz, I. 37-40, 52, 102 Manessier, A. 88, 152, 155-158, 173, 174, 222, 226, 228 Margolis, J. 25 Marin, P. 135 Marion, J.-L. 5, 6, 22, 51-52, 55-71, 167, 178, 202-203, 226, 250 Masaccio, T. 83-85, 157, 171 Masheck, J. 98 Maurer, N.M. 91, 93, 94, 95 McCahon, C. 103 McEvilley, T. 53, 244 Memling, H. 19, 24, 105, 123, 173 Merleau-Ponty, M. 22, 127, 185-188 Merton, T. 71, 98-99, 212, 213 Mikhailov, B. 253-254 Mitchell, W.J.T. 239-241 Molendijk, A.L. 217 Moltmann, J. 75, 122, 221, 223 Monet, C. 60, 64, 89 Morgan, D. 2, 108, 243 Moyaert, P. 6, 50, 179, 193, 195-197, 202, 237, 250 Muelder Eaton, M. 226 Mulders, M. 1, 138-139, 145-148, 150, 162-165, 173, 174, 181-182, 210, 222, 226, 228, 229, 252, 258, 261, 263 Müller, K. 216 Nagel, A. 23, 34, 132, 150 Nancy, J.-L. 2, 37, 40-52, 56, 143 Narvaez, O. 134 Nicholas of Cusa 65, 99, 197, 200, 248-250 O’Hear, A. 109, 173 O’Hear, N.O. 109, 173

293

O’Keeffe, G. 88 Olympios, L. 105, 110, 122-123, 126, 128, 148-149, 150, 155, 203, 229230, 252, 254, 258 Orsi, R.A. 217 Ouspensky, L. 79, 81, 82, 83, 85 Pallikarides, E. 123 Pannenberg, W. 175 Panofsky, E. 31, 214-215 Picasso, P. 30, 62-63, 161, 204 Piero della Francesca 60, 64, 153 Plato 24, 68, 117, 224 Pontormo, J. 35, 48-49, 50 Post, P. 236 Prettejohn, E. 29-30, 35-36 Preziosi, D. 31 Prins, W. 111, 119, 140-141, 166, 168, 170 Pseudo-Dionysius 81, 82, 92, 117 Punt, A. 1, 181-182, 205, 207, 209, 210, 213, 217 Rahner, K. 242 Ramsey, I.T. 211-212 Raphael 85, 136-137, 146, 149, 206 Rattemeyer, V. 112, 113, 114, 116, 124 Rauschenberg, R. 132 Régnier, G. 161 Reinhardt, A. 2, 71, 88, 97-101, 102, 178, 212-213, 228, 241, 247 Rembrandt 124-125, 144, 214-215 Révai, A. 159, 160, 161 Ricoeur, P. 179, 180, 181, 182 Ringbom, S. 24 Rombold, G. 53, 111, 134 Rosen, A. 53, 244 Rothko, M. 69-71, 97, 156 Rouault, G. 69, 88, 105, 108, 110, 118122, 124, 126, 136, 144, 171, 174, 180, 197, 203, 212, 223, 229, 258 Rublev, A. 43, 80-83, 85, 87, 88, 103, 157 Ruisdael, J. van. 88, 214-216 Salzmann, S. 129, 132 Sandoval, R. 2, 34, 127, 133-136, 150, 174, 229-230, 252-253, 254

294

INDEX OF NAMES

Saussure, F. de. 240 Schapiro, M. 186 Schleiermacher, F. 96 Schmidt, K. 112, 113, 114, 115, 116 Schmied, W. 2 Schönberg, A. 75-77, 101 Schönborn, C. 194, 195, 198, 199, 200 Schriemer, I. 247 Schwebel, H. 1, 2, 5, 10, 134, 243 Scruton, R. 258 Sendler, E. 79 Sherman, C. 168 Sherry, P. 276 Silverman, D. 91, 96 Slob, M. 59 Smedes, T.A. 188 Sontag, S. 140, 141 Spence, B. 159 Spijkerboer, A.M. 102 Steiner, G. 50 Steiner, R. 232 Steunebrink, G. 77 Stigter, B. 139, 150 Stoker, W. 208-216, passim Sussman, E. 141 Sutherland, G. 138, 147, 158-162, 209, 219-220, 228 Sylvester, D. 142, 143, 144, 145 Szeemann, H. 131 Taylor, C. 52 Taylor, M.C. 43, 53, 244 Theißen, G. 243 Thek, P. 22-23, 127, 128-133, 139-141, 149-150, 182, 212, 227-228, 261 Theodore the Studite 197-200, 201, 202 Thije, S. ten. 230-231 Thijs, D. 133, 244-247, 257, 261 Tilborgh, L. van. 92 Tillich, P. 203-208, passim Tracy, D. 183-184

Turner, J.M.W. 88, 177-178 Turrell, J. 53, 244 Tzara, T. 32 Uitgeest, W. 187 Varga Weisz, P. 39-40, 53 Vasari, G. 27 Veenhof, J. 151 Verdon, T. 84-85 Verlinden, W.J. 90 Veronica 12-16, passim Vikan, G. 235 Viladesau, R. 25, 136 Viola, B. 1, 47-48, 244 Vries, G. de. 182 Wal, J. de. 1, 147 Walther, I.F. & Metzger, R. 92 Walton, K.L. 226 Warburg, A. 38 Warhol, A. 5, 33, 34, 140, 151, 166, 168 Weintraub, L. 133 Welsh-Ovcharov, B. 97 Weyden, R. van der. 19, 142, 248 Whistler, J.M. 29, 219, 225 Wijnia, L. 233 Wilson, A. 128 Wiman, C. 188 Winzen, B. 170 Wolf, G. 13, 15 Wolf-Withöft, S. 279 Wollheim, R. 178 Wolterstorff, N. 26, 28, 33-34, 35, 102, 201, 224, 227, 251 Wreen, M.J. 227 Zelevansky, L. 129, 132, 133, 141 Zimmermann, J. 142, 145 Zuidervaart, L. 224, 226, 227 Zweite, A. 113

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Abstract Expressionism 30, 166, 239 aesthetics 6, 25-26, 32-33, 35, 58, 137138, 221-222, 254 aesthetic concepts 227-230 aesthetic experience 223-224, 227, 247 formalistic-aesthetic 28-31, 219, 222, 224, 226, 231 functional-aesthetic 35-36, 224-226, passim theological aesthetics 2, 3, 6, 177189, 191-217, 219-263 aesthetic experience, see experience art art as play 225, 259-263 art with Christian themes, see religious art art image, see image concept of art 26-36, 132-136, 231, passim, see also aesthetic concepts art history 4, 31-32, 35, 84, 125 pre-modern (art history) 128, 150, see also Middle Ages religion of art 30-31 religious (art), see religious art secular art, see religious art style (hieratic) 161, 220, 229 art history, see art, art history beauty 87-88, 89, 90, 92, 220-227, 255-259 becoming flesh, see incarnation Christ 105-126, 127-150, 151-174, passim church and art 155-158, 158-162, 162165, 233-234 commemoration, see memory council Nicaea, Second Council of 14, 57, 66, 78-79, 193, 199 Stoglav 107 Trent 79 Vatican Council, Second 38, 79 cultic image, see image

creation 42-44, 67-68, 87-97, 255-259 cross/crucifixion 136-139, 139-148, 148-149, 221 Dadaism 32 deconstruction 38, 40-51, 52, 55, 141145, 145-148 devotional image, see image Eastern Orthodoxy (and art) 80-85, 105-107, 122-123, 161-162, 252 Environment, see exhibit, exhibition experience aesthetic experience 17, 21, 30, 98, 223-224, 227, 247, 257 religious experience 30, 89, 93, 101, 213, 216, 236, 246, 257 exhibit, exhibition 37-40, 128-133, 232-236, 244-246, passim, see also museum (and religious art) Expressionism 112, 118, 166, 206, 208, 232 formalistic-aesthetic, see aesthetics fusion of horizons 123-125, 149, 223 God 37-53, 55-71, 75-103 image of God 69-71, 162-163 presence of God or Christ 182-189, 191-217, 247-250 Trinity, triune 80-83, 83-85, 86, 87, 88, 155-157 see also Christ, Holy Spirit hermeneutics 101-103, 123-125, 167 Holy Face 15, 24, 78, 105-127 Holy Spirit 151, 156-157, see also God, Trinity, triune holy/sacred (and profane) 216-217, 246-247, 257 humiliation and exaltation, see cross iconic difference 178, 241 iconoclasm 75-77, 97, 100 iconology 31, 214, 239-240

296

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

image 3, 55-71 art image/artwork 12-36, 219-236, passim cultic image 12-16, passim devotional image 11, 19, 22, 23, 40, 124 narrative image 10-11, 12, 14, 22, 23-24, 25, 48, 67, 79 portrait (holy portrait) 10-11, passim image and word 158, 171-172, 174, 238-243 images prohibition against 16-17, 75-77, 78, 194 veneration of 12-16, 75-76, 194, 201, see also council, Nicaea, Second Council of incarnation 13, 42, 44-45, 47, 48, 105126, 127-150 installation, see exhibit, exhibition Jesus, see Christ landscape painting 67-68, 87-88, 8895, 103, 203, 211, 214-216 Mandylion 12-14, 22, 78, 105-108, passim, see also Holy Face memory (and art) 10-11, 14, 19, 25, 50, 108, 250-252 Middle Ages (and image history) 4, 12-16, 22, 25, 34, 132, 252 museum (and religious art) 230-236, passim, see also exhibit, exhibition narrative image, see image painting 177-179, passim phenomenology 59-66, 185-188 photo 3, 193-194, 253-254, passim Platonism 24, see also Plato play, see art, art as play popular piety 12-16, passim portrait (holy), see image practice (and religious art) 23, 24, 230236, 243-263 presence, see God presence (of the image) 46-48, 62, see also God, presence of God or Christ

presentational, see symbol profane, see holy/sacred realism (painting) 62, 113, 135-136, 145, 166-168, 226, 254, 256 Reformation (and the religious image) 16-17 relics 15-16, 124, 140-141, 192-197, 234-235, 247, 261 religion of art, see art, religion of art religious experience, see experience religious art with Christian themes XI, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, passim and secular art XI, 37, 141-145, 191, 205, 207, 210, 217, 232, 244, 257 Renaissance, the (and art) 9, 16-19, 21-26, 27, 31, 34, 38, 79, passim representational, see symbol sacrament, see sacramental sacramental 18, 183, 184, 185-188, 197, 200, 216, 217, 257 sign iconic 22-23, 27, 31, 34, 35, 124, 150, 192, 197 indexical 22-23, 27, 31, 32, 34, 124, 136, 150, 174, 197 Stoglov, see council style, see art, style (hieratic) sublime 36, 147, 158, 220, 226, 229 surreal 36, 149, 154, 155, 210, 229 symbol 177, 179-189, passim presentational 179-180, 182-188, 188-189 representational 179-182, 188-189 terrifying-expressive 145, 229 theological aesthetics, see aesthetics Trent, see council Trinity, triune, see God, Trinity, triune Vatican Council, Second, see council Veronica, the 12-13, 14-16, 19, 22, 24, 105-108, 118-119, 123, 125, passim, see also Holy Face video 3, 11, 47-48, 123, 133, 209, 254 visual practice, see practice visual piety, see practice

ARTWORKS

1.1. Marlene Dumas in collaboration with Jan Andriesse and Bert Boogaard, Altaarstuk, 2015-2017

1.2. The Good Shepherd, beginning of the third century

1.3. Holy Face of Laon, thirteenth century

1.4. Lucas Cranach the Elder, Wittenberg Altarpiece, 1547

1.5. Hans Memling, Saint Veronica, ca. 1470-1475

1.6. James McNeill Whistler, Arrangement in Grey and Black: Portrait of the Painter’s Mother, 1871-1872

2.7. Paloma Varga Weisz, Corpse II, 1999

2.8. Paloma Varga Weisz, Lying Man, 2014

2.9. Katharina Fritsch, Display Stand with Madonnas, 1987-1989

2.10. Bill Viola, The Quintet of the Astonished, 2000

2.11. Jacopo da Pontormo, Visitation, ca. 1528

2.12. Piero della Francesca, Madonna del Parto, 1455-1465

3.13. Piero della Francesca, Legend of the True Cross, 1452-1466

3.14. Claude Monet, Water Lilies (Nymphéas), 1914-1926

3.15. Malevich, White on White, 1918

3.16. Gustave Courbet, The Oak at Flagey, 1864

3.17. Caravaggio, The Calling of Saint Matthew, ca. 1599-1600

3.18. Mark Rothko, Photograph with Seagram murals

4.19. Hospitality of Abraham, fourth century

4.20. Andrei Rublev, The Holy Trinity, 1408-1425

4.21. Masaccio, The Trinity with the Virgin, Saint John the Evangelist, and Donors, 1427-1428

4.22. Vincent van Gogh, The Sower with Setting Sun, June 1888

4.23. Vincent van Gogh, Starry Night Over the Rhône, September 1888

4.24. Vincent van Gogh, Starry Night, June 1889

4.25. Ad Reinhardt, no title, 1964

4.26. Ad Reinhardt, Black Painting No. 5, 1962

4.27. Colin McCahon, Northland, 1962

5.28. The Mandylion, 2nd half of nineteenth century

5.29. Alexej von Jawlensky, Saviour’s Face: The Holy Hour – Last Look, 1919

5.30. Alexej von Jawlensky, Abstract Head: Pain, 1927

5.31. Alexej von Jawlensky, Saviour’s Face: Christ, 1920

5.32. Alexej von Jawlensky, Meditation: Versunken, 1934

5.33. Georges Rouault, ‘Et Véronique au tendre lin passe encore sur le chemin …’, 1922

5.35. Georges Rouault, Veronica, ca. 1945

5.34. Georges Rouault, The Holy Face, ca. 1946

5.36. Georges Rouault, ‘Jésus sera en agonie jusqu’à la fin du monde’, 1926

5.37. Georges Rouault, De Profundis …, 1927

5.38. Georges Rouault, Fille au miroir, 1906

5.39. Lefteris Olympios, Veroniki or the Absent, 1999

5.40. Jacques Frenken Spijkerpiëta, ca. 1968

5.41. Albrecht Dürer, Self-Portrait, 1500

6.42. Paul Thek, Die Krippe, litter/throne, 1973

6.44. Rosemberg Sandoval, Baby Street, 1998

6.47. Matthias Grünewald, Isenheim Altarpiece, 1512-1516

6.46. Raphael, Mond Crucifixion, 1502-1503

6.48. Paul Thek, Untitled (from the series Technological Reliquaries), 1967

6.49. Paul Thek, Fishman, 1968/1969

6.50. Graham Sutherland, Study for the Northampton Crucifixion, 1946

6.51. Marc Mulders, Siena (Vleeswand), 1988

6.52. Marc Mulders, Crack L.A. II, 1989

6.53. Francis Bacon, Crucifixion, 1965

6.54. Lefteris Olympios, The Messenger, 2015

7.55. Anselm Kiefer, Sende Deinen Geist aus, 1974

7.57. Gijs Frieling, Kruisiging van Christus, 1996

7.56. Gijs Frieling, Paasmorgen, 1996

7.58. Alfred Manessier, Les Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville, 1988-1993 / La joie de Pâques au petit matin de la Résurrection (3 windows in the centre of the choir)

7.59. Alfred Manessier, L’Annonce de la Pentecôte, part of Les Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville

7.60. Alfred Manessier, Grande Nuit du Samedi Saint, part of Les Vitraux de l’Église du Saint-Sépulcre d’Abbeville

7.61. Christ Pantocrator (second half of the nineteenth century)

7.63. Graham Sutherland, Second Cartoon 1954 and Third Cartoon 1957 Christ in Glory in the Tetramorph, 1962

7.62. Christ in Majesty (The Last Judgment), ca. 1430-1440

7.68. Marlene Dumas, The Teacher (Sub B), 1987

7.67. Marlene Dumas, Jesus Serene, 1994

7.69. Marlene Dumas, (In Search of) the Perfect Lover, 1994

7.64. Marc Mulders, Het Laatste Oordeel (The Last Judgment), 2006

7.65. Marc Mulders, Christus op de regenboog (Christ on the Rainbow) Part of the stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel, 2006

7.66. Marc Mulders, 9/11 Part of the stained glass window Het Laatste Oordeel, 2006

7.70. Max Beckmann, Apocalyps No. 25, 1941-1942

8.71. J.M.W. Turner, The Arrival of Louis-Philippe at the Royal Clarence Yard (ca. 1844-1845)

8.72. Annemiek Punt, Glass work, 2005

9.73. Annemiek Punt, two windows, 2007

11.77. Lucas Cranach the Younger, Weimar altarpiece, 1555

9.74. Raphael, The Alba Madonna, ca. 1510

9.75. Rembrandt, Landscape with a Stone Bridge, circa 1638

9.76. Jacob van Ruisdael, Landscape with a Corn Field Near the Sea, ca. 1660

9.75a. Detail of Rembrandt, Landscape with a Stone Bridge [9.75]

9.76a. Detail of Jacob van Ruisdael, Landscape with a Corn Field Near the Sea [9.76]

11.78. Giotto, The Kiss of Judas (The Arrest of Christ), 1304-1306

11.79. Derk Thijs and Chris Brans, DAH OSLA DOTHEM, 2011-2012

11.80. Derk Thijs and Chris Brans, DAH OSLA DOTHEM, 2011-2012

11.81. Boris Mikhailov, Case History, 1997-1998

11.82. Boris Mikhailov, Case History, 1997-1998

11.83. Henk Helmantel, Stillevencompositie, 2003

11.84. Henk Helmantel Stilleven met schelpen, 2006

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31. P.F. Bloemendaal, Grammars of Faith. A Critical Evaluation of D.Z. Phillips’s Philosophy of Religion, Leuven, 2006 32. J.-M. Narbonne & W.J. Hankey, Levinas and the Greek Heritage followed by One Hundred Years of Neoplatonism in France: a Brief Philosophical History, Leuven, 2006 33. J.-W. Barbeau (ed.), Coleridge’s Assertion of Religion: Essays on the Opus Maximum, Leuven, 2006 34. W. Stoker, Is Faith Rational? A Hermeneutical-Phenomenological Accounting for Faith, Leuven, 2006 35. L. Anckaert, A Critique of Infinity. Rosenzweig and Levinas, Leuven, 2006 36. P. Schaafsma, Reconsidering Evil. Confronting Reflections with Confessions, Leuven, 2007 37. K. Johannesson, God Pro Nobis. On Non-Metaphysical Realism and the Philosophy of Religion, Leuven, 2007 38. C.R. Joby, Calvinism and the Arts: A Re-assessment, Leuven, 2007 39. J. Geldhof, Revelation, Reason and Reality. Theological Encounters with Jaspers, Schelling and Baader, Leuven, 2007 40. B. Hebblethwaite, The Philosophical Theology of Austin Farrer, Leuven, 2007 41. P. Fridlund, L. Kaennel, C. Stenqvist (eds.), Plural Voices. Intradisciplinary Perspectives on Interreligious Issues, Leuven, 2009 42. B. Carter, ‘The Little Commonwealth of Man’: The Trinitarian Origins of the Ethical and Political Philosophy of Ralph Cudworth, Leuven, 2010 43. C. Ryan, Schopenhauer's Philosophy of Religion. The Death of God and the Oriental Renaissance, Leuven, 2010 44. M. Vejrup Nielsen, Sin and Selfish Genes. Christian and Biological Narratives, Leuven, 2010 45. K. Alfsvag, What No Mind Has Conceived. On the Significance of Christological Apophaticism, Leuven, 2010 46. H. Clement, Antwort auf den Nihilismus. Die Philosophische Theologie von Wilhelm Weischedel, Leuven, 2010 47. J.-O. Hendriksen, Finitude and Theological Anthropology. An Interdisciplinary Exploration into Theological Dimensions of Finitude, Leuven, 2010 48. P. Fridlund, Mobile Performances. Linguistic Undecidability as Possibility and Problem in the Theology of Religions, Leuven, 2011 49. G. Dumbreck, Schleiermacher and Religious Feeling, Leuven, 2012 50. W. Stoker & W.L. van der Merwe (eds.), Culture and Transcendence. A Typology of Transcendence, Leuven, 2012 51. R. MacSwain, Solved by Sacrifice. Austin Farrer, Fideism, and the Evidence of Faith, Leuven, 2013 52. J.-A. Meylahn, The Limits and Possibilities of Postmetaphysical God-Talk. A Conversation between Heidegger, Levinas and Derrida, Leuven, 2013 53. D. Leech, The Hammer of the Cartesians. Henry More’s Philosophy of Spirit and the Origins of Modern Atheism, Leuven, 2013 54. R. Masson, Without Metaphor, no Saving God. Theology after Cognitive Linguistics, Leuven, 2014 55. G. Keogh, The Evolution of Hope. Theological Metaethics in the Context of Evolution, Leuven, 2016 56. E.D. Baldwin, Fully Informed Reasonable Disagreement and Tradition Based Perspectivalism, Leuven, 2016 57. N. Brunsveld, The Many Faces of Religious Truth. Hilary Putnam’s Pragmatic Pluralism on Religion, Leuven, 2017

58. J. Bryson, The Christian Platonism of Thomas Jackson, Leuven, 2016 59. N.H. Gregersen, M. Stenmark (eds.), Naturalism and Beyond. Religious Naturalism and Its Alternatives, Leuven, 2016 60. C. Cimorelli, John Henry Newman’s Theology of History. Historical Consciousness, Theological ‘Imaginaries’, and the Development of Tradition, Leuven, 2017 61. D.-J. Eklund, Faith and Will. Voluntariness of Faith in Analytic Theism, Leuven, 2017 62. D.A. Michaud, Reason Turned into Sense: John Smith on Spiritual Sensation, Leuven, 2017 63. F. Jonbäck, The God who Seeks but Seems to Hide, Leuven, 2017 64. C.R. Brewer, Christian Theology and the Transformation of Natural Religion: From Incarnation to Sacramentality. Essays in Honour of David Brown, Leuven, 2018 65. J. Orr, The Mind of God and the Works of Nature: Laws and Powers in Naturalism, Platonism, and Classical Theism, Leuven, 2019 66. J. Gillett, Compatibilist Freedom and the Problem of Evil, Leuven, 2018 67. M. Jakobsen, Moral Realism and the Existence of God. Improving Parfit’s Metaethics, Leuven, 2020 68. T. Bersee, On the Meaning of ‘Miracle’ in Christianity. A Philosophical Evaluation of the Current Miracle Debate and a Proposal of a Balanced Hermeneutical Approach, Leuven, 2021

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