Unlike Mapplethorpe, Serrano’s publicly funded life as an artist left behind a body of work that is unable to produce even a good looking website: A failure in the eyes of the NEA?  I hope so.  Wasted tax dollars?  Perhaps in this isolated case.  However, this scrutiny; this scouring, cleansing, one-moment-in-time, upheaval in the art world got funding cut so guys like Mapplethorpe and Serrano could never again desecrate the things we hold sacred.  Yippee!  Hooray!  Great work; the world is better because of it.  I don’t think so….  Let me explain.

   While I don’t want to financially support Serrano’s depiction of Jesus cresting the foamy wave brought on by a Cleveland Browns half-time, I also don’t want this incident to define the role of sowing seeds into artist.  I’m not a homosexual, and, as such, I’m not interested in attending a showcase of men posturing on men.  But I, with equal fervor, don’t want that ONE exhibition to stop us from seeing the necessity of art, artists and our Creatively Inspired nature to appreciate things of beauty.Don’t we get it?  When we create things of beauty, we are swimming in the very nature of God.  The plastic symbol Serrano put in the jar of his murky toxin represents more than bad art; if art at all.  It represents, if you look closely enough, that the Creator of the universe whose symbol was sloshed around the United States, partially at our expense, loves Serrano.  Jesus is able to love an artist through the urine in which we placed Him.  Isn’t it ironic, that in reality, Jesus is less put-off by this art than the people who are furious over the “desecration of a holy symbol?”  Is symbolism becoming greater than what they represent?  Jesus is able to look through the symbols Mapplethorpe photographed to see Robert, himself.  Robert is someone Jesus loves and whose expression He appreciated; not the appreciation of homoeroticism, but an appreciation of Mapplethorpe’s ability to be like God…to see and create.

   Again, I’m not for pissing on a crucifix nor will my office “don we now our gay apparel, (fa-la-la) with stuff like men-on-men photographs (well, perhaps me and Vic in our wrestling uniforms might quality).  But, I am unabashedly in support of money being sown into artists.

   Art is, as I’ve already stated, elusive by definition.  While I may not agree with a couple isolated examples of grant dollars ill-spent, I refuse to let them define or abandon the vast, prolific body of creativity that every culture needs from her artists: We, as human beings, need to see people being like God.  We love it when a hundred year, dirty water supply is cleaned up allowing Africans to drink clean water.  That is an example of us being like God.  We love it when we hear of an orphan being adopted because that’s our story; it is a reminder to us of God…He’s like that.  Those things are visible, tangible testimonies of His pleasure in our existence.  We celebrate Him in our works as such.  Who doesn’t love the Sistine Chapel?  How about the frescos at Florence or the statue of David?  …all phenomenal works of creation.  In so doing, Michelangelo was being like God; he was expressing the beauty of his gifting, a gifting from God.  The notes penned in anguish by Mozart; notes that transport us to a different place of reality…We love Mozart!  But really, we love the part of him that is like God.  I really think if we met Michelangelo or Mozart, we would have utter disdain for them as people.  They were extremely difficult to get along with, add Michelangelo’s appetite for young, male understudies….uh oh.   There goes the entire grant program.  I can hear Senator Helms right now: “How can we fund something like the Sistine Chapel If Michelangelo’s break time is spent fondling a man who cleans his paint brushes…and all this right smack dab in the middle of the church.”  We should make it easy; simply, out of deference for good behavior, stop funding everyone’s everything. Had we snuffed out the NEA dollars to Michelangelo, what would we have?  Possibly another pissed off catholic, like Serrano, whose creativity was stifled by our disdain for the part of him that Is not like God rather than speaking to the part of him that is…his majestic vision of God’s most pervasive revelation-His Creation.  No one has depicted a more beautiful understanding of God’s creativity than Michelangelo.  I don’t think he’d get past the grant application stage in the post-Mapplethorpe, post-Serrano NEA world of artist funding.

   In case you’ve never noticed, go to any art museum and look at the content of 18^th century art in comparison with 19^th and 20^th century art.  What’s different?  The subject, almost exclusively, up to that time in art history is a deep sense and appeal to physical creation and heaven.  Then we kicked the artists out of the church.  Now look.  The subject and content of our creative expression changed to us, almost overnight and almost imperceptibly.  Not that we aren’t a part of creation; of course we are, but we are now almost exclusively the focus of all art created.  The subject of art is no longer the grandeur of God’s physical revelation-His creation, the content is now almost unswervingly focused on the only thing in creation that chose to became flawed!Something happened historically and I think I know what it is.  Michelangelo, Rafael, Van Gogh, even Monet simply grew weary of fighting us for their redemptive process and right to create as they see.  Since God made sure these gifts would never go away (Romans 11:29-God’s gifts and call are irrevocable) the desire and penchant to create doesn’t fade.  We didn’t chase the gift out of the church, we chased out the artists, the receiver of His gifts…people.  His people.  They still create, see, paint, chisel, notate according to their gift and call by God, we just stole their best and safest environment and “invited” them to do that elsewhere.  Then we all got “pissed’ when they didn’t do it like we wanted them to.  Reminiscent of the Native Americans, don’t you think?  We told farming tribes to become hunters, then told the hunting tribes to farm and failed to understand why they were mad at us as they watched their people literally starve from their inability to live and prosper inside the only parameters of living they’d ever known.  Historically, they are still hurt, defeated and angry.  Like the artists, they simply stopped fighting and stayed the hell away from us

   I know there are no easy answers.  Any perspective brings about a different host of questions and problems.  What am I suggesting?  I’m suggesting this: if we really want to be like God, and I think we do, then let’s have His perspective.  Instead of deciding whether to invest in someone solely based on the product, let’s invest in the person.  Let’s continue sowing into artists even if some of the product is disagreeable.  Let’s continue to invest in artists as people even if some of them create in anger or pain or religious animosity.  Let’s continue to celebrate the part of us that’s like God, the taking care of widows and orphans (a direct quote from the book of James), the unquenchable love for people as people, as well as the sheer, majestic awe of His creative beauty every night in a sunset.  While Serrano may see more “yellow” in his depiction of color than I do, I need often to be reminded that Serrano is like God in some way.  My eyes may have trouble seeing that, but that’s an issue with my eyes, not God’s.I am not in favor of giving Serrano money for pooping on a pizza box and topping it with a menorah; that would be funding a part of Serrano that is hurting him.  I don’t think giving tax money to White Power Bill for his pictures of a swastika is money well-spent.  But I will say this: I would hate to miss a Michelangelo or a Rafael or a Bach because a guy like Mapplethorpe wasn’t to my liking.

   I feel better having said that.  Thank you for staying with me to this conclusion. Now, a reward for weathering my incessant banter: Do you want to see something worth looking at?  Go to www.sandanimation.com and view Ferenc Cako’s creativity; it is so like God.  His depiction of creation by using only sand is like nothing I’ve ever seen before.  So good is it that I’d allow myself to be a little disturbed by a urine-soaked crucifix if it meant tons of stuff like Cako’s would be allowed to exist.  Realistically, I think that’s what God meant when He said, “While you were yet sinners, Jesus died for you.”  At our worst moment, God said creating us was still worth it to Him.  I want to be like God in that way….

   Art for Christ’s Sake (I stole this salutation from my friend and one of my favorite artists-Dan Gilliam)