Recovering the Lost Unity Between Art and the Sacred - Jacob Hamitlon

 Gerardus Van Der Leeuw, in his book, Sacred and Profane Beauty, speaks of a split in the activities of humans. Originally, art, play, religion and work were all united. Gradually, they came to be separated. Today, I think, the split has become particularly bad. People no longer think of going to church as an aesthetic experience. Likewise, very few people think of going to an art museum as something sacred. Much of the world’s great art was produced for religious purposes. Religious art had the function of making the divine truly present.  

Since the protestant reformation in the west, Churches gradually lost their sense of beauty. The use of Iconography fell under suspicion and Churches eventually ceased being a grand works of architecture. This is an unfortunate state of things. Religion without beauty is dull. Art without the sacred falls into decadence and decay. Art becomes commercial and ideological. It no longer acts as a bridge to the sacred. The split has not only affected the protestant churches but also the Catholics as well. It is rare to find a Catholic church today with the grandeur of the medieval churches. Furthermore, religious art no longer seems to carry the power it once did.  

In order to overcome this split, there must be new ways of engaging with the sacred. The artist’s job should be a sacred profession. An artist is not meant to produce pretty little images, but gateways to the Divine. I think part of the reason for the split is that religion and the Sacred has become something personal. Spirituality has been reduced to a fanciful sentiment one feels about the world that is regarded as strictly private. Without the Sacred pervading our world, the world becomes bland. When the Sacred no longer fills our activities, the Divine becomes almost nonexistent. In order to heal the split Van Der Leeuw speaks about, people need to find new ways for the Sacred to fill their everyday activities again.