Paul Hebblethwaite

Exit Through the Gift Shop

Paul Hebblethwaite — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 15:30:37 -0800

Street punk and artist, Banksy's rise to fame continues with the superbly funny documentary, Exit Through the Gift Shop.

Debate continues concerning the authenticity of the documentary and many believe the movie and resulting fame of the artist Mr. Brainwash are an elaborate performance art piece, though by this point we are all wondering if life is anything other than a long performance art piece with an end we all avoid.

The most fascinating component of the film is the progressive transformation of the main character from film taker (not maker) to art star persona Mr. Brainwash. It is a wonderful and playful study on how we as people absorb and create identity; and why your mother warns you to not hang out with certain people.

Abstract Contemplation

Paul Hebblethwaite — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 14:10:12 -0800

An active participant in the Art and Shelter program since the beginning, Dan Callis has been the point of contact for many artists who have filled the empty walls of our housing programs. Professor of Art at Biola University, Dan is a prolific painter and curator.

In the last year, Dan has organized a series of exhibitions by local painters in multiple venues, building awareness in the community of an evolving group of artists. He recently mounted a solo exhibition at Bunny Gunner in Pomona. At the end of a sabbatical and recent residency in Barcelona Spain, Callis’s work is emerging from the studio with fresh energy and a complex layering of composition and meaning.

The work reflects an appreciation for the dynamics of the material, from the board the paintings is built on top of to the way layers interact across straight lines, curves, drips, and splats. The rawness of the work brings to mind the unconscious layering of abstraction that heavily gratified walls conjure over time.

Dan Callis' art is a good reminder of the unfolding potential of abstract work to train our eyes to see more clearly the complexity of our visual environment. Though many people pass on the assumed simplicity of abstraction, the time spent with this type of work translates into a contemplative depth that helps us develop spiritual practices toward greater maturity as individual people. The work of Dan Callis is a form of art that we should live, pray, and brood over as we seek a deeper understanding of who we are in this frustratingly beautiful and tragic world.

Mud Struggle

Paul Hebblethwaite — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 12:29:24 -0800

“Kin”, an exhibition of photographs that explore the dynamics of home and family, opened at the Art and Shelter gallery in November. On view through January, the collection of photographs gives the viewer the meditative opportunity to explore the visual breadth of family life.

Mud Struggle, by Kurt Simonson, is an intimate and dirty peek into the unfettered lives of children in the North Woods of our country. A classic composition of children playing in the mud, all work and play as the children search the surface and below for lost treasures or some unknown object of interest. For a photographer, the amazing composition of figures represents the rare moment of opportunity. Beyond its beauty, the image also invites us to participate in the moment, leaving the viewer checking their shoes for traces of mud.

The photograph comes from a larger body of work entitled North Woods Journal, a collection of quirky and visually rich images that explore Kurt Simonson’s family life. Combined, the photographs tell a story of a photographer (and California transplant) looking deeply at the unique flavor of his heritage and using the photographic image to bring sharp splendor and a little nostalgia to an experience history is likely to gently let go.

The Weather Project

Paul Hebblethwaite — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:37:27 -0700

Opened in 2000 and designed to accommodate up to 2 million visitors each year, the Tate Modern in London is now visited by over 5 million people a year.One of its most spectacular destinations is the Turbine Hall, the cavernous center of the former power plant.

A 2003 Turbine Hall installation was The Weather Project by Olaf Ureliasson. An artificial roof of mirrors cut the hall in half vertically and a semi-circle of light illuminates the hall with a hazy gold accentuated by a fine mist drifting through the hall.

The Weather Project is an incredible example of how an architectural space can be transformed by an awarness of how design and lighting interact. A similiar principle applies to many of the Europe's Cathedrals, and is a creative tool for worship often lacking in contemporary church design.

Visit the Tate Modern to learn more about The Weather Project and contemplate ways your sacred space might be transformed by different qualities of light.

Tools for the Conversation

Paul Hebblethwaite — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 17:06:44 -0700

The news and commentary swirling around the confrontation between Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates and a Cambridge police officer is a reminder that the election of Barack Obama is not a period at the end of America’s race conversation. Though the confrontation itself may not be a case of racial profiling, the ongoing reaction to the event demonstrates the need for continued discussion.

The discussion should continue and adapt overtime to the changing dynamics of our society. For example, in Los Angeles the discussion has to adapt to the new dynamic of Hispanics becoming the majority population in historically African-American neighborhoods like South Los Angeles, Watts, and Compton. In the same way that discussion around gender continues, our conversation about race doesn’t end just because glass ceilings are being shattered. I would also point out that the last place the conversation should end is within the Church, were segregation is still a chronic problem within every denomination.

To help this conversation we need creative tools for exposing and understanding prejudice.

An incredible source for conversational reference points and discussion catalysts is the creative arts. A good example of a visual artist whose work places the discussion of prejudice front and center is Kara Walker. Utilizing the stark visual impact of black and white cut out drawings, Kara Walker subverts the racist subtexts of American history in a direct confrontation of stereotypes. Her work is jarring and even offensive in its explicit amplification of racial and sexual stereotypes, but its direct style leaves the audience responsible to condemn the historical roots manifest in each image.

Sadly, the Church has done so little to cultivate the arts that there are very few practitioners within the Church that can offer tools to help congregations talk about race, sexism, and other forms of human prejudice. We just don’t have that many storytellers (visual, oral, written, and physical) to help us confront our fear and dislike of the “other”.

Persepolis 2.0

Paul Hebblethwaite — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:59:12 -0700

Last year saw the release of the animated film Persepolis, an adaption of the comics by Marjane Satrapi. In the movie, the story of Marjane unfolds through the Iranian Revolution, living abroad in Europe, and her return to an Iran changed by Islamic law. In response to the election protests, two Iranian cartoonists have created Persepolis 2.0 using the original images of Satrapi accompanying a new narrative based on the recent election experience. You can view Persepolis 2.0 online at spreadpersepolis.com.

The most striking parallel to the original Persepolis is the last frame were God is holding who is now Neda in his arms saying, "Don't cry Neda, your death will not be in vain...". It is fascinating to see the original images from the novel "recycled" to portray a contemporary event. It is a stark reminder of the repeating cycle of history.

As I have watched the forced democratic journalism in Iran during the election aftermath I am reminded of the growing responsibility of individuals to share information as the newspaper industry is gutted by the Internet and an outdated business model. We can no longer rely on investigative journalism to hold our government accountable, but find unique ways to collaborate as net(citizens). In the last two weeks I have been very impressed by efforts at the Guardian Newspaper in the UK were they are harnessing the power of the Internet to collect information. First, getting help combing through expense records for MPs and now cataloguing the arrests, disappearances, and deaths of Iranian protesters.

No Soul For Sale

Paul Hebblethwaite — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 17:15:51 -0700

X Initiative has brought together over 40 nonprofit arts organizations in the former Dia Art Foundation building for a un-art festival titled “No Soul for Sale”. The festival is filling a void between exhibitions, with the next exhibition by X opening July 9th.

Using taped lines in the building’s cavernous space, different organizations are organizing a series of creative experiences including solo shows, group exhibitions, screenings, and lectures/discussions. In these difficult economic times, the empty pause between is being filled with the creative potential of human experience.

No Soul for Sale is an excellent reminder of the accessibility hardwired into the arts. Despite a selective economy surrounding the fine arts, creativity can be embraced with little more than a stick and a patch of dirt, drum sticks and a plastic bucket, or pen and paper.

I wonder if we will surface from this recession more creative or just desperate for the same care free consumption we have indulged in for the last half century?

Not being prophetically gifted, I can only hope that the unique blend of technology and limited resources we are faced with is a catalyst for a flowering of creativity. The recession is a great opportunity to reboot our society with a more sustainable perspective. We need to learn how to live abundantly with less, which I believe, will lead us down the road toward relationship investments and a creative exploration of the world God has so graciously given us.

Photo: Yana Paskova for The New York Times
Reference: New York Times "No Soul For Sale"

Art Needs the Church, 1956

Paul Hebblethwaite — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 16:47:52 -0700

I periodically search Google for evidence of growth in the relationship between the visual arts and the Church. On my most recent search of "Art in Church" I discovered an article published in Time Magazine called "Art Needs the Church". The article highlighted a decision by the National Council of Churches to establish a Department of Worship and the Arts. If I hadn't been paying attention I might of missed that the article was dated February 13, 1956. That's right, 1956. Take Google at face value and you would think not much has happened with "Art in Church" for over 50 years (other than the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship and an article by Alfred J. Freddoso at University of Notre Dame).

The article "Art Needs the Church" seemed to parrallel many of the conversations I have overheard or participated in, with quotes like "The church should have a vanguard of men and women qualified to interpret the significance of contemporary art for the believer ... in terms of Christian criteria." or...

"The church must also "challenge and expose the unexamined errors of our contemporaries in all that concerns their values, loyalties, way of life and assumptions in connection with the novels they read, the plays and films they see, the music they play and hear, the buildings in which they live, work and worship, the social symbols they revere, the dreams and fables, indeed the myths they feed upon." or...

"reassume its ancient and proper responsibility and productivity with reference to all the arts," an undertaking that "it could well begin by purging its own arts [of the] insipid or precious or esoteric or sentimental."

However, this is a 50 year discussion that many visual artists are moving beyond; starting to look at how missional and emerging church ideas impact their role as artists who are Christian. Many are interested in moving INTO a more dynamic role as extensions of the Church's cultural contribution to and critique of contemporary culture. This desire for a more integrated geography of presentation doesn't mean the abandonment of exhibiting art in churches, but that a singular focus on the empty walls of a church overlooks the opportunity to fill empty walls in society.

Image by Georges Roualt, Celui Qui Croit En Moi, Fut-Il Mort Vivra, 1956

Completed (In Progress) Julie Kocher

Paul Hebblethwaite — Tue, 26 May 2009 10:40:36 -0700

The current Art and Shelter exhibition at The Salvation Army Alegria is a collection of art by 2009 Biola University Graduates. The exhibition is a wildly diverse collection of style and content, ranging from pastel portraits, backlight photographs, to crochet story tales.

“Meditation VII” by Julie Kocher is mounted on the wall just outside our child care center. While most of our work is hung beyond the reach of a 4 year old's hungry grasp, this particular piece is tantalizingly within reach. The work is a small card file box with the image of a flower imbedded in layers of wax. The flower is drawn with thread; with each thread covered by wax creating a three dimensional effect. Inside the box is a series of cards. Each card is a line in a poem that unfolds as the reader flips through the index cards.

The work is somewhat inspired by a unique class at Biola University that brought together a painter and poet who taught a curriculum exploring the relationship and difference between the two fields of study. In Kocher’s work, the layers of thread and index cards extend the viewers experience beyond a quick glance, and challenge the audience to experience the art more intimately. “Meditations VII” is a work that can't be easily viewed by more than one person. The viewer must take possession of the piece in order to read the poetry, blocking others from experiencing the work. As the poem is read, the details of the flower on the top are revealed because the viewing distance is shortened by the act of reading. Kocher has created a liturgical experience that fuses the best of poetry, reflection, and pre-computer library searches.

“Meditation VII” is an excellent focusing devise for experiencing the text of the poem, and a great example of how the visual arts might amplify the meaning of scripture.

I See the Promised Land

Paul Hebblethwaite — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 14:52:37 -0700

In the early eighties Tim Rollins began working in the Bronx as a school teacher, teaching emotionally handicapped and learning disabled students. Art-making provided a teaching strategy, and the collaborative process of Tim Rollins and KOS (Kids of Survival) grew out of this pedagogical model.

I See the Promised Land is a printed copy of the speech by Martin Luther King Jr. with a black triangle painted over the text.

Tim Rollins and K.O.S., "I see the promised land (after the Rev. Dr. M. L. King, Jr.) Triangle" (2008)