The Cathedrals Fabric Commission for England (CFCE) have refused on two occasions the application made by the Chapter of Chichester Cathedral to commission Jaume Plensa's Together for installation in the Cathedral as the Hussey Memorial Commission. The grounds for rejection are to
do with the perception of significant change in the character of the space
above the Arundel Bell Screen as a result of the installation.
It is undeniable
that there would be significant change to this space as a result of the
installation. The more complex question is whether the change that would occur
is positive or negative, allowable or not. The chapter have argued that the
change should be accepted and the CFCE have ruled that the change would be
unacceptable. The commission has therefore come to an impasse because no basis
for further discussion exists. This is because there are no objective criteria
on which it is possible to discuss this issue or, in my view, the quality of
art generally.
All of us
routinely make judgements about the art that we encounter. Art is something
which generally provokes opinions, whether positive or negative. However, when
asked to explain the basis on which we make these judgements most of us would
struggle to do so. Often we resort to saying things like, ‘I know what I like,’
which are ways of closing down the conversation without answering the question
or examining our own assumptions. We tend to assume though that art
professionals do have some more objective means of assessing the worth or
quality of artworks. After all, they are constantly selecting work to show and
attributing differing values, financial and otherwise, to that work.
Jonathan Jones is an art critic for The Guardian who has acknowledged that the age of the art
critic as an unassailable voice of authority is long gone due to the force of
digital debate and the era of readers biting back. Entitled 'how I learned to look – and listen' Jones wrote that the way he thinks about art criticism has
changed: "Criticism in the age of social media has to be much more playful
and giving ... Criticism today is not about delivering truths from on high, but
about striking a spark that lights a debate."
In the past, he
argues, he and other art critics could speak in an "aggressive, cocksure,
dismissive voice, determined to prove that my opinion was worth more than my
readers" but "in today's more open forum – where people answer back,
and where people often know more than I do – it becomes more and more absurd to
claim such august authority for one's opinions." As a result, the way he
thinks about his work, and about art, "is infinitely more plural and
ambiguous than it was in 2006." Essentially, Jones is arguing that, while
he can still express strong opinions, he is now much more aware that his
opinions are essentially personal opinions and need to be acknowledged as such.
The underlying implication is that there are no agreed criteria for assessing,
evaluating and critiquing contemporary art.
Yet we continue
to look for rules or talk as though these exist. Grayson Perry explored the issue of taste in the Channel 4 series All In The Best Possible Taste. He thought that "there will always be this
barrier where there are people who are looking for rules. A lot of the lower
middle class still need reassurance and clear rules, which they find in brands
and in definite trends because they perhaps don't have the confidence to go on
their own intuition and try something else out. So there's always going to be a
large proportion of the population that have what they think is a very clear
idea about what is good taste. But of course the good taste is just an
illusion; it's just that they're obeying the rules of their tribe."
Within the art
world, Perry suggests, the rule by which people work is that of consensus plus
time i.e. “If it's agreed amongst the tribe for a fairly sustained amount of
time, then it becomes good taste.” This is no different, then, to the seeking
after rules which he criticizes in the lower middle class. On this basis, too,
“good taste is just an illusion; it's just that they're obeying the rules of
their tribe.” But many choose to work on this basis that, as artists,
commissioners, critics, curators, gallery owners, historians or patrons, they
know what good taste is because of consensus plus time. If one is in agreement
with the consensus it is, of course, a safe place to be.
This does not
mean that no criteria exist at all within the visual arts as there are clear
technical criteria within each discipline that relate to whether or not the
work is well made. However, these relate to the artwork as a craft object and
do not provide us with answers as to the difference between a piece which has
been competently crafted and one which demonstrates significant artistic vision
or merit. Nor does it mean that particular groups, by consensus, do not have
their own criteria. What does not exist, however, are any broadly accepted, and
therefore objective, criteria.
In a dispute like
that over the Hussey Memorial Commission, because there are no objective
criteria on which discussion can be based, all that can be done to argue the
case in favour of the commission is to demonstrate the consensus which supports
it. That is essentially what the chapter did in response to the first rejection
presenting significant support for the proposal from public consultation and
written support from significant arts professionals; all this on the back of an
initial well-run and broad selection process. Yet when the CFCE rules that they
perceive a different consensus against the proposal, there is essentially
nowhere else that the discussion can go because there is no objective basis for
dialogue.
What has happened
in essence within the visual arts is that the action of Marcel Duchamp in exhibiting ready-mades and his arguing that the choice of the artist makes them
art (now widely accepted as the most significant art event of the twentieth
century) has opened floodgates which render rules or criteria for the creation
and comparison of artworks superfluous.
As a result, we
enjoy huge diversity in the visual arts. So, for example, I have been able to
see a wide variety of styles and media of art and architecture in the
sabbatical visits I have made. But the techniques required for each medium are
often not transferable to other media, meaning that like cannot be compared
with like. In this way, the variety of styles and media that exist within
contemporary art limit the extent to which contrasts and comparisons can be
made. As art can now be made of anything that the artist wishes, one blindingly
obvious implication seems to be that the quality of a piece of video art by
Bill Viola, for example, cannot be gauged by comparing it positively or
negatively to a painting by Maurice Denis or stained glass by John Piper. Each
is its own entity within a medium with its own techniques. As a result, widely accepted quality standards for works of art no
longer exist. In addition, the techniques required for many of the traditional
forms of Church art – stained glass, mosaic etc. – are no longer as widely
understood as previously nor are these media generally viewed as cutting edge;
a factor which impacts on the attention paid to church commissions within the
art world.
The Church world
and the art world, on the basis of Perry’s definition, are essentially
different tribes with different tastes and fashions causing confusion for the
emerging artist who is a Christian and those who commission art for churches. The
dichotomy which is often cited between significant contemporary artists
participating in church commissions and "self-styled 'Christian art' that
though sincere and well-intentioned" is "often formulaic or
decorative" and has "little or no standing within the art world,"
is essentially a debate about which tribe’s rules of good taste it is best to
apply. Ultimately, that is a superfluous debate about illusions.
The way through
this situation is, I think, what I perceive Sister Wendy Beckett to be doing in
her art criticism, meditations and TV programmes. Sister Wendy is an informed
enthusiast who applies the injunction in Philippians 4:8, to fill our minds
with those things that are good and that deserve praise, to her writing and
presenting. The kind of poring and praying over images that characterizes
Beckett's best writing can be a distinctively Christian contribution to the
plurality of art criticism and the experience of commissioning for churches. Beckett
cultivates a prayerful attentiveness to the artwork through sustained
contemplation in order to see or sense what is good and of God in it,
regardless of whether the artist who made it has an international, national,
regional or local reputation.
Early on in my
sabbatical I gave a talk on visual art to the East London Three Faiths Forum in
which I said that art, at its best, is epiphany and sacrament. In other words
art takes the stuff of everyday life and transforms it so that we see it,
ourselves and God differently. This was reiterated for me towards the end of
the sabbatical in a talk by Rev. Sam Wells, Vicar of St Martin-in-the-Fields, on ‘Art
and the Renewal of St Martin’s’ where he also spoke of the sacramental nature
of art.
In a talk I gave
to the Friends of Chelmsford Cathedral earlier this year I said: “To encounter
the Gospel in contemporary art, diversity must be embraced. The traditional
forms of expressing the Gospel in art – illustrating Biblical narratives and
the lives of the Saints – remain, albeit sometimes in the newer forms of
movements like Expressionism, while attraction and reaction to the meaning,
impacts and influences of the Gospel also continue to inspire creative work by
contemporary artists working in fields such as the abstract, conceptual, performance
and relational arts.”
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