Long Ago and Far Away

©A. Rutherford

Long ago and far away, but not a fairy tale.

Maundy Thursday, or Holy Thursday, in the Christian faith is a day to observe the last meal Jesus shared with his disciples.  It is a solemn day, a day lived out under the shadow of betrayal, a day for reflection and personal questioning.

 "When evening came, he sat down with his twelve disciples, and, while they were at table he said: “Believe me, one of you is to going to betray me.” 

They were full of sorrow, and began to say, one after another, “Lord, is it I?” He answered, “The man who has put his hand into the dish with me will betray me.” 

For the Son of Man goes on his way to die, as the scripture foretells of him; But how terrible it will be for the one who betrays him; better for that man if he had never been born."          Matthew 26:21-24

This scene in the Easter story has engaged the imagination of artists throughout the centuries, but the most famous painting of the event is that of Leonardo da Vinci.  However, his Last Supper is not the usual static tableau of figures frozen in time, but rather Leonardo has rendered each disciple caught up in the emotions of shock, anger, agitation, or fear.  Their gestures and expressions have reverberated through time, and one cannot look at the painting for long without being caught up in the question too—”Am I one of them, Lord?”

The Last Supper (ca. 1492/94–1498)

Leonardo's Last Supper, on the end wall of the refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, is one of the most renowned paintings of the High Renaissance. Recently restored, The Last Supper had already begun to flake during the artist's lifetime due to his failed attempt to paint on the walls in layers (not unlike the technique of tempera on panel), rather than in a true fresco technique.  Even in its current state, it is a masterpiece of dramatic narrative and subtle pictorial illusionism. 

Leonardo chose to capture the moment just after Christ tells his apostles that one of them will betray him, and at the institution of the Eucharist. The effect of his statement causes a visible response, in the form of a wave of emotion among the apostles. These reactions are quite specific to each apostle, expressing what Leonardo called the "motions of the mind." Despite the dramatic reaction of the apostles, Leonardo imposes a sense of order on the scene. Christ's head is at the center of the composition, framed by a halo-like architectural opening. His head is also the vanishing point toward which all lines of the perspectival projection of the architectural setting converge. The apostles are arranged around him in four groups of three united by their posture and gesture. Judas, who was traditionally placed on the opposite side of the table, is here set apart from the other apostles by his shadowed face. 

Source: Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) | Thematic Essay | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The poet Rainer Maria Rilke upon seeing Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper in Milan in 1904 was moved to write the following poem:

The Last Supper

They are assembled, astonished and disturbed

round him, who like a sage resolved his fate,

and now leaves those to whom he most belonged,

leaving and passing by them like a stranger.

The loneliness of old comes over him

which helped mature him for his deepest acts;

now will he once again walk through the olive grove,

and those who love him still will flee before his sight.

To this last supper he has summoned them,

and (like a shot that scatters birds from trees)

their hands draw back from reaching for the loaves

upon his word: they fly across to him;

they flutter, frightened, round the supper table

searching for an escape. But he is present

everywhere like an all-pervading twilight-hour. 

                                           _________________

While not a “last supper” poem, the following excerpt from a poem, “Rice,” by Mary Oliver makes a salient point.   She uses the metaphor of a rice field to make a powerful statement about what our response should be to the gift of risen Life.  Are we to be observers only, satisfied that our bellies are filled?

. . .

I don't want you to just sit at the table.

I don't want you just to eat, and be content.

I want you to walk into the fields

Where the water is shining, and the rice has risen.

I want you to stand there, far from the white tablecloth.

I want you to fill your hands with mud, like a blessing.

Yes,  something that happened long ago and far away . . .  but its meaning is just as relevant today.

"Like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life." Romans 6:4b

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The Beauty We Do

The garden of my 90 year old mother

"Let the Beauty you love be what you do."  -Rumi

Below are some more thoughts from Joe Paquet, the contemporary traditional landscape painter from yesterday’s post.  But of course, few of us are painters.  However, that doesn’t preclude us from working to develop our sense of awareness of the beauty that lies around us, what Joe calls “a personal sense of vision that is authentic and individual.”

He explains in an interview that “there are certain aspects to making art that are germane to all of us.” 

And I agree . . . I think that his thoughts in this interview do indeed pertain to us all.  Why?

Because each of us is participating in a culture that is exerting an influence on us, and on our children, and we need to be aware of what those motivational impulses and influences are, and what kinds of subtle effects they are having on us.  And we need to be tirelessly vigilant in that regard.

Thus, if Art is a mirror that is reflecting what is going on in the culture, then how can we not pay attention to what is going on in the world of the Fine Arts and in the so-called art, music, literature and film of the general culture.

And how can we not pay attention to our responsibility to provide a counterbalance with the intentional beauty and integrity of the things we do or make, the activities in which we engage, and the choices or decisions we make.  People of Faith especially have a responsibility to be authentic representations of the Creator.

To develop his point, Paquet uses the analogy of language, explaining that the ability to use language well should not be an end in itself:

“Language is a beautiful thing, but language should be in service of the thing being said.

And very often in the 20th century, Art has been where the artist creates their own vocabulary, and I have always found that curious, because you don’t have to create a new English language to say something special.  You just have to have command of the language and you have to have something to say.   The language of Art, the beauty of Art, is very exquisite, and requires time, and we live in a time when people are not terribly interested in an organic growth process.  

We have a pretty severe epidemic of self-esteem out there artistically speaking, and we’ve been told that we are fabulous just because we draw a breath on this planet, And as people we may be, but as artists it’s up to us to bring something of estimable worth to the world, and you do that by having exquisite command of the language [of art].  And you do that by digging deeper and having something to say that’s meaningful.  And it takes risk, and it takes courage, and it takes time.  And very often that’s a very individual choice for everyone.” 

Here Paquet is talking about the discipline and courage it takes for any of us to do anything that we do with integrity and beauty.  We need to examine our motivations and our intentions for our efforts and our choices, and determine that we will take the time and make the effort to be as authentic as is possible.

Paquet:

“External motivation ....... money, fame, awareness, the idea that you want to be noticed.  There’s a vast difference between having something to say and wanting to be heard.  And in the 20th century we’ve swung very largely towards wanting to be heard.  Everybody wants their 15 minutes of fame.  Reality TV is a perfect example, of that.”

Paquet quotes Rainer Maria Rilke in his Letters to a Young Poet.  The young poet has sent some of his poems to Rilke for critique and writing advice.  Of course, the aspiring poet has not spent the requisite time in “paying his dues” so to speak and perhaps wants some easy answers, a quick fix.  Rilke kindly declines to critique his actual poems, but over the course of time writes the young man ten letters about how to learn to look at life so that he becomes a person who has something worthwhile to say.  These letters have become a classic for teaching writers, but have good advice on several topics for anyone.

Rilke tells the young man, 

“If your daily life [your environment] seems poor, do not blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you are not poet enough to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is no poverty and no poor, indifferent place.”  

Paquet explains:  “If your craft [your effort, your discipline] is insufficient, no matter how wonderful your vision may be, you are always going to be something less than what you could have been. “

He further explains why he doesn’t let the world spirit discourage him in his own artistic efforts, although his work runs counter to the "philosophy" of the current art world:  

“We live in a world now where people don’t pay too much attention for more than five or six seconds at a time, and to ask someone to look at a painting or to read a book seems to be getting harder and harder to do.  But I can’t think too much about that, all I can think about is what’s meaningful to me . . . and do what will leave something behind of the time that I was here.  

The beauty is what you bring to something, and the subject is secondary.

. . .

Art in the 20th century has been very psychological . . . there’s a lot of concepts out there . . . but ideas don’t keep you warm at night.   

Love and Grace and Beauty are things that have been horribly maligned in the last hundred years in the Arts, considered trite even, but the very sad fact is that the very people who are saying that do not live their lives without love, they don’t live their lives without Beauty . . . but irony and all those things have become paramount in the Arts. You know, the more edgy, the more salacious, the more harsh, the more shocking. . . .”  

However, when we witness something or someone authentic, it resonates with everyone, doesn't?  Authentic living is creating a life of purpose, and living that life with intentionality so that it is an actuality not a dream.  And this is the life God has called us to live.

“…prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves.”

—James 1:22, NAS 

That verse is a challenge to us all, isn't it?

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