The conference schedule has been updated over at the conference dedicated page.
Monthly Archive for September, 2008
Part II: A Brief Introduction to Sergei Bulgakov, by Cynthia Nielsen
In the previous post, I mentioned two experiences that helped bring Bulgakov back to the Orthodox Church. In this post, we encounter the third experience, viz., the death of Bulgakov’s four year old son in the summer of 1909. At his son’s funeral, Bulgakov had a strong sense that “his child lived in the life of the Resurrection” (p. 602). This experience moved him to re-read Soloviev’s works in which the theme of wisdom (created and uncreated) is prominent. Bulgakov develops his theme of “the Wisdom of God as the foundation and goal of all earthly reality” and begins to employ it in his writings on economics and philosophy. In his book, The Philosophy of Economy (1912), Bulgakov argues that even though our labor is toilsome, the economic process is meaningful because it participates in the Divine Wisdom. Moreover, our struggles in nature also involve (besides pain and difficulties) joy and beauty, if we, as followers of Christ, realize that human beings possess a “hidden potential for perfection [and so must] work to resurrect nature, to endow it once again with the life and meaning it had in Eden.”1 For Bulgakov, the most mundane human activities have value and are redeemable “by the Christian message of the fall and resurrection of man and, with man, nature. We have a common task and it is universal resurrection out of fall, bringing resurrection-life into everything” (p. 603). Continue reading ‘Bulgakov Blog Conference, Day 1, part 2′
- C. Evtuhov, The Cross and the Sickle, p. 147, as found in “Wisdom from Above,” p. 603.↩
The Bulgakov Blog conference starts today. We begin with a piece written by Cynthia Nielsen of Per Caritatem. Cynthia was gracious enough to let us repost her excellent introduction to Bulgakov. Following her format, I will post this in 2 parts, with the second part following this evening.
An Introduction to Sergei Bulgakov, by Cynthia Nielsen
Part I
My brief introduction to Bulgakov is based on Fr. Aidan Nichols article, “Wisdom from Above? The Sophiology of Father Sergius Bulgakov”1 -an article that is worth reading in its entirety. Bulgakov, who was to become an important 20th century theological figure in both Orthodox and Latin theological circles, was born in 1871 in a rural town in south-central Russia. Bulgakov’s father was an Orthodox priest, and his family line included a number of priests (p. 599). Although his early education was religiously focused, as a young teen Bulgakov underwent a faith crisis and in 1888 publicly proclaimed himself an unbeliever at the age of 18. Two years later, he enrolled at the University of Moscow, where his interest in and commitment to Marxism grew with an ever-increasing intensity (p. 599). Entailed in Bulgakov’s embrace of Marxism was the idea that human beings are essentially material beings, “albeit an expression of the nobility and complexity matter could attain” (p. 599). In 1897 Bulgakov published his first work, “On Markets in the Capitalist System of Production,” and even so, he had already begun to experience some uncertainties with regard to central Marxist claims.
As Nichols explains, there were three significant experiences (two of which are described below) that played crucial roles in bringing Bulgakov back to his Orthodox faith. Continue reading ‘Bulgakov Blog Conference, Day 1, part 1′
- As found in New Blackfriars 85, (2004): 598-613.↩
“We must not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time.”- T.S. Eliot
I have admired the greatness of Eliot as a poet, but never expected to use a bit of his work for a meditation of education such as this. However, it seems to me that this quote from Eliot is filled with profundity and enormous implications for our practice as educators and continuing students. I must say from the outset that my reflection on this quote is not an exegesis of Eliot’s poetry (though certainly such an venture is a worthy endeavor and has been embarked upon by interpreters much more able than I), but rather a contemplation of these words as they stand on their own, detached from the context of his work in which it is originally embedded.
I will begin with a memory. Continue reading ‘The Wisdom of Eliot’s Turn of Phrase’
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I realized today that I don’t care about trying to define what is and is not a work of art…. not that it doesn’t matter as a project. It just doesn’t matter to me. I’ve never been very excited about this project of aesthetics, anyway. What exactly are we trying to accomplish in so doing? David is a work of art, and fountain isn’t. The Isenheim altarpiece is a work of art (albeit religious art, so some might not agree), and the Easter Island Moai aren’t, unless of course one of them happens to be in an art museum, in which case it could be, although… blah blah blah. Don’t take my cheek as irreverence toward the fields of contemporary aesthetics or art criticism. Quite the contrary. I’m more interested in talking about the above mentioned pieces themselves, rather than stipulating whether and how aestheticians may talk about them. After all, it is, or should be, a bit of a common place that works like the above weren’t necessarily created with the kind of museum culture that we often presuppose (with the exception, possibly, of Fountain). Nor where they necessary created to be works of “art” as we understand that word. Rather, these works each demonstrate an elasticity and plurivocity in their ability to function within and without that museum culture. We might say that they function in a milieu that is significantly more robust than the one provided by the western art world.
Contrary to my position, Jerome Stolnitz maintains that the iconic status of these works depends on the disinterestedness that the museum culture preserves1. This assertion or judgment, it seems, relies on two judgments of which I remain unconvinced. First, regarding this iconic status, he presupposes that the reasons for which these works are valued is and ought to be grounded in their being works of the museum culture, or works that we value in a disinterested way. Is this in fact why many or most people do value these works? Is this the only reason why they can value these works? For instance, the Isenheim altarpiece might facilitate a new way of experiencing Mary’s role in the passion of Christ, or, in it’s original context, it can change the way in which the space is experienced, niether of which seem to be especially reliant on ways of viewing that are explicitly dependent on the contemporary museum. And thus, second, Stolnitz asserts that the museum culture fosters the right way of viewing or experiencing works of art. Why? Who decides which aspect of the artistic milieu is the one that ought to be emphasized? What does this say about the revival of urban murals? Are these murals to be viewed the way that one would view visual art in a museum? Is one detrimentally impaired in viewing an urban mural if one hasn’t been formed by the museum culture? Or, is it possible that developing an awareness of the way in which murals shape urban space, and are contextualized by urban space, can actually improve viewers’ sensitivity to museum pieces by thinking about the ways in which context and space change the our perception of works and the way in which works change our perception of space and context? In this case, the intention of the artist and the intentions of the viewers are not unimportant. Nor are they the focal point of a work because works are plurivocal, they function in ways that neither the artist or nor viewers anticipate when working from the perspective of the museum culture. They exist in a milieu of activity, intentions, contexts. Similarly, in Art in Action, Nick Wolterstorff says the only thing that works of art have in common is their varied activities, their ability to do many different things.
Thinking about aesthetics this way, how much does the status of the piece as a work of art or non-art make a difference? I don’t really have a defensible answer at this point… just a hunch that it doesn’t make much of a difference at all.
- “On the Apparent Demise of Really High Art,” JAAC 43 (1985): 356↩
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