Art and Religion - a short essay

[karadin.livejournal.com]

Art exists as a reflection of nature, but it also reflects human culture. Religion has been a part of human culture since its inception.

For an artist to create work with a religious theme, be it 'Jesus Christ Superstar' or 'The Satanic Verses' is to take certain concepts and put them in a modern context. The purpose of these works are to explore the metaphors and symbols that permeate culture, such as Redemption, Forgiveness and Enlightenment, not to mock them.

To say an artist 'blasphemes' by including a religious figure or a symbol in their work is not only doing disservice to the artist, but the notion of freedom of expression.

It also is a disservice to deny oneself the opportunity, sight unseen or unheard, to find a new concept to agree with, or, to miss a chance to discuss a different point of view in a considerate, thoughtful way.

Every work of art should stand on its own merit, and succeed or fail as it deserves.

But, every musician, painter, composer, writer, and Gackt, is also a person who has the right to explore these themes, in fact, an artist should be lauded for tackling weighty metaphors and challenging their audience.

Comments

[koshien.livejournal.com]

Jesus is a very popular name in the Hispanic community, he might be singing about a friend or an imaginary person who he has named Jesus in the song.

People have jumped straight into this one.

It's Gackt's problem if he causes controversy by being too close to the knuckle or offensive, ie burning bibles/crucifixes etc. People will be offended. Simple as that, that's obviously imflammatory and imo very far from anything that Gackt would probably attempt. Edgy yes, thoughtprovoking yes, but straight out offensive on purpose......I think not. He's not that kind of guy (from watching his career for ten years), what would it achieve? Why do people think the worst just because of a simple song title? How about Jesus could be a metaphor for goodness/kindness and the song lyrics are about helping people, being compassionate etc? Yeh kids just jump on the negative.

On the other hand people have a responsibility to accept that other people can express themselves, artistically or otherwise with whatever subject matter they choose. Not forgetting that most Japanese people have little idea of Christianity, (remember the crucified Santa in the shopping mall?) From talking to Japanese friends over time on the whole Jesus is seen as a nice dude on the same scale as any Japanese saint equivalent. (won't go into theological blah here, just getting a point across)

[karadin.livejournal.com]

I think about it much in the way that modern media appropriates many ancient religious symbols and uses them to tell a story (for example, an Anubis figure - ancient Egyptian deity - in Bounty Killer as stand in for a Christian devil) no one complains about this use of religious symbol (because there's very few around that still worship Anubis - maybe) yet the image of the jackal-headed god is buried in our collective unconscious, so it still pulls some sort of primal trigger.

Personally, having grown up being indoctrinated into a Christian church, and discarding it in adulthood, I know the Christ story, I never believed it as literal truth, but as a metaphor, it's still a really good story, and could and should be re-told.

Whether Gackt's taken this metaphor and done something thoughtful with it, or used it to shock will have to be seen (or heard) when the song and vid are released. But it's the dismissal of it before it's even seen or heard that bugs me the most, in the case, it's the close-minded who will lose out.

[koshien.livejournal.com]

But it's the dismissal of it before it's even seen or heard that bugs me the most Yes that's the whole argument really.

[karadin.livejournal.com]

Gackt's had pictures of himself dressed as a Catholic priest, holding a crucifix splattered in white paint and wrote a song called 'Maria' from the Rebirth album, he could have called the new single Messiah or Christ, but it seems to be the name 'Jesus' that's a real trigger to some.

[koshien.livejournal.com]

It's a powerful word, I think Christ would be the ultimate provocation though (if it was meant to ever be one)