CATHOLIC ART in AMERICA

Daniel Mitsui- Pentecost

I have been recently asked where I find the art which I use in my Blog. While I certainly love classical art, I am these days drawn to more modern art, esp. naive (naif) or primitive works and those of other ethnic backgrounds. Since we know the more traditional works of art, I think it is fun to find artists from our own times. As I have said in other Blogs, I love the Japanese Sadao Watanabe and the Chinese-American artist Dr. He Qi (both of whom I have used in many recent blogs).

C.S. Lewis in The Weight of Glory wrote: “We do not want merely to see beauty… We want something else which can hardly be put into words – to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it… At present we are on the outside of the world, the wrong side of the door. We cannot mingle with the splendors we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumor that it will not always be so. Some day, God willing, we shall get in.”

Jodi Simmons- The True Vine

While Europe and now many in the East, have many wonderful Catholic artists, there seems to be a dirth in our own country. We do have Daniel Mitsui, Matthew Alderman, Bernard Brussel-Smith (1914-89), Jodi Simmons, Edward Knippers, George Tooker (1920-2011), Father John Giuliani, Carl Schmitt (1889-1989), Dan Paulos, and of course the wonderful artists of the Santos tradition in NM and other places in the USA.

Dana Gioia, Catholic poet and former chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts said he considers the lack of Catholics in the arts to be a “paradox,” given the Catholic Church’s long tradition as “patron and mentor” to the arts and the strength of the largest cultural minority in the United States. It is particularly ironic, Dana added, in a nation where “diversity of culture and ethnicity are actively celebrated.”