Fading Beauty and Cultural Decay

Artistic Absence of Beauty

There are few indicators of cultural decline as significant as the disappearance of beautiful art. When one considers the works of early Americans, the ancient Greeks, their works are truly beautiful and inspiring. Upon viewing their craft, one is left with reverence that God has created such beautiful images for the artist to capture on canvas or within chiseled stone.

However, recent American and European art has departed from the beautiful and plunged into the imagination of man. As man has searched for meaning outside of God's word and world, signifying man's repudiation of God Himself, he has delved into his own mind and found the brokenness revealed in Genesis 3. Consider these highly lauded examples of modern American art:





Is there anything beautiful in them? The Scream (the first painting) betokens a silent menace at the end of the bridge. The other two paintings are decompositions of reality. Is there anything redeeming within them? Yet the world has devolved so much from a true appreciation of beauty that empty-headed critics heap praise on these modern debacles.

The message of the paintings is that reality is malleable, chaotic and threatening. While I consider these paintings intellectually intriguing, my four year old has created such masterpieces without nearly the artistic training.

Literature and music follow the same path as the visual arts. There are very few, if any, great literary masterpieces being written. Music has been conquered by drug saturated, blond no-talents who believe that baring all is part of their musical repertoire. The messages of their songs are self-indulgent and decadent.

In the words of a famous deviant, "I care not who makes a nation's laws, so long as I can write its songs." Musicians are the laymen philosophers of every age. Within music, there is real power to influence and shape a nation. Is it any wonder that our children commit atrocities as they gyrate to the music of their lawgivers?

American culture is in decline because it has abandoned God. As a post-Christian nation, America still has vestiges of its former glory. It is up to Christians to redeem the arts and to salvage the ruins of mankind's artistry. When a Christian creates beauty, he does so to the pleasure of his Creator.