Image © Trevor Anzai 2023

Five minute read

If someone asked you what the purpose of art is, what would you say?

This question came up during a getaway weekend. My spouse and I visited St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montréal for a retreat. After spending some time in silence with God, we went shopping and ate tasty food. Montréal has an outstanding restaurant scene, and we stumbled upon a vegan sushi spot in Mount Royal. We were deliciously surprised at its wonderful tastes and flavours. I also searched for creative inspiration at various art galleries. 

One afternoon, I thought we were going to find just that by visiting a café shop with local artwork on display. The ambiance was cute, and the paintings had vivid colours. I asked one of the employees about the artist’s creative process, and she shared various insights. That employee turned out to be an art agent. As we continued talking, our conversation took a negative turn. She asked me what the purpose of art was. After thinking for a moment, I said, “Art is about showcasing God’s beauty.” She denied my answer and replied, “The first priority of an artist is to make money.” She came across as abrasive. Her opinion did not inspire me but left me feeling repulsed. It seemed that only her point of view mattered.

Trying to keep my cool, I asked the art agent, “What about artists like Van Gogh? He only sold a few paintings, yet he made nearly a thousand.”¹ She brushed off my argument, saying that he lived in different times.

Are our times really so different? I’ve thought a lot about this conversation. Van Gogh would have abandoned his art practice from the get-go if he were motivated by money. Museums would not have displayed masterpieces like The Starry Night and Sunflowers. He didn’t make a dime from these works during his lifetime. His fame and success were paradoxical. Some artists, like him, make way more money when they are dead than when they are alive.

Beauty

My faith gave me some insight into beauty and art. Saint John Paul II’s Letter to Artists says, ‘The artist has a special relationship to beauty. In a very true sense, it can be said that beauty is the vocation bestowed on him by the Creator in the gift of “artistic talent.”‘ An artist is beauty’s curator, who enriches life, and not greed’s agent, who impoverishes creativity.

Beauty. It’s a broad term that has so many dimensions and can mean so many different things to so many people. Really, what I am talking about here is eros, the Greek word commonly associated with romantic desire. Yet eros goes beyond this definition and appreciates beautiful things and a desire for union. Beauty is when we experience something amazing that lifts the inner part of our human heart and soul to exclaim, “Wow!” It’s a joyful gift, a small glimmer of something greater and better. It leads the soul to further contemplation, prayer, and praise of God—who is Himself true, good, and beautiful. 

For me, beauty takes the form of an ambient date night over carefully presented and yummy sushi. It looks like a freshly cut lawn, and it sounds like the wind sifting through our backyard trees. I find beauty in Van Gogh’s paintings, and Michelangelo’s work greatly inspires me. Beauty has many faces. It inspires, creates, encourages, and lifts our souls upward.

Providence

I am passionate about this subject because a new creative chapter has begun. I made significant lifestyle changes last year when I experienced health struggles. Switching careers from finance to visual art was one of those changes. Making art has been therapeutic, joyful, and prayerful. I’ve received very positive feedback about my artwork from others. While not the most profitable (for now), my work has covered a portion of our monthly expenses.

Two established artists have informally mentored me. They discouraged me from falling into greediness. One of them said that God calls us to be faithful, not necessarily successful. This out-of-favour disposition is a stark opposition to capitalism. It’s not about the money; it’s about following God’s plan for our lives. Sometimes His plan can lead to riches, but following Him, regardless of financial success, always leads to salvation. 

The other established artist discouraged me from prioritising money over creative inspiration. I must confess that I made this mistake. I once created a painting, scrupulously calculating its cost in time and labour. I wanted to make more money, and this desire rushed the creative process. Feeling uninspired, I repented for my lack of pure intentions. I eventually gave away the piece for free. Greed made me feel sick because it did not foster an environment for good, creative work. I’m learning from my mistakes.

It’s a balance. On the one hand, artists need to support their livelihoods and families. On the other hand, there’s no guarantee that their work will sell. Artists may need money to live, but their creative work does not need money to thrive. The truth is that God provides, regardless of profession. Artists often live in financial instability, and in this sense, they share in God’s providence in a radical way. What I’ve learned is that God’s love completely fills our hearts. With Him, we have everything. Contrastingly, greediness makes us crave more. It manipulates us to believe we have less.

The Process

The art agent’s approach has a practical problem: selling art is a full-blown mystery. An unpredictable formula characterises artistic work. I recently displayed five watercolours at a local wellness clinic, and they all sold within a few weeks. Yet no one has purchased my first works on display. It’s been more than six months. With art, we just don’t know what will sell as opposed to what won’t. People’s tastes and appetites for artwork vary. Artists can’t control who buys, but they can control their creative process. 

The process (the act of creation) and its end (which I think is beauty) link an art piece together. One of my clients said, “The process means more than the final result.” The process is everything: the time, energy, and effort put into a work. I incorporate Scripture, prayer, and reflection into each of my creations, whether spiritual or not. And while I don’t always live up to a perfect process, trying my best is part of it. The artist is very much a work-in-progress, much like our spiritual lives.

The process has power over the end result. This has significant implications. Creating something beautiful takes inspiration, time, and skill. Greed, however, is the love of money. When treated as an end, it coldly trades creative work for financial profit. Its process becomes tainted, ruined, and desolate. Real beauty cannot reach its potential if the motivation is to make another buck. Like maggots wriggling through the fresh ingredients of beautifully prepared maki rolls, greed turns something attractive into something repulsive.

Pure intentions help guide the artist’s hand, eye, and heart to make beautiful works of art. Artists can trust in a God who provides, who loves us, and who wants the best for us. It’s an act of faith to make an art piece, discern a reasonable and fair price, and hope for the best that someone special will buy it. But oftentimes, artists can fall into greed’s trap. The snare of conventional thinking states that we need to create in order to produce, and that profit is the only measurement of success. The beautiful truth of making art is that the intentions, process, and effort for any given art piece are everything—and the difference between pure intentions and greed shows in the end, consciously or not. Only beauty survives decades, generations, and even centuries, with its many varied masterpieces there to prove us still.

 ¹ According to the Van Gogh Museum, we don’t know exactly how many works he sold, but he finished some commissions early in his life, and he would often trade his paintings for food and supplies.