A central purpose of the Studio is to help reestablish trusted relationships between the four constituencies traditionally involved in the work of art: not only the artists employed to make art, but the patrons who commission and fund it, the scholarly-types who interpret it, and the communities who use artwork to give shape and purpose to the activities that mark their identity.
During recent centuries, the relations between these four parties fell on hard times as the artist's autonomy became the paramount value, and the community of users and patrons became the detached viewers of an art for art's sake.
During many centuries previous, art in various media was almost always the product of clear accountability among these four parties. Although not always conflict-free, these lines of communication ensured the social relevance of the artwork, the answerability of artists to their publics, and the acknowledged value of the artist as one who gives tangible visible form to the deep values and beliefs of his sponsoring community.
Thus the goal of the Studio is to help
- train a new generation of artists willing and able to work humbly yet astutely with patrons and commissioning communities,
- foster a new generation of patrons who appreciate the value of art both in the church and from the church for society,
- cultivate a new discourse-community of interpretation in which the arts can be understood, evaluated, and contextualized through historically-informed conversation,
- nurture communities who know how to use art for their own edification and enrichment, and who can discriminate work that is answerable to their guiding beliefs from that which is merely trendy or fashionable.
A central purpose of the Studio is to help reestablish trusted relationships between the four constituencies traditionally involved in the work of art: not only the artists employed to make art, but the patrons who commission and fund it, the scholarly types who interpret it, and the communities who use artwork to give shape and purpose to the activities that mark their identity.
During recent centuries, the relations between these four parties fell on hard times as the artist's autonomy became the paramount value, and the community of users and patrons became the detached viewers of an art for art's sake.
During many centuries previous, art in various media was almost always the product of clear accountability among these four parties. Although not always conflict-free, these lines of communication ensured the social relevance of the artwork, the answerability of artists to their publics, and the acknowledged value of the artist as one who gives tangible visible form to the deep values and beliefs of his sponsoring community.
Thus the goal of the Studio is to help
- train a new generation of artists willing and able to work humbly yet astutely with patrons and commissioning communities,
- foster a new generation of patrons who appreciate the value of art both in the church and from the church for society,
- cultivate a new discourse-community of interpretation in which the arts can be understood, evaluated, and contextualized through historically-informed conversation,
- nurture communities who know how to use art for their own edification and enrichment, and who can discriminate work that is answerable to their guiding beliefs from that which is merely trendy or fashionable.
A central purpose of the Studio is to help reestablish trusted relationships between the four constituencies traditionally involved in the work of art: not only the artists employed to make art, but the patrons who commission and fund it, the scholarly types who interpret it, and the communities who use artwork to give shape and purpose to the activities that mark their identity.
During recent centuries, the relations between these four parties fell on hard times as the artist's autonomy became the paramount value, and the community of users and patrons became the detached viewers of an art for art's sake.
During many centuries previous, art in various media was almost always the product of clear accountability among these four parties. Although not always conflict-free, these lines of communication ensured the social relevance of the artwork, the answerability of artists to their publics, and the acknowledged value of the artist as one who gives tangible visible form to the deep values and beliefs of his sponsoring community.
Thus the goal of the Studio is to help
- train a new generation of artists willing and able to work humbly yet astutely with patrons and commissioning communities,
- foster a new generation of patrons who appreciate the value of art both in the church and from the church for society,
- cultivate a new discourse-community of interpretation in which the arts can be understood, evaluated, and contextualized through historically-informed conversation,
- nurture communities who know how to use art for their own edification and enrichment, and who can discriminate work that is answerable to their guiding beliefs from that which is merely trendy or fashionable.
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