Seventh Volley

"Constancy is defined as: the quality of being faithful and dependable; a state of being constant; the perception of an object or quality as being constant under changing conditions. Artists are invited to share their concepts of faith, spirituality, and beliefs in a culture that rapidly shifts and evolves. How do we define a constant God in a changing world? Is our image of God altered by our faith and system of beliefs? How does the reality of everyday life as we know it alter our perceptions of God?"

I'm in a show (see description above). It's coming up soon. This is a sketch for the drawing that I'm submitting. I'll come right out and say it -- I'm an atheist. Submitting to this should have been fairly easy right? I hang a blank sheet of paper, or there's an empty spot with my name next to it, or just a picture of me giving the finger and going "But you're making this shit up!" Which is unnecessary, and uncalled for. It also feels like cheating. I like to create stuff, I don't like to tell people what to think about that stuff. So I look back to the time when I was struggling with my faith (and then losing it). It was a traumatic experience, and not something I relished going through.

In doing so, I came to the realization that the perception of God (at least in the Christian society I was raised in) is largely made up, and personified. Here we have this all powerful being, all knowing, creator of the heavens and earth, and all the cosmos in between, and we expect it to behave in a human manner? We expect it to bless us by giving us a parking space at the mall, or to help our team win, to cure our sick and suffering? Faulty reasoning, twitching scientists, and broken logic aside, what a way to reduce in power and attempt to humanize an hypothetical being. The problem with said being behaving like a human, is that it is subject to human flaws. While these make us interesting, the idea of a god that is powering the universe, but having an off day and not feeling like getting out of bed has terrifying consequences for those peopling said universe.

In sticking with this idea of making a god, there is a short parable by Jorge Luis Borges titled, The Witness, in which we find a dying Saxon, the last Pagan, and with his passing, all his rituals, his beliefs, his history disappear. Which got me to the thought, if we were to die, does our perception of god, if not the idea of god itself die with us?

In the updates of this, will be experiments with gilding (my first time! woo hoo!).