Art And Religion example essay topic
People would even break down the natural genetic construction of living things to alter them esthetic ally, destroying the natural balance of the ecology in the name of art. Welcome, to the world we live in. Our world; this world, is already devoted to art. Mankind inhabits this our world, and has a habit, bad or good, of doing more then is necessary.
We add frills, little bells and whistles, to everything we touch. Like the decorations on a Christmas tree, civilization is the decoration of earth, and we the decorators, are art. Animals construct and develop, but only to a necessary level. Humans exceed the minimum of extraneous development needed for survival with institutions that have no equivalent in the animal kingdom. Institutions like religion, science, and art itself. Religion is an important part of all of us, either because of it's existence or it's lack thereof.
Through a fear of death, and an appreciation of authority we have painted a beautiful picture of an existence outside the one we all know and live. In our artistic world we have learned to tailor thoughts and ideas to an audience so well, that mass hallucination is merely serendipitous. An excellent performance is all the players are looking for, and as they hang up their robes and take of their collars they look at the cross, and are convinced of their own truth. Some people say that art stemmed from religion. I suggest that art and religion are one and the same. Music, and drama are both arts; religion is a sort of drama.
An actor pretends to be something he isn't. Religion pretends that the world is something it isn't, and the priests and converts are all excellent method actors. An atheist might applaud this deconstruction of religious principal, but they are just as spiritual as Mormons. In their denial they become critics, arguing the truth of art. By arguing the acknowledge it's existence, and become actors themselves. If religion can be accepted as art, the world's human population is entirely saturated with artists.
Art itself is defined as a human creative skill, or it's application. The traditional arts are usually considered to be music, drama, and the fine arts; namely drawing and painting. Certainly these are applications of creativity that animals lack, but perhaps other things match these criteria as well. Science is all about discovery, but are not discovery and creativity intimately twined?
No sooner have we discovered how to split the atom then we have created the atomic bomb. An application of creative skill, and itself as result of discovery. Science is a fine art, creation through exactitude, and mathematics. The more we discover the more we invent, finding uses and applications for the knowledge we uncover over time. As a creative skill of mankind, science becomes yet another form of art; added tinsel on the tree of civilization. But does the whole equal the sum of it's parts?
Perhaps the goal of the whole; of civilization, is art. The culture and peoples of our planet ever evolving into something greater then both. To discover what a world devoted to art would look like is as simple as looking around one's self. Always we are refining and perfecting our habitat, our minds, and our lives. As a people we are constantly creating, continuing the development and construction of our epic civilization. In the act of creating we are applying our creative skill; effectively producing art.
For all practicality then, civilization is art, and whether we are artists or merely tinsel on the tree, we are a part of it.