Written by Paul Mizzi

Too late came I to love thee, O thou Beauty both so ancient and so fresh.
-- Augustine of Hippo.

The Triune God, Creator of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible, is the Fountainhead of Beauty, wherever and in whatsoever shape and form it is experienced. In manifesting Himself to us, God comes in judgement, in mercy, in holiness, in grace: that is, in His splendour and beauty. For just as white is the aggregate of the seven-streaked rainbow, so God’s holy beauty is a compendium of His attributes.

Scripture overwhelms me when it speaks of the beauty of God’s holiness. I was raised up to think that beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, that it is something relative. I was taught that the artistic heart expresses its own intrinsic sense of beauty. Not having thought these things out, I initially assumed that I am autonomous as far as art and creativity are concerned.

The case turned out to be otherwise. Truth, goodness and beauty all come down from above. They proceed from God. Three intertwined divine characteristics: one is insufficient, two miss the mark, three give us a fair concept of reality as it flows from God, subsists through God and tends towards God. “‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty,’ that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.” The poet’s dictum is impressive, but found lacking. No beauty and no truth can be enjoyed apart from goodness: the three are interdependent.

My centre and circumference in art, whether it be in poetry or painting, find their stability upon the above presuppositions. I desire my art to be judged and appreciated as distinctively Christian.

God, having disclosed to me that truth, goodness and beauty are in His Son, impels me to still pursue them in ever-increasing fashion. My soul is attracted to loveliness: God made man thus, to be irresistibly drawn to the beautiful. That’s the primary reason why we decorate our walls with pictures. The serious pursuit of beauty amplifies all other areas of life: it ravished the would-be discoverer. In the process it makes us better fathers, better mechanics, better theologians, better husbands. Metaphors and similes, sonatas and symphonies, short-stories and novels, oil-paints and canvas transform my sterile logic and my strict timetable.

David’s ambition was quite explicit: “One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life (goodness, morality), to behold the beauty of the Lord (aesthetic), and to inquire in His temple (philosophy, truth)” (Psalms 27:4). An abundant life indeed! And I, having been moved to adopt a similar stance, have my hands and my heart full - my hands manoeuvring sables and palette-knives, and my heart overflowing with praise.

It must be observed, though, that in a created order, beauty can only be a simulation of heavenly glory, of things no eye has seen. Apropos, Dürer was on the right track when he wrote: “What beauty is I do not know. Nobody knows it but God.” And yet Dürer left behind an inestimable legacy of beauty.

But “the True Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,” always leads us to the love of beauty. Now where an adequate appreciation of beauty is lacking, a defective theology will necessarily be found. By the same token a hearty obedience to the most fundamental of all commandments (“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God...”) qualifies man to approach and be initiated into the sanctuary of beauty.

But man cannot behold beauty directly: no one can see God’s face and live, as Moses was instructed. Nevertheless we can see it as in a mirror, dimly, with our faces covered. But it is there, and the faithful know in which direction to look. “And let the beauty of the Lord thy God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands...” (Psalms 90:17).

Constable affirmed, “I have never seen an ugly thing in my life.” On the other hand, Picasso: “Anyway, what is beauty? It doesn’t exist.” Much as I admire Constable, I beg to disagree, for my eyes are strained with ugliness: violence, injustice, sin, rebellion, even within my heart. But then, Picasso errs on the other extreme, for “all the earth is filled with the glory of the Lord,” not only to the believing heart, but as a matter of fact, whether we assent or not.

Despite all human failures, beauty is to be discerned even upon the earth. “Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined” (Psalms 50:2). “Honour and majesty are before him: strength and beauty are in his sanctuary...O worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness: fear before him, all the earth” (Psalms 96:6,9). Thus beauty is always related to God, for it proceeds from Him; and since this is so, it gives us all the more reason to enjoy the Chorale, recite Paradise Lost, and frequent the Museum of Fine Arts.

What motivates me to paint? My religious convictions. Painting is a spiritual endeavour; it is nourished in my soul. Whatsoever I do, from the most insignificant to the most remarkable, I am under orders to do it to the glory and splendour of God. Since the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ alone is true, since He alone is good, since He alone is beautiful, I cannot be kept from writing poetry and applying colours according to design and premeditated composition.

And yet notice that my work is not patently religious. For worship most spiritual and acceptable to God must avoid such outward ornamentation as might fallaciously become associated, if not identified, with the Creator. God is a Spirit and those who worship Him must do so in spirit and in truth. Hence, “it is pure spiritual religion which with one hand deprives the artist of his specifically religious art, but which, with the other, offers him, in exchange, a whole world to be religiously animated” (Von Hartmann).

We are so fashioned as to make beautiful things: the cook, more than everybody else, knows the importance of presenting a feast to the eye before the meal is experiences as a feast to the stomach. Medieval man sculpted angels in the architecture at Chartres and Cologne: we still dress gardens, play bands, and wield the brush. But because of our fall in Adam, we come short of our appointed task to be vice-regents upon the earth. Art must therefore be measured not by man, but by Him who gave it in the first place.

And that is exactly the reason why advances in painting, philosophy, literature, music and the sciences have been most significant and considerable in societies where Christ is confessed as Lord of all. His culture is now established upon the earth - a culture as varied as could be, but distinct from all others, and unique in a special way. And any society which desires beauty now must have the beauty of holiness, walking in His law of liberty. Turning from Him means turning away from the only source of genuine aesthetic wonder.

My desire is to exhibit a vision of beauty, to give away a testament of beauty. I do not want to fail to present something worthwhile, something beautiful, a springboard to God’s greater acknowledgement of His “worthship.” Being salt and light for everything men do certainly does not exclude the arts. For man himself is a work of art, able in turn to produce works of art. Lesser in degree and in kind, to be sure, but still works of art.

“A thing of beauty is a joy forever; its lovliness increases, it will never pass into nothingness...” (Endymion). “Nothing is beautiful except the true; the true alone is worth loving; it should reign everywhere, even in fable” (Boileau). And I might add, even in framed pictures.

If after looking at my pictures, the wonderful becomes familiar to you, and the familiar wonderful, then at least one of my purposes in art is fulfilled. Another purpose is to have you see that God’s handiwork above, around, and within you. Bypassing it would be missing a lot. It is inescapably and convincingly there. And once you are arrested by it, your life will not be the same: it will be captive to beauty, the first step towards becoming captive to God.

Are you bothered by beauty? Enough to be stimulated to manlier thoughts, deeper feelings, a contrite heart? For “unless there is within us that which is above us, we shall soon yield to that which is about us.”

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