P e a c e f u l p on d e r i n g s
“The arts are the field on which we
place our own dreams, thoughts, and
desired alongside those of others, so that
solitudes can meet, to their joy some-
times, or to their surprise, and some-
times to their disgust. When you boil
it all down, that is the social purpose
B Y E R I C vaughn H O L O WA C Z
of art: the creation of mutuality, the
passage from feeling into
ey, we’re putting together
shared meaning.”
an issue of Imagine maga-
Since those two sen-
zine focusing on art, peace,
tences sum up about 50,000
and social justice—would you like to
years of human creativity
share your thoughts?” asked my friend
and consciousness, I could
Jane Perini. It sounded fascinating, so I
just stop there. But Jane
agreed right away (not really knowing
asked me to ponder art,
what I’d write about). I am a wordsmith,
peace, and social justice in
an art historian, and I love thinking
a magazine-length musing.
about how people create and advance
And I promised her that
culture. So yes, challenge accepted.
I would etch something
A few weeks later, Jane and her
meaningful on the cave
infectious smile resurfaced, with a
The Cave of Altamira in Cantabria, Spain, features charcoal
wall that is this magazine.
deadline bearing down. I sat at my key-
drawings and polychrome paintings of local fauna, created
What follows is a sampling
board that weekend to think up a few
between 18,500 and 14,000 years ago.
of works of art—old and
examples of art and peace, and figure
new—that stand as monuments to our
Around that prehistoric campfire,
out how we use artistic expression to
humanity, that cry out for peace, that
we find the original reality television
address humanity’s need for social
move us with their message of justice.
show,
the
first
instructional
videos,
justice. Here goes...
Light your torches, and look...
the original media format intended for
Let’s start in our cave dwelling
Our first case study is about love,
rites of passage and collective human
days. I’m talking hominids and aus-
poetic expression, and a human peace.
identity. Look closely enough, and we
tralopithecus and primates gathering
The Song of Songs goes back 2500
might
also
imagine
and
discover
hu-
together around the fire—to share their
years, and appears in the final section
manity’s earliest expressions of peace
pre-historical half-simian selves. This is
and happiness. Surely they wanted the of the Hebrew Bible, as well as the fifth
where our own stories begin, with the
Book of Wisdom in the Christian Old
cave wall to show us love, peace, and
ability to communicate and represent a
Testament. Yet when we read it in Eng-
right
from
wrong.
shared world, and collective experience,
lish today, it is undeniable poetry. The
In the tens of thousands of years
with nothing more than abstract marks.
language is rich, playful, dreamy, and
since, we humans have made our
Our pre-Ice Age cousins burned
“drunk with love.” Metaphorical and
marks in pencil, paint, bronze, song,
their scenes upon the cave wall—ani-
passionate, the Song of Songs immerses
dance,
and
film.
We
remain
driven
by
a
mals and journeys and crops remain
us in an intimate, romantic, beautiful
need, born in the fire of the cave, to tell
etched into the rock to this day. Once
relationship—filled with desire and
stories that define our collective tribe,
marked in ochre and illuminated by
satisfaction and wanting more. It is
fire, human history and rituals began to and express the shared identity we
a primer on the frenzy and ultimate
call
culture.
In
the
late
20th
century,
emerge. Even today, we see ourselves
peace to be found in human love.
art critic and historian Robert Hughes
in their hunt, their dance, the shaman
From sacred and allegorical love
made his own mark and described the
trance, the age-old agrarian blueprint
between two, we move to perhaps the
role of artistic expression this way:
etched into the earth.
Humanity’s search for peace, justice
and meaning through the ages
“H
IMAGINE l Spring 2017 19