Category: Beauty/Aesthetics
The Dogma of Minimalist Drama
In his comedy sketch about “Stuff,” George Carlin joked that the whole meaning of life can be described as “Trying to find a place to put your stuff!” After all, that’s what a house is: it’s a “place to keep...
Not for Bread Alone: Notes on Good Work
On a number of the shelves in my home sit baskets that I have made myself. I took up the craft out of a need for contrast in what is a largely abstract existence, mostly consisting of reading and computer...
Beauty Spots
…When old age shall this generation waste, Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st, “Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need...
On Diligence
I was the sort of teenager who studied too much Latin. I was homeschooled, then, and lonely. We lived in Rome. I had no friends. I read books off my mother’s shelves for most subjects — textbooks, and Madame Bovary,...
Rise of the Scops: Wonder After the Pandemic
It was Virginia Woolf who wryly observed, “On or about December 1910, human character changed.”[1] I had no idea what this meant, until I stumbled into a fairy wood where a gilded volume by W.B. Yeats waited patiently for my...
Executive Orders Don’t Make Buildings Beautiful
A draft executive order has recently riled up the architectural community. Entitled “Making Federal Buildings Beautiful Again,” it points out the ugliness in a number of modern architectural movements and calls for a return to classical and other traditional styles...
Why Churches Need Artists
My church is accustomed to download a work of art corresponding to the sermon or the liturgical season and to print it on the bulletin. (This is something I love.) But, recently, we “discovered” a painter who had lived for...
Against the Sterile Style
By Ryan Hammill I am not sure what other fathers-to-be think about as they sit in hospital waiting rooms. With a pregnant wife still a few months out from delivery, already I have found myself sitting here on a number...
The Tedium of Worldview Analysis
In an episode of “The Briefing,” yesterday Dr. Al Mohler of Southern Seminary reflected on the death of the renowned physicist Stephen Hawking. You can read a full transcript of the eight minute segment on Hawking using the link above.
The Good, the True, and the Beautiful and the Oscars
By Brewer Eberly Carl R. Trueman recently offered yet another characteristically surgical takedown of contemporary culture over at First Things—this time biting into the Oscars and Western aesthetics. It is worth reading here.