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Author Topic: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)  (Read 4956 times)

HeartShadow

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #15 on: October 07, 2012, 02:46:32 pm »
Quote from: Materialist;76072
Well, sailor, outside of villas, British walls are flat, but not smooth-rough stone, wood, thatch, wicker. Would an ancient person be inspired to paint on such a surface? Then we must wonder if they made tapestries to cover the walls in winter to keep the chill out, that could potentially hide sacred wall paintings. Would wall paintings be practical? Would smoke from the fire damage the images?

 
sooo .. sacred tapestry.  We KNOW that people have been making sacred art out of fiber since .. well, since we figured out how to make art with fiber.

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #16 on: October 07, 2012, 05:53:12 pm »
Quote from: Materialist;76073
Sorry, folks, for the confusion I have caused. Placing it closer to home, then: would one use Neolithic and Bronze Age European petroglyphs to represent Zeus, not knowing what they were originally for, because they look "zeusy" to you?

For personal use? Why not? The whole purpose of symbols seems summed up in a symbol for Zeus "looks zeusy to you". :)
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Materialist

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #17 on: October 07, 2012, 08:43:34 pm »
Quote from: HeartShadow;76079
sooo .. sacred tapestry.  We KNOW that people have been making sacred art out of fiber since .. well, since we figured out how to make art with fiber.


Well, sacred tapestries are made now, anyway. The Catholic Church is wholly commercialized now. Saints are a gimmick to them, if you look at their catalogs. St. Anthony golf balls. St. Michael key chains. Prayer pillows and aprons. Personally, I find putting the images of sacred beings on this mundane stuff disgusting. Their images should be reserved for stuff to be venerated-the original, medieval statues and icons.

Tapestry icons that I've seen for sale are little things, technologically possible for the times, but I've never heard of them mentioned before the modern era.

Euryalus

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #18 on: October 07, 2012, 08:55:34 pm »
Quote from: Materialist;76097
Well, sacred tapestries are made now, anyway. The Catholic Church is wholly commercialized now. Saints are a gimmick to them, if you look at their catalogs. St. Anthony golf balls. St. Michael key chains. Prayer pillows and aprons.

 
Are you sure that's the church proper, and not just companies run by Catholics?  (Saints are, after all, public domain)

Materialist

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #19 on: October 07, 2012, 08:59:42 pm »
Quote from: Euryalus;76098
Are you sure that's the church proper, and not just companies run by Catholics?  (Saints are, after all, public domain)


Some of them are run and owned by religious orders.

Euryalus

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #20 on: October 07, 2012, 09:11:28 pm »
Quote from: Materialist;76099
Some of them are run and owned by religious orders.

 
It's hard to look at the behavior of orders within the church and say that they reflect the church as a whole.

Castus

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #21 on: October 07, 2012, 09:55:08 pm »
Quote from: Materialist;76099
Some of them are run and owned by religious orders.

 
Which, as Euryalus said, doesn't necessarily reflect on the Church as a whole. Plus, holy orders have to make money too. If the sale of a little kitsch can keep the soup kitchens going then to true harm done. You do seem to have an anti-Christian/Catholic bent though.
“Castus, meanwhile, goes straight for the bad theology like one of those creepy fish that swims up streams of pee.” — Darkhawk

“Believing in the Lord means you are connected to me no matter when you are poor, sick, or struggling in a relationship. I am always with you. I want you to believe that. The future is uncertain, and much suffering awaits. However, the mission of the believer is to live life doing their best, no matter what the circumstances.” — Ryuho Okawa

HeartShadow

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #22 on: October 08, 2012, 08:44:56 am »
Quote from: Materialist;76097
Well, sacred tapestries are made now, anyway. The Catholic Church is wholly commercialized now. Saints are a gimmick to them, if you look at their catalogs. St. Anthony golf balls. St. Michael key chains. Prayer pillows and aprons. Personally, I find putting the images of sacred beings on this mundane stuff disgusting. Their images should be reserved for stuff to be venerated-the original, medieval statues and icons.

Tapestry icons that I've seen for sale are little things, technologically possible for the times, but I've never heard of them mentioned before the modern era.

 
There is also the argument that keeping the sacred /separate/ is damaging - that we SHOULD see images of the sacred in everyday life.

I'm currently wearing a shawl I made for religious reasons.  It's also REALLY warm and snuggly, and I'm cold.  But when I wear it I remember the religious aspect, even as I USE it to stay warm.

Sacred-as-separate is a VERY specific worldview, and not one necessarily shared by even everyone in the same religion, much less across religious boundaries.

Materialist

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #23 on: October 08, 2012, 06:12:29 pm »
Quote from: Castus;76101
Which, as Euryalus said, doesn't necessarily reflect on the Church as a whole. Plus, holy orders have to make money too. If the sale of a little kitsch can keep the soup kitchens going then to true harm done. You do seem to have an anti-Christian/Catholic bent though.

 
Hearing that I'm anti-Christian is quite shocking, since I protest such bigotry, and all the pagan created anti-catholic conspiracies I've heard, and pagans stealing holidays from Christianity-like All Saints' Day. Or the Roman Church forced Christianity on Europe, "destroyed" paganism. The only problem I find with the pope is that he tries to combine Christian rituals from different ethnic cultures into a seamless whole, which I think looks more like a swamp.

I need to stop; I'll get myself riled up. Read Ronald Hutton's books. Though I have thought of writing something about my method of religious construction...where to put it though...

Euryalus

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #24 on: October 08, 2012, 06:20:05 pm »
Quote from: Materialist;76140
Hearing that I'm anti-Christian is quite shocking, since I protest such bigotry, and all the pagan created anti-catholic conspiracies I've heard, and pagans stealing holidays from Christianity-like All Saints' Day. Or the Roman Church forced Christianity on Europe, "destroyed" paganism. The only problem I find with the pope is that he tries to combine Christian rituals from different ethnic cultures into a seamless whole, which I think looks more like a swamp.

Would you mind clearing this up a bit?  I'm finding it hard to parse.  Pagans created anti-catholic conspiracies?  The Pope is multi-cultural and this is bad?  Pagans are stealing Christian holidays?
« Last Edit: October 08, 2012, 06:20:39 pm by Euryalus »

Materialist

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #25 on: October 09, 2012, 12:03:54 pm »
Quote from: Euryalus;76141
Would you mind clearing this up a bit?  I'm finding it hard to parse.  Pagans created anti-catholic conspiracies?  The Pope is multi-cultural and this is bad?  Pagans are stealing Christian holidays?


I'm starting to get the impression that post that take to long to write never go through. I'll try a briefer response this time.

Anti-catholic conspiracy promoted by pagans: Catholic borrowed a lot of pagan rituals and holy days.

The pope makes obligatory local customs that he finds interesting, cluttering the liturgical calendar.

Holy days stolen from Christianity, a list for Theodisc Geleafa, from "Hammer of the Gods" by Mr. Wodening: Solmonath, Eostre, Hlaefmaest, Waelburges.

Holy days he combines with Christian ones: Hredhe, Sumerdaeg, Winterfylleth.

Holy day taken from secular custom: Haligmonath.

Holy day taken from non-Germanic people: Midsummer.

maerecatha

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Re: Historically Accurate Holy Images (Trying to Avoid Cultural Appropriation)
« Reply #26 on: October 23, 2012, 08:42:08 pm »
Quote from: HeartShadow;75934
The thing is, are we talking /icon/ or /painting/?  Because /icon/ says to me specific STYLES of artwork - posing, coloring, etc - to indicate which saint.  It's not just the paint-on-wood thing.  And using those specific styles would be problematic to me, yes.

If you're talking paint-on-wood, I don't see how that's a problem at all.  Humans have painted on everything that's held still enough (including each other - tats!) for as far back as we can find.  Art HAPPENS, we are a decorative species, and the idea that paint-on-surface is limited to ANYONE just boggles my little brain.

 
Technically, until and unless the icon is blessed by a priest on the altar, it's just paint-on-wood. Yes, they use specific poses, colours, and symbols when writing the icons to show which saint it is, but until it's blessed, it is merely a pictorial representation of the intended figure.

If you're buying an icon, you're not going to be buying one that is already blessed. They don't know who is going to buy it, and those that do write them realise that not everyone who buys them is Eastern Orthodox (or Coptic Orthodox or Byzantine Catholic... or even other varieties of Catholic, which I believe use them as well).

The original hand-written icons are made with specific prayers being said, but they still must be blessed before use. Most icons that you can buy (unless you shell out for the hand-written) are simply printed copies.

For me, personally, because my icons are blessed, I don't hang them up, even if I still think they are beautiful pieces of artwork (although I can't find most of them, especially my Alexandra ones, and that does actually sadden me a little, because they are a part of who I was), and I'm not sure if I'm okay with doing that, yet.

That being said, the icon my grandmother wrote for me of Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe will probably end up on a small altar/shrine to my ancestresses, because it was made for me, by my grandmother, and Mary is, essentially, the goddess of my family, even if she's not mine.

Ultimately, if it's an icon that has been blessed by a priest, I know they would ask that you be respectful of that with your veneration (should you choose), and what you do with it. Generally, though, unless you are being gifted an icon by someone who follows Eastern Orthodox Christianity (or something similar), you're not going to have a blessed icon, and can pretty much do with it as you will.

(I say this as someone who spent about 8 years as a practicing Orthodox Christian, and who has had a little experience writing icons)
~*~Mara~*~
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