On Monday, March 8, 2010, the newly-created Fine Arts Camerata met to discuss
the role that excellence should play in the life of a Christian artist.
The Camerata is a group at Northland that consists of all of the students and
faculty in the Fine Arts Department and exists to promote open communication
and critical thinking about issues related to the arts. The Camerata was born
out of a burden to disciple the students through discussion and analysis of the
issues that are relevant to the students’ future ministry and field of study.
In the realm of fine arts, the words excellence
or excellent emerge frequently. “That
was an excellent performance!” or “We must always strive for excellence.” For
our first Camerata meeting, the faculty chose to discuss the role that
excellence should play in the lives of Christian artists. For the sake of the
discussion, excellence was defined as
“perfect, superior, very good of its kind.” The core question was: Should
Christian artists strive to be excellent?
The students and faculty discussed a biblical response to this question and
arrived at the conclusion that pursuing excellence as an end goal results in a
whole host of consequences, such as:
• Results in comparative thinking (Pride/Depression)
• Creates a universal standard of excellence that must be achieved in
order to glorify God
• Results in the perfection of a talent to the neglect of spiritual
disciplines (Idolatry)
• Often leads to obsessive perfectionism (Idolatry)
The Camerata eventually arrived at the conclusion that rather than pursuing
excellence as the goal, Christian artists should seek to be wise stewards of
their time, relationships, gifts, and responsibilities. The end result may or
may not be excellence, but God will be glorified as the artist worships God
through every aspect of his or her life.
After the whole Camerata met in the morning, a group of students and faculty
met at the home of one of the speech faculty to further discuss the topic of excellence
and stewardship over coffee and cookies.
Click here to learn more
about the Fine Arts Department at Northland International University.