Why Beauty Matters

Linda and I recently attended the lecture of a former philosophy professor addressing our group of fellow artists of faith with the thesis “Why Beauty Matters.” It was a thought-provoking message about the meaning of beauty and its intrinsic value in our increasingly fraught times. 

One of the more salient points that resonated with me was the statement that “nature introduces us to beauty” for we are surrounded by it here. Of course, as was stressed at our gathering, the original author of beauty is God, without whom there would be no creativity.  

The above photo is from our front porch but intentionally omits the usual focal point of the lighthouse here. I snapped it during our first snow of this new year and it captures for me the beauty of the place apart from the iconic light itself. 

As photographer and author Murad Sayen writes in Maine: The Home Place, “There have been times, standing behind a camera and tripod, or driving to a place of promise, when the sudden recognition of the beauty of the scene before me has brought tears of joy and gratitude to my eyes.” 

And Michael K. Komanecky states in At First Light: Two Centuries of Maine Artists, Their Homes and Studios, “Attracted to its rugged beauty, artists have found in Maine a place to connect more directly with the natural world. For many, the wildness that…Henry David Thoreau described in The Maine Woods…was and continues to be a significant reason for relocating to this place, at least temporarily.” 

It is definitely one of the main features that drew Linda and I here a half-dozen years ago and it continues to feed our souls to this day. It also is partly what I try to impart on this blog with my photography in the hopes of sharing some natural beauty to buoy the spirits of others. And to continue the nautical theme, I strive to shine some light via my writing about the virtues of simplicity and experiencing more life with less stuff.  

According to career coach Ken Coleman, loving creations accomplish three things: equipping, encouraging, and entertaining. “Your creations should entertain people enough that they want to experience more. They should also encourage people to take some sort of action. And they should equip people with knowledge or experience.” So here is hoping you realize why beauty matters and experience it for yourself! 

The Beauty of Creativity

The other day I was doing some online research when I stumbled upon the listing of our neighborhood as a national historic district on the National Park Service website. The article said, “Land’s End Historic District…is a summer cottage colony developed by Russell W. Porter…[who] divided much of his property into lots and pursued a vision of an enclave of seasonal residents dedicated to experiencing nature, living a simplified existence and nurturing artistic talents (emphasis mine). At Land’s End Porter built cottages and created a summer community with lasting cohesion.”

As regular readers may recall, I wrote about Land’s End earlier here but this particular description of why Porter sought to develop the neighborhood stood out to me for all the reasons articulated above in italics. The very attributes that drew Linda and I here originally are the exact ones with which our corner of the world was intentionally designed. For us and our like-minded neighbors, nature, simplicity, and art represent the creativity of beauty.

And on that note, my mother recently shared with me this gem from fellow writer and photographer Vicki Kuyper: “Photography is one of the pursuits I’ve found where I can worship with childlike abandon. As I play with light and shadow, pattern and perspective, color and contrast, I’ve developed a habit of whispering a word of thanks, praising God for His handiwork right along with every photo I take…I can worship God through my lens as well as I can on my knees.” 

Landscape watercolorist David Dewey, whose painting of Marshall Point (pictured above) we encountered long before moving here, adds this to the conversation: “God’s invisible qualities and divine nature. I think this is what has always come through my work. I was raised by parents with a deep faith in God, and they raised me to honor him with my life and my work, but it was never a religious decision to paint this way. Instead, it was the realization that I really am God’s creation living and working in his creation; nature for me has become the fundamental evidence of his handiwork.” 

As writes Tish Harrison Warren, author of Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life: “Being curators of beauty, pleasure, and delight is therefore an intrinsic part of our mission, a mission that recognizes the reality that truth is beautiful.” If there is one thing that stands out to me about living here literally at Land’s End, it is the transcendence of our natural surroundings and how reflective of our Creator it all is. And it moves me to make art through my writing and photography that also communicates the beauty of creativity. 

The Heart of Art

As part of our celebration of my 50th birthday the other day my wife and I visited the Norman Rockwell exhibit at the Frist Center in Nashville and loved it. According to the exhibit, Rockwell was hailed as a “contemporary Currier and Ives” and “Dickens with a paintbrush” and was heralded for the realism and idealism of his portrayals of simple, small town life in America.

One of my favorite Rockwell paintings, which was not part of the exhibit but hangs at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, is the painting of his adopted hometown at Christmastime, which is pictured above. It speaks to me of the beauty of New England, the Christmas holiday, and small town living in general. Rockwell’s ability to capture the essence of any setting was unparalleled, but home even more so.

Rockwell was a master of his craft and as an artist he inspires me to create with heart the type of art that uplifts people and moves them toward their better selves. To me the artist’s legacy is so much more than the impressive quantity of his artwork; it is also the quality of the art he created with such attention to detail. Some may criticize Rockwell’s work as crass commercialism, but I think he preferred people to products and it showed in his portrayal of them.

Winter Wonderland

I am happy to report that since my last post Nantucket received the snowfall my wife and I had hoped for, with about five inches of fabulous white flakes covering the ground and creating a winter wonderland of serene scenery. According to our best recollections, it had been more than two decades since my wife and I last saw that much snow and we learned that it is relatively uncommon for here also.

And it could not have been more picture perfect. We awoke on a Saturday morning to a steady stream of snowflakes and it continued to gather virtually all day as wooly blankets of white fleece. We got dressed in our winter gear, headed down Main Street to the island wharf and photographed the breathtaking beauty of it all before heading home to share our excitement with Florida friends and family.

There is something special about the simple beauty of a winter snowfall that blends manmade structures like buildings and boats with the natural presence of flora and fauna to create a landscape that is theatre for the senses. And we loved our front row seats to the spectacular show that the picturesque snow presented our fellow residents and us on this dreamsicle of an island thirty miles out to sea.