Bridge to Wonder: Art as a Gospel of Beauty by Cecilia González-Andrieu

Abstract

Reviewed by: Bridge to Wonder: Art as a Gospel of Beauty by Cecilia González-Andrieu Rebecca Berrú Davis (bio) Bridge to Wonder: Art as a Gospel of Beauty By Cecilia González-Andrieu. Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2012. 250pp. ISBN 978-1602583511 As the book’s title, Bridge to Wonder: Art as a Gospel of Beauty intimates, Loyola Marymount assistant professor Cecilia González-Andrieu’s premise is that art as a gospel of beauty is “an announcement of the good news of our beloved status as children of God.” She asserts that, “In the beauty that delights us or breaks our heart, something is offered and understood, briefly, as wholeness and healing, and that “something” changes everything.” (37) This experience of beauty, or its absence, expedited by art, not only links us to God, but enables insight into our own or the world’s brokenness, engenders our community’s capacity for love and compassion, and has the potential to inspire, deepen and activate faith. With that said, theology does well when it pays attention to art’s transforming power. But how do theologians persuasively demonstrate that art is a viable source of theology? González-Andrieu shows us a way by naming art, in its broadest sense, the creative activity that unites spirit and matter. Whether it is drama, music, poetry or visual art, symbolic or narrative, these works are significant because of their power to mediate revelatory experience. This is what the arts do well. Thus, the arts (and the aesthetic experiences they evoke) are not only relevant to the theological discussion, they are necessary because “they are markers, pointers and reflections of the shimmering glow left in our world by the presence of God.” (23) They not only express and mediate God’s self-communication, but challenge us to see, respond, imagine and act. Making full use of a theological method, she proposes engaging art and religion in meaningful conversation with one another. González-Andrieu eloquently interlaces strands of theology, philosophy, art history and criticism. She draws from familiar sources in theological aesthetics: Aristotle, Pseudo-Dionysius, Abbot Suger, Jonathan Edwards, John Dewey, Hans von Balthasar, Paul Tillich, Frank Burch Brown and Roberto Goizueta. However, she also introduces the reader to new partners in the discussion, such as Von Ogden Vogt, Art and Religion (1948), Avery Dulles, Models of Revelation (1967), and particularly the insights of Pope John Paul II’s Letter to Artists (1999). Nonetheless, the work of her mentor, colleague and dear friend, Alejandro Garcia-Rivera, is a recognizable undercurrent throughout her book. She pushes further Garcia-Rivera’s appeal for those engaged in the work of theological aesthetics to attend to the experiences of diverse communities, as well as his challenge to artists to be responsive to the communities that call them forth. González-Andrieu does her best work in the chapters that describe, examine and address particular encounters with art. In Chapter Three, “In Search of Wonder,” she recounts her experience attending La Pastorela, a medieval shepherd’s play reenacted during the Christmas season at the California Mission of San Juan Baptista by Teatro Campesino’s cast of seasoned actors and local farmworkers. The classic narrative “of the triumph of the human capacity for goodness in the face of temptation” (118) is described in its local particularity as an experience that, for her and those in attendance, evokes wonder. Her point is that it is the experience of the beautiful that awakens love in us. This power of being awakened, asombrado in Spanish, then becomes a place where God is experienced. Wonder becomes revelatory. As wonder-filled beings, we are moved first to silence, to insight, and then to speech—a necessary process for imagining and then creating a better world. In Chapters Four and Five, González-Andrieu introduces us to Seeing Salvation: The Image of Christ an exhibit where art and religion was brought together at the United Kingdom’s National Gallery, February 26–May 7, 2000. She argues that its unexpected popular reception in light of culture’s “aggressive secularism,” demonstrates that “it is still possible to pick up signals of the transcendent to gain a...