Sunday To Sunday Attentive Heart

Welcome to the Attentive Heart Podcast where we explore how an integration of mind, body, and spirit makes us whole and enables us to become more compassionate to ourselves and to others. I'm your host, John Gribowich, and today my guest is David.

David, we've known you for some time here but I haven't seen you in from some time, so there's a lot to catch up on here. But why don't you just tell us a little bit about your background and what occupies most of your time these days?

Well, first of all, you can probably hear I'm English, although last Monday I actually became an American citizen, so. Oh wow, congratulations. Yeah, so I'm very happy about that. I came to the U.S. 15 years ago. I came to the U.S. to be an artist in residence at a Catholic college in New Hampshire. And there's a whole story about how I managed to discern that I was going to be an artist, which is, I met somebody in my twenties and he helped me discern that.

And that ended up also in my committing to the faith, you know, changed my whole life. But, so I came to the U.S. back forward in time. Yeah. And what I do now, I was there for seven years and now I work for a University called Pontifex University and I wrote a book about being a, about sacred art and the training that artists got traditionally.

And the research for that was done in order to train myself because I couldn't find a school to go to. And I published a book called The Way of Beauty, and once that was published, I was approached and asked to design a master's course based upon the book. And so, I created a Master of Sacred Arts program, which is a formation for people in any creative pursuit.

It's really mimicking the formation that artists would have got 200 years ago, something like that, 250 years ago. But not the skills. There's a little bit of drawing, but it's mostly about giving an understanding of the, what the patterns of beauty are in the cosmos. How to develop an openness to inspiration and so that God can guide us if he chooses to inspire us. And how to harness that in pursuit of a particular skill.

So it's done in the context of visual art because that's what I use it for, and it's what I, it's how I discovered this, but I think it would work well for whatever you want to do. You know, entrepreneurial activity, research science, or just being creative in ordinary, everyday activities.

And so that's, that's what I do professionally still in my personal life. I made 60 and I got married last July and so I'm very happy. And I moved at that time from California, where I met you on the West Coast, to Princeton, New Jersey to join my wife. She works here in Princeton.

That's great, I mean you've had a very storied life. I know that. And I'd love to unpack a little bit of that story. But first off, you know so much about the artists, so I think that a lot of times we think that only certain people can be defined as artists, but I would probably imagine that you would like to think of everyone as an artist in some way, shape, or form.

And that's what I think that The Way of Beauty, the book and kind of just the whole course that you kind of design wants to get at that, we're all kind of participating ultimately in a work of art which has been given to us by God and we each have a role in kind of participating in that. In a unique way to unleash a certain type of beauty that comes from the source. Well, so I mean, like, is that, is that fair assessment or, I mean or how would you define being an artist? Yes. And what that means to you? The artist. I probably would use that particular word in the way that most of us hear it, you know, it's somebody who paints, draws, or sculpts.

But getting, getting at what you're responding to what you're getting at in the question. I think that all of us are called to participate in some way in the creative work of God in redeeming the world. Some are in conventional art, but in others, it can be in anything that we do it. It can be just in the way that we carry out our lives.

But there is a creative aspect and creativity in this sense means I have an idea that I bring it to fruition. So if I'm an entrepreneur, then I might do that, but even if I'm working. In a business where I'm not in a position to be an entrepreneur, there are ways in which I can think creatively. And one of the things that I'm convinced is that is a crucial component for all of us in order to lead a joyful Christian life, actually, is to discover that element.

And it's different for different people. It'd be expressed in, every person has a unique calling. So we can't say exactly where in your life you are called to be creative. But I believe everybody is. It's part of being human. It's to participate in the redemption of the world, and it's the source of our joy I think.

In many ways, I've heard people say it's that when we do that, we are closest to a sort of divine activity in manifesting ideas in material things. We don't create something. I don't create the matter that I form, but I do form it. And that the manifestation of ideas, which of their good come from God is this is what we're called to do.

And it's a sort of joy and satisfaction. And the thing that struck me when I discovered this process by which artists used to be trained, which really assumes this was, that this is appropriate for anybody. And that also it's an aspect of education, which is just about absent wherever you go.

And I'm not just talking about the public school, John Dewey sort of utilitarian approach, you know, by which education is just to form you to be employable in any way. And really just to sort of carry out a function. I think even at many classical academies, many traditional schools that are trying to instill traditional values, which is a noble thing, is a good thing.

I think still, there's this attitude that it's about learning, developing the mind and that it isn't real education unless I'm able to write an essay or complete a test. That it's an intellectual pursuit. And that if you do art for example, well that's recreation, but it's not really part of your genuine formation.

And I would say that putting aside a significant amount of time, not just the sort of the last period on Friday or something, for creativity really needs to be introduced. Because once that happens what it does, it, it's, you develop that faculty for manifesting ideas and then if you can, and so supposing I go to school, it just has an excellent art teacher and they teach us to draw very well and I can then be created in that respect. Still, I might, I might have a certain competence, but that might not be what I'm called to be. So what I need to do is to discover that calling, and that's where the book that I wrote, the Vision for You comes in because I was given that direction 30 years ago by somebody as well.

And we each need to discover what God is calling us to do. And then once you combine that with this formation, to be creative, open to supernatural creativity. In other words, God inspired. Then this is the source of joy and this is what's gonna draw others to us and to the faith and give meaning to our lives, I think.

Okay. Yeah. So much too, I'd like to talk about First off, I, you're totally onto something that makes sense and I think that resonates across the board and across the spectrum. I mean, I'm reading this excellent book by the American record producer, Rick Rubin called, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, and it's a phenomenal book, and he's getting at the whole part here.

First off, saying that everyone is an artist, whether they realize it or not. Yeah. Like, you know, you're an artist, even if you like, have a creative way on how you get from work on your commute. Like if you figure out a way to kind of get from point A to point B, that's somehow, you know, creative.

So everyone is creative and he just makes the argument that you made this, that's just that if you don't tap into that and see how that is you participating in something bigger than yourself, then you ultimately don't really find a joy in life because you feel as if sometimes the whole burden is upon you to create your own happiness or your own life. When rather we are always in a responsive mode to everything around us and how we respond to things and allow them to transform and change us, brings us out of ourselves to see what is our role within it. Which I think is, you know, what vision for you is talking about and how that, and how that compliments The Way of Beauty so much.

So before we go a bit further, I just wanna know a little bit more about this, what you call like the traditional or the ancient technique of the process of the artist. Like what were some of the things that they would do and like what time period are we talking about here? Like what, what are you, what are you referring to when you talk about this process?

The way, first of all, I'll just show, tell you a little bit about how I discovered this. A lot of this is me drawing conclusions and trying to work something out. Because I wanted, my question was not so much what did people do in the past. It's how can I do something similar in the present so that I'm always, and if I discovered something new, then I didn't mind that, that it seems a good idea to look at the past.
The first thing I did was sign up for Icon painting classes because this is a tradition that seems to be sort of well-established and working well. And then I also studied in Florence doing something called the Academic method, which is a very rigorous way of naturalistic drawing and painting based upon methods developed in the Renaissance period. And the academies were run by people like the Carracci brothers, Annibale Carracci for example. And deliberately, you know, trying to invoke the memory of Plato and suggest that they were doing something divine in what they were doing, you know, reaching for ideals.

And what I did when I learned these things, I was well taught, but I tried to look for common elements in the way that these two traditions, which sort of barely hung on. I mean, they're just about, had a continuous thread with people at various stages trying to reestablish them over the years, but, I look for similarities in the teaching methods. Because ultimately what I wanted to do was paint in a third style, which was the Gothic style, and there was nobody teaching that.

So I thought, I'm gonna have to work out how to do this. So, this is what I discerned. First of all a common element is that you. In art, you copy old masters. So, you look at a canon of great works in whatever it is you want to do and you just imitate them. You let them guide what you do.

Then you, in art, you would look directly at nature so that the master there is God himself, you would say the Creator. And that's, that is where you get a personal response, but you are trying to imitate nature. And the natural style that you develop develops from the old masters that you look at so that the people in the tradition. So if I painted all the time endlessly copied Superman and Spider-Man and superheroes and I did life drawing classes. I would then naturally start to paint people with bulging muscles in strange, contorted, you know, powerful, you know, actions and gestures. Because I would tend to do it in the way that the people that I imitated did. But in time I would develop my own style.

I would, within that tradition, I would start to express my own style and you sort of move beyond it. So that's, that's how you learn the skills, but all you learn the skills in conformity to a model that you're looking at. So even as you are learning to draw and paint, you are imitating. In other words, it's being humble as you're doing it. You're allowing an image to dictate what you actually, or what you see in front of you.

Then there is an inculturation. So beyond what you actually study when you are drawing or painting, you learn about the culture and the history of those who've done what you're doing.
And so you study the great masters and this is more in terms of appreciation rather than imitation. So you do that as well. And then you learn on top of that the meilleur, which each of them emerged and why they painted as they did, and get an understanding of how style and form and content relate to the times that they were in.

The other thing is to actually, to start to understand the patterns of beauty, because if an idea comes from God, it's a, it is good. I don't think this good comes from God, but any idea I have, I believe, and so when I'm trying to manifest it, there are certain, what you might call rules of composition that guide me to help me to understand what I'm looking at or what my idea is.

So in music, you learn the rules of composition. You learn the rules of harmony. Now actually there is a whole array of mathematics, which apply to space just as much and were used traditionally in architecture. They were used to proportion paintings and drawings and the placement of compositions. And so you, you learn that, and again, it's sort of a theory that underlies you start than to see how others have used that in the past.

But this also ultimately relates to the patterns and the rhythms and the motions of the cosmos, that effectively the starting point for the mathematics of beauty is the observation of the beauty of nature. And trying to describe the relationships in nature in a way that man can copy it. Can reproduce them in his work, the assumption being that if these mathematical relationships underlie what I create, then it's effectively following the same pattern as the beauty of the cosmos and will reflect in itself with God's grace and the ability to the degree I can follow his inspiration, divine beauty.

So the culture of man is seeking to be something that speaks of God just as God's creation speaks of the creator. That’s the idea behind it. And so you analyze what is it that makes the cosmos beautiful? And you would do the same to great works of the past as well as a model. And then finally, Spiritual formation.

And of course, this is one where you can't, you really can't guarantee results. You can't, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. So nevertheless, learning how to pray, how to especially liturgical prayer and for that reason, the list should be hours as a layman. Something that I can do all the time was emphasized very strongly.

And this is a pattern of prayer, which again follows the pattern of the cosmos. And when I'm praying in this liturgical pattern, praying the Psalms, for example, which is what I do, that is, it's stimulating the imagination. But of course, I'm not just doing it as a detached observer who's interested in reenacting historical events that great artists is in the past.

To the degree that it becomes my own prayer and I really participate in it's forming me as a person to almost be a, you know, conform to that template myself spiritually. So just give an example of that because I think that's just so fascinating. I mean like, just based off of really everything you were just kind of outlining here. When you went to say, the course on writing icons. Yeah. How did you start to see, first off, your own style emerge from that? Well, I know that that may not be the best example because I know there's, there are very strict rules when it comes to iconography.

But I mean, how have you seen your life, something like that, when you invested the time to really study what has proven to be good, true, beautiful, how that's actually revealed within yourself? Your own unique style, your own unique contribution, and maybe even how that even doves tails nicely in your prayer life with how you see your own way of expressing praise to God through the recitation and chanting of the psalm? Does that make sense how I'm trying to get at it here for you?

Yeah, so, one thing I would say is that the uniqueness just sort of happens. So it's not contrived. That on the whole what you're doing is responding. You only change things in order to respond to a particular need. So if something doesn't, from the past, doesn't meet the need that I'm trying to meet, then I will develop something. But I'm just trying to think. An example would be in the house that I now live in, you can see this part behind me. It's not the best picture there. That's the sort of abstract Rothko-esque painting now. Sure. We deliberately set this house up so that when you go in the front door, the icon corner, the prayer corner is the prominent thing.

You go in and there's a foyer, there's an entrance and you see the icon corner. That's deliberate. We want people to be aware of that when they come in. That has the most precise art and it's very clearly delineated iconographic or gothic style art. Then as you move away into the other rooms, you have art that reflects the beauty of nature.

And, but I don't want it to detract from the icon corner. I wanted to be clear that that's the main focus, so I started to paint art that is what you might call very large canvases, six feet by three feet, filling the wall in colors. They're, they're landscapes, but they're abstracted.

And so they're evocative. You know, you get a sense of clouds and hills and a field in the foreground. The colors I painted are designed really just to harmonize with the colors in the room. Because as much as anything, I wanted to set a mood for the room so that you're comfortable and I want it in some way to evoke the beauty of nature but in a way that is, puts you at, puts you at ease. And it's deliberately much more loosely painted, slightly abstracted, so that, in a sense, it's obvious that it isn't the main attraction, it's a supporting player.

And then the next step away from that is these Rothko-esque abstraction canvases, which I put in the room. Again, the main purpose of those is, is really just to be purely decorative, but just to give a little bit of interest. And I've embedded within that, that actually has the, what's called the Boethius’ arithmetic of harmonic proportion of this horizontal lines are all calculated according to these mathematical relationships.

I just put them in there. Now, anyone looking at that, I don't want people to look at that and think, “Ah Boethius”. If anything, I don't want people even to notice it. I wasn't thinking that at all. Trust walks into the room and feels at ease because it feels like the colors are beautiful and there's enough interest, so it doesn't seem bland.

But I don't, it's, they're deliberately painted so that you don't go and look at them. And what I would say is, unlike what, the idea of abstract expressionism is that you can actually paint pure emotion. You, you're abstracting the expression of human emotion from the human person.

I think that's a flaw. If I want to show joy, the way I do that is to show a joyful person because you can’t, you don't separate the two. That's dualism. So I'm not, if anybody looks at these and says, “I see profound insights into the nature of humanity”, I'd say, “Well, you're mad”.

Actually. I don't. I didn't. So you know, you're may. It is certainly not what I intended, but interesting. If you find it beautiful because the shapes are pleasing, then that's good. But there's this deliberately tiered structure of art, like a sort of Catholic feng shui or something, where in every room or so there is an icon, there's a face of Christ somewhere.

But even if it's discreetly placed so that, that is the most precise piece of art in the room and everything else then is very obviously a supporting player, even if it's much bigger. And these are ideas that I have, you know, I just thought this seems to be the hierarchy of art. Yeah.

WellI mean, and all that you've explained is just, I mean, it's, it's absolutely beautiful. I mean, and it shows that you're very mindful of the space, mindful of what you would like visitors to your house to experience. I mean, maybe even more importantly, what you and your wife would like to be able to experience as you live there. So I mean, how we shape our surroundings is definitely going to be harmonious with our mood and how we at least intend to set our disposition.

I hope you enjoyed Fr. John Grovowich. He will be back as a contributing podcaster. Please share the Sunday to Sunday Witness Podcast with your friends, and if you have comments send them to me at annmary@sundaytosunday.com. As always this is Ann Mary Mullane from Kearny, New Jersey for Sunday to Sunday Productions.