stark contrast.

interesting thread on a favourite website of mine: serial killer cross-stitch.

the discussion on there was interesting…and i now have a clear handle on just how different from past versions of myself i really am…

i used to have a morbid fascination with…er, morbid things…and my first response after suspending the second thought i SHOULD have had before clicking the link was “this is abhorrent.” yet like a magnet the discussion pulled me through it and my stomach was turning by the end…

i understand the sentiment of having someone be able to study crime and be one step ahead of criminals, but this discussion hinged largely on what art is and the bounds of “personal taste.”

my opinion? taking the incredible amount of time it takes to cross-stitch and funneling it into portraits of serial killers is wrong. studying their mind is more of a gray area, but this is a blatant glorification of pictures of these people’s faces, not their psychology, which suggests a very different slant than straight criminology. “personal taste” should not be an actual issue, here.

and art. i too used to adhere to the dogma that making people respond was the highest point of art; whether that was a response of disgust or admiration was irrelevant as long as they felt something. obviously, by stating i “used to,” i have since cast this off and realized that art is a delicate medium that has a much nobler purpose than mere self-expression. than a way to be controversial. it’s a form of communication and it can effectively build up or tear down. i still believe that there is a place for satire and pointed wordpictures and the like, but my faith has taught me that we are to strive to get every single WORD we say carefully constructed to give grace to those who hear as is appropriate to the situation. (Eph 4:29) naturally, if even our daily speech is supposed to be so controlled, so our art should be, also.

if anyone still reads this, what do you all think about art and personal tastes and the grotesque?