Artistic Play: Seeking the God of the Unexpected Pubblico
Goto, Courtney Teru (2010)
Abstract
Abstract
Artistic Play: Seeking the God of the Unexpected
By Courtney T. Goto
Setting forth a practical theology of play through art, this
dissertation investigates
the question "How does artistic play allow people to seek the God
of the Unexpected?"
Artistic play is a term I use to place in conversation two
partners (art and play) whose
intersection has not been explored well, especially within
practical theology and adult
religious education. I define artistic play as the practice of
exploration through art forms
in which one opens oneself to unexpected transcendence, delight, or
discovery.
In this intersection of art and play, I examine
issues of body, imagination,
teaching, and learning for adults in two case studies involving
three types of artistic play
(liturgical art, aesthetic pruning in a Japanese garden, and
improvisational performance
art). The cases shed light on artistic play as a lived practice
that allows members of the
community to indirectly seek and gain spiritual knowledge in ways
that tend to be
overlooked, namely through stories, imagination, creativity, and
the senses. In the first
case study, I discuss a Japanese American congregation in
Sacramento, California
(Sacramento Japanese United Methodist Church) that is discovering
connections between
faith and culture through play, Japanese artifacts, and aesthetics.
Through artistic play,
the congregation is reflecting on what it means to be Japanese
American Christian. In the
second case, I explore how participants of InterPlay, a movement
based in Oakland,
California, are creating selves by engaging in improvisational
theater, movement, and
vocal music. Performance theory and object relations theory,
especially the work of
D.W. Winnicott, serve as analytic lenses.
While theological aesthetics has traditionally addressed art,
perception, and
revelation in the abstract, it has rarely explored how art
contributes to practical
theological construction in situ. This dissertation offers
insight about local practical
theological aesthetics and their implications for religious
education.
Table of Contents
Contents
One Introduction1
What is Artistic Play? 4
Research Question and Assumptions 10
Case Studies 17
Case 1: Artistic Play in a Japanese American 18
Church and Family
Case 2: InterPlay 20
Why These Case Studies 22
Some Guiding Questions 24
Two Method and Literature Review 26
Principles Informing the Research Design 27
1. Empiricism 27
2. Subjectivity 31
3. Hermeneutics 36
Research Design 38
Fieldwork 38
Analytic Frameworks 40
Object Relations Theory 41
Performance Theory 47
Literature Review 52
Art 53
Play 61
Three Japanese American Liturgical Art 70
SJUMC (Sacramento Japanese United Methodist Church) Context 72
The Pottery of Tears 78
What Is It? 79
What's the Story: Remembering the Dismembered 83
Pottery of Tears as a Transitional Object 88
Form and Content 93
Imaginative Pilgrimage 98
Making Sense of the Pottery of Tears 103
Floating Saints 105
Pretending on Girls' Day 107
Pretending to Be at Church 111
Seeing a Japanese Jesus 117
Limitations on Playing with Christ Images 122
The Recovery and Construction of Communal Memory 127
Summoning Home the Ghosts 130
Making Sense of Floating Saints 134
Conclusion 136
Four The Issei Garden 138
SEEING as Artistic Play 142
SEEING as a Formative Practice 146
Haunted Garden 155
Performing a Japanese American Male Self 164
Evolution of Artistic Play in the Garden 172
Garden as Symbol 177
Conclusion 179
Five InterPlay 184
InterPlay Context 185
Framing and Intention 191
Creating a Self 197
Surprise, Surrender and Serendipitous Creativity 212
Teaching and the Unexpected 226
Structure 227
Language 235
Mentoring 240
Conclusion 247
Six Constructing a Practical Theology of Play through Art 252
Mystical Adventure 253
Practicing Stories: Toward a Storied Epistemology 263
Imagination, Creativity, and Limiting Patterns 272
The Dynamics of Imagination and Creativity 272
Disturbing Patterns through Imagination and Creativity 280
The Senses and Spiritual Knowing in Artistic Play 289
Local Practical Theological Aesthetics 299
Conclusion 307
Seven Epilogue 312
Appendix 320
Works Cited 339
About this Dissertation
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