A visual interlude

Ford Madox Brown was one of the Pre-Raphaelite painters who brought great detail and accuracy into their works, exploring scenes from history, mythology or daily life in Victorian Britain.

‘Work’ is a complex painting Brown created over a 13 year period, depicting a group of “navvies” digging up a street near his studio in Hampstead.  Surrounding them is a variety of other characters, typical of London during the 1850s, who illustrate widely different relationships with respect to work.

The navvies are heroic characters, working to create the infrastructure of modern Britain.  Here they are installing piped water to the houses of north London for the first time, an advance which would reduce the incidence of both cholera and alcoholism. 

On the right of the scene are two men observing the manual work and conversing together.  Brown sees the philosopher and the clergyman as “brain workers”, who improve the lot of others through the power of their thinking and teaching.  He modelled these two on Thomas Carlyle, whose book “Then and Now” inspired the painting, and Revd Maurice, who founded a college for working men where Brown used to teach.

Below and behind them are people out of work – haymakers in search of a harvest, Irish immigrants displaced by the potato famine, and other itinerant agricultural labourers.  As they shelter from the heat of the July sun, their lack of significance in the painting reflects their apparent worthlessness in real life. 

   

Then there are those who do not need to work for a living: a gentleman and his daughter out for a morning ride, who find their path inconveniently blocked; a lady with a blue parasol on the left, concerned with keeping in fashion and ensuring her greyhound’s red jacket stays clean; another middle class woman behind her is distributing tracts for the temperance society. 

By placing the gaggle of children and the ragged chickweed seller in the foreground, the artist emphasises the destitute who cannot work, or who lack supportive relationships, and depend on their wits and the charity of others to survive in a cruel world.

Brown’s decision to crowd so many characters of widely differing wealth and status into one scene – in close relational proximity – reflects his strong social conscience.   

As true now as it was then, material wealth has to be created and stewarded, involving strength and wisdom and good judgment.  But those attributes alone do not make a society great; that depends also on a society’s ability to care for and include those who cannot work due to age, illness or lack of education or opportunity – in a way that is both compassionate and just.  As recession, unemployment and reduced welfare budgets loom large, we would do well to contemplate Ford Madox Brown’s perspective on the world.

(You can explore the painting further by visiting the Manchester Art Gallery’s dedicated section on ‘Work’.)

One in a thousand

Quote
"Everyone is kneaded out of the same dough but not baked in the same oven.”  Yiddish Proverb

News

The release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit this week in exchange for 1,027 Palestinian prisoners

was hailed as a triumph by Hamas, who held Shalit and negotiated the terms of release.  It brings to 13,509 the number of Arab prisoners freed since 1957, in exchange for a total of 16 captured Israeli soldiers – which equates to a ratio of around 800 to one.

On the Israeli side, feelings were mixed.  Journalist Ari Shavit summed it up.  "There are many very good reasons to oppose the deal for the release of Shalit.  They include the fact that the deal is a surrender by Israel to terror; that it will spur Hamas... and empower extremists in the Arab world and in Palestine... And yet there is one decisive reason to support the deal: Israeli solidarity; without this feeling there is no meaning to our lives here."

The extraordinary terms of trade involved in the prisoner exchange indicate two widely different valuations of human life.  The Israelis sense of solidarity is so strong – of covenantal proportions – that they will pay far over the odds to release one of their own from captivity.  On the other side of the coin, though, is the implication that a Palestinian is worth just 1,000^th of an Israeli.  The danger is that this will be manifested in other ways in the complex politics of Israel/Palestine, and lead to further injustice.

Read on

The latest Cambridge Paper by Julian Rivers touches on the same underlying issues as it examines the new British equality law.  It contrasts the biblical concept of equality with the prevailing cultural approach which marginalises the genuine differences of conscience between people, which are essential to honest public debate.  You can read this insightful paper here. 

Walk the talk

How much do we allow notions of political correctness to stifle different expressions of belief or conscience in our office, home or school?  Might you do something to encourage more honest airing of different viewpoints, and hold back the tendency to mock or pass immediate judgment on others who don’t appear to be politically quite correct? 

The last word
From the Bible, Galatians chapter 3:28 “In [Jesus] the distinctions between Jew and Gentile, slave and free man, male and female, disappear; you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

Steve Jobs and the fruit of Apple

Quote
"3 Apples changed the world: 1st one seduced Eve, 2nd fell on Newton and the 3rd was offered to the world half bitten by Steve Jobs."  Posted on Twitter, 6^th October.

News

The untimely death of the digital generation’s maverick leader, Steve Jobs, is mourned all round the world by fans of his innovative genius.  Since Jobs took back the helm of the Apple Corporation in 1997, millions of people have become owners of iPhones, iPods and iPads, as well as the latest Mac computers.

Under Jobs’ leadership, Apple’s products have become iconic.  They combine cutting edge technology, style and ease of use with a brand that embodies the freedom and individualism of the postmodern world.  ‘iProducts’ are at the heart of the explosion of the internet, the mobile phone industry, and affordable laptops which have created a digital generation connected across every continent. 

Social networking (which includes texting and email along with social network platforms such as Facebook and Twitter) has brought unimaginable changes to the number of people we stay connected with, as well as the speed and convenience of getting in touch.

But there are downsides of this technological revolution, especially the way it can change the quality and nature of our relationships.  As more and more communication is done via a smart phone or laptop, it can weaken people’s ability to communicate and relate to others face to face.  Also, maintaining more relationships means less time is available for each one.

Paradoxically, the technology which enables us to be ‘better connected’ can prevent us from engaging in real-time relationships; the convenience of being contactable at all times can become the burden of constant availability; and the ease of texting what we think and feel can weaken our face to face social skills and our ability to resolve conflict.

So let us celebrate new technologies and learn to use them, but beware of captivation by their beguiling possibilities and subtle demands. 

Read on

MIT researcher Sherry Turkle recently published a book called “Alone in the crowd”, about how social networking is eroding our ability to live comfortably offline.  Read a summary of her challenging findings with respect to intimacy, boundaries, conversational ability and other issues here.

Walk the talk

It is easy to be guilty of ‘presenteeism’ (being physically present but mentally or emotionally absent) in our close relationships?  Texting at mealtimes, glancing at the TV when in conversation, or thinking about work when your child is reading to you all weaken relationships.  Is this a habit you need to change? 

The last word
From the Bible, Proverbs 18:24: “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.”