Purpose-driven Life Art
Here is the front cover of The Purpose-driven Life: What on Earth am I Here For? written by Rick Warren (2002). The oak tree with exposed roots is a scraperboard by Michael Halbert. In fact two scraperboards: one showed the tree, the other the roots. Michael combined them to fit the author's concept and, unusually, sold the rights to the combined work so that it could be used in spinoffs planned by the author. The book spent 238 weeks on USA TODAY's best-seller list and became the best selling non-fiction hardback in history. Click the title link to read Michael's account of this unusual and most successful commercial art project.
posted by Unknown @ 1.2.09
4 comments
4 Comments:
Hmmm - the Amazon.co.uk "one star" reviews suggest the author offended both Christians and atheists by his cherry picking of biblical quotes. Not a book I'll bother reading - even in a "used - 20p" edition. A rather unexpected Abrahamic God plug from CoxSoft Art :-)
You noticed! I wasn't plugging the book, but the cover art. The book is that type of whacky nonsense that appeals to the Yanks. It dropped like a stone in the UK. I searched my borough library database and found only 1 copy.
Cover art does help sell a book. So this was a very successful project for Michael. He sent me the link because the book has attracted renewed interest lately. He's a true professional artist, and his account of this project is interesting for anyone trying to become a professional artist. It's worth reading just out of curiosity. His project writeups are very good.
It is always an interesting philosophical test when good art in any medium is used to promote an ideology which one considers has dangerous effects.
The world of art would be a poorer place without such creations - albeit usually sanitised by the passage of time. Iconoclasts often destroy the artistic symbol - while promoting their own equally "certain" ideology.
Yes. Where would Western European art be without Biblical fantasies? Look at the Sistine Chapel ceiling. As a humanist and a firm believer in Darwin's theories, I see religious lunacy as extremely dangerous, but I can admire the art as I would modern fantasy art. Gods, dragons, Martians; it's how well they are depicted that matters.
The buildings aren't bad too. I discovered last night that the Natural History Museum in London had been intentionally designed as a cathedral in praise of God's hand in nature by a devout Christian opposed to Darwin's heretical theory. Terrific building, one of my favourites. Darwin's statue has recently been given centre stage there. So it's now a cathedral to Darwin! Times change.
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