A chronicler of pop culture, David LaChapelle is best known for photographing celebrities—Michael Jackson, Andy Warhol, Madonna, Elton John, Courtney Love, Kanye West, Lady Gaga, and so on. But he also maintains a fine-art photography practice, creating pieces that regularly reference religion and the metaphysical. His style is highly saturated and dramatic and combines elements of surrealism and pop art. He has exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, the Musée d’Orsay, and the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC.
In this photograph, John the Baptizer hears from God, his eyes rolled back as if in a trance. Perhaps he is receiving words for a sermon—he was a fiery preacher of repentance—or the call to rebuke the tetrarch Herod Antipas for divorcing his wife to marry his brother’s ex. He holds a palm branch, a symbol of martyrdom. For speaking truth to power, John literally lost his head.
LISTEN: “He’s a Keeper of the Fire” by Buffy Sainte-Marie, on Illuminations (1969)
He’s as heavy as a lead weight, baby He’s as skinny as a wire He’s a prophet of a new day, baby He’s a keeper of the fire
He’s got a funny kinda voodoo, baby You oughta see him at the zoo He’s got a heavy kinda hoodoo, baby And he can lay it on you
He can say it like an angel, baby He can say it like a blowhorn He can see a-seven devils, baby And never even give a whole turn
Been haunted like a razor, baby He’s been tested in the blood He’s a walker on the hot coals, baby And he’s a-heavenly bound
I saw him walkin’ in the valley, baby I could see him through the trees I saw him talkin’ to the moon there, baby He was walkin’ on his knees
He can play it like a rainbow, baby He can play it like a clown He can play it like a river, baby And he can follow you down
He’s as heavy as a lead weight, baby And he’s as skinny as a wire He’s a prophet of a new day, baby He’s a keeper of the fire
Buffy Sainte-Marie is a Canadian American singer-songwriter, visual artist, and social activist. I’ve not found any indication that she wrote this song with John the Baptizer in mind, but boy does that reading seem to fit! The wild-eyed, desert-dwelling, locust-eating ascetic, burning with a heavenly ardor and treading flat the valleys to make way for his cousin Jesus. John prophesies a new day coming, one involving judgment. He carries the weight of this message. Unfazed by societal ridicule, he continues on in communion with God, inviting folks down to the river to be baptized—cleansed of their sin and awakened to new life, in preparation for the coming of Christ.
It’s worth noting that other songs on Sainte-Marie’s Illuminations center on biblical figures—namely, “Adam” and “Mary.” And the opening track is “God Is Alive, Magic Is Afoot” (brilliantly covered earlier this year by Chris Thile).
Art & Theology 