We all have a story. No matter how much we dismiss, neglect, or overlook other people, the reality is that they have a story just as complex as ours. This is what the author John Koenig meant when he coined the word "sonder" in 2012: each and every human being is living a life just as vivid, nuanced, strange, and unique as your own. And this is why I decided to name my newsletter "Sacred Sonder" as a reminder of this beautiful reality — that every human being, every story, is sacred in the eyes of God and thus worthy of love and redemption.
The celebrated Spanish painter Pablo Picasso knew the power of story. Through his artistry, Picasso sought to illustrate the mundane experiences of human life — one such painting was The Old Guitarist.
Painted in Barcelona, the deep blue of The Old Guitarist depicts a man who appears to be lifeless, alone, and destitute in the city streets. The man is stale and fragile, old and hungry — his skin unable to carry the weight of heavy bones deformed by years of trauma, poverty, and alienation. Eyes closed, it is only a matter of time until he encounters the ultimate mark of human suffering: his own death.
With this painting, Picasso depicts the story of a man laid to waste by the rest of society, creating and making with everything he has left. With all strength and ability, his body hangs forward as he holds on to his only source of vitality: the guitar.
The guitar's earthy brown contrasts against the man's lonely blue. Unlike the monochromatic color scheme of the painting, the guitar is the only piece that exudes a different color — revealing the man’s reliance on his artistry for relief amid a society that has abandoned him. His guitar is the only thing giving him the golden rays of new life in a world so cold and blue.
The Old Guitarist thus epitomizes the human condition — the realities of marginalization, fear, and hopelessness that plague peoples and nations across the world.
But, despite the noteworthy portrayal of the old guitarist as accentuating marginalized experiences, it is necessary to mention that Picasso was himself nowhere near perfect. Far from "perfect," he was a known misogynist and bullier of women. Many of his paintings depict women through the male gaze and as objects of male sexual exploration and exploitation. In this way, we also encounter Picasso's complicated story of artistic genius and blatant misogyny. Despite highlighting marginalized experiences, like that of the old guitarist, he was himself a marginalizer of particular lived experiences — those of women and the “feminine.”1
And this is the story of Pablo Picasso, a complicated man who rose to fame through the uniqueness of his art. Through his famous artworks and masterpieces, he did both: highlight the marginalized experience of the old guitarist and marginalize the experiences of numerous women. In many ways, it makes me wonder about the complexities of human life and the tragedy of the human condition. It makes me ask, “Can I still appreciate The Old Guitarist while holding in tension Picasso’s blatant misogyny?”
Art critic Kamna Kirti writes a helpful note, saying:
"In my opinion, a true appreciation of Picasso’s art can only come from embracing him both as a person and as an artist. As a society, we should be intelligent enough to simultaneously enjoy a work of art and know that the person who created it was flawed."2
And this is true of all human beings. As we look up to our cherished theologians, philosophers, poets, and musicians, we must remember that they are just as human as we are. They are no messiahs. Their lives are as complex, nuanced, beautiful, and tragic as our own. What ultimately matters is what we do with their stories, and how we acknowledge their faults without throwing the baby out with the bathwater. This is the project of redemption: learning day-by-day what it means to see human beings through the providence of God — our God who steps into the deepest and darkest parts of our existence to heal, restore, and reconcile.
Indeed, our work is to make all things new again, reorient our visions, and recognize the God-imbued sanctity of what it means to be alive — to recover our sacred stories.
Shannon Lee, The Picasso Problem: Why We Shouldn't Separate the Art From the Artist's Misogyny, published in Artspace.
Kamna Kirti, Picasso — An Artistic Genius or a Bullying, Misogynistic Womaniser?, published in The Collector.
Absolutely beautiful. Thank you for this genius man.