“It’s a joy to be allowed to be the servant of the work. And it’s humbling to know that my work knows more than I do.”

Madeline L’Engle

Artists and art lovers have tried to define where creative inspiration is born since men and women drew on the walls of caves. The ancient Greeks believed that the Muses – the nine daughters of Zeus – presided over the arts and sparked artists’ imaginations.

Where modern artists find inspiration in a secular society will be the subject of a panel discussion titled “Art and Spirit: An Exploration of Spirituality and the Creative Process.” The program, featuring a panel of Castine artists, will be held at 5 p.m. today at Trinity Episcopal Church in Castine.

The definition of spirituality will be “the big elephant in the room,” moderator Paul Gray, professor emeritus in performance studies at the University of Texas, said recently.

“I think we’ll start with a whole bunch of definitions of that word or substitute a different word,” he said. “I think people attending will hear intelligent artists in a number of different fields describe how in their work they encounter whatever it is they want to call it when the work takes on a life of its own.”

The Rev. Melissa Skelton, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church, said that the panel was a natural extension of the congregation’s emphasis on the exploration of spirituality through art. The Stone Church, as it is known locally, features an art gallery and the children’s program uses a method called “Godly Play” to help children explore a Sunday School lesson in a profound engagement with story, image and symbol, she said.

In a way, the relationship between religion and art has come full circle.

“For centuries, art was religion,” Gray said. “Religion without art was unthinkable and it was only about 200 to 300 years that society began see art as worldly [secular] and separate from religion.”

Filmmaker and writer Peter Davis will be a panelist along with artist Joshua Adam and novelist Deborah Joy Corey. Davis believes that spirituality resides not in the heart, the head or the soul, but in the imagination.

“We think of ourselves – most of us in the West – as rationalists,” he said, “but if we exalt the rational at the expense of the imaginative, then we come out with things that are flat, whether they’re creative products or any other thing that we produce. On the other hand, if we exalt the imagination and forget the rational, we’ll go crazy.

“The job of the creative person is to weave creative impulses, which I think is where spirituality resides, with the more planned and reasoned expressiveness that can unite these two poles into a finished work.”

Adam, a painter, believes that his work reflects the feelings of many people who do not regularly attend church. They find spirituality in nature. The woods, Maine’s rocky shore or Arizona’s desert are their cathedrals.

He also believes that the spirit of the artist or craftsman can survive for years in the objects they leave behind after their deaths.

“Whether you paint or build a boat, you leave something behind – the connection that was there in the moment as you were creating it,” Adam said recently. “You’re going to be gone, but that thing of beauty will still be there.”

For more information on the event, call 326-4180. Judy Harrison can be reached at 990-8207 and jharrison@bangordailynews.net.