"Last Supper" depiction at Olympics Opening Ceremony

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453042#Comment_122453042

It was created for worshippers of the religion, and holds high importance to them.

It wasn’t, and it doesn’t.

After that you can make whatever ridiculous arguments you like.

Nermal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453004#Comment_122453004

Eagerly awaiting your 'many, many more examples' of paintings from any era both more famous and popularly associated with Christianity.

Given that the Last Supper is the second most famous painting there is, and that the world's most famous painting is a portrait without religious significance, you've got quite a lot of Googling ahead.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453069#Comment_122453069

I don’t need to google, rather I’d simply encourage you to go back and read what I said, more carefully this time rather than jumping over your keyboard to scrawl out a useless retort. I said it was up there with many examples of art from the Renaissance period. There are many examples of paintings from that period which are equally famous as the Last Supper, some with more meaning to some people than others.

The Last Supper isn’t the second most famous painting there is, though I wouldn’t quarrel with you over whether or not it is the second most famous painting in European Art history. Of the 2 billion Christians there are in the world, most won’t be remotely familiar with the painting.

Don’t get me wrong - it stands to reason that you would want to imagine that your idea of Christianity is the definitive version of Christianity that all Christians must share, and believe me when I say I take no pleasure in disabusing you of such ridiculous notions, it just doesn’t feel right, but, even among Catholics, the Universal Ministry of the Church takes precedence over depictions of Christ in Art, and every culture imagines Christ in their own image. The Church has long been ok with it, and the portrayal of the Last Supper at the Olympics is not the exception, it’s the rule:

https://catholicexchange.com/why-its-okay-to-portray-jesus-as-europeanor-any-other-race/

Nermal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453064#Comment_122453064

Being painted on the dining room wall of a monastery it literally was created 'for worshippers of the religion'.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453157#Comment_122453157

It was commissioned by an Italian nobleman in what was intended to be used as a mausoleum. I don’t know about you, but mausoleums aren’t places where worshippers tend to hang out, they’re ornate buildings for people with more money than sense to be buried when they’re dead, so there wasn’t many worshippers going to be looking at it in any case, much like the way as I posted earlier in the thread - a reproduction of the painting hung in my living room throughout my childhood. There wasn’t much worshipping done in the living room, apart from a few chairs around once a week for a few decades of the rosary, but the last supper was just a nice painting with no greater significance attached to it. Could’ve just as easily hung in the bathroom.

nolivesmatter

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122432829#Comment_122432829

I like Dara O'Briain but that's a pretty weak excuse for why a comedian wouldn't make a joke about Islam.

Nermal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453236#Comment_122453236

I think you'll find worshippers do hang out in mausoleums, often for a very long time. Hence the care taken to adorn them with art of religious significance.

Still waiting for the image of Christian art that's more iconic than the Last Supper. Even one will do. Your link didn't have any.

volchitsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122452940#Comment_122452940

Just for info, their own press release (pre ceremony) literally called it "a Last Supper mise en scène" and that's the information that was sent out to the press.

"La Cène" means the Last Supper, so there's a pun there about "mise en scène". That was French television's press release straight from the artistic directors - later deleted when the row blew up.

I don't know why some people are so determined to be this disingenuous - it was a mise en scene of the Last Supper. Then they brought in more Greek elements, in particular blue Dionysus guy. But it's not a one or t'other, it's both. Still, if people are really determined to be lied to, that's basically their problem. I'm not going to go along with it though.

It's not that I find it particularly objectionable, myself - not being a believer I don't care much either way, and it was pretty clever. But all this studied inability from some people to see what's in front of them is frankly disconcerting. It reminds me of back when we were all expected to believe that communion was literally the body and blood of Christ: not many people really did, AFAIK, but the ability to believe (or pretend to believe?) an obvious lie is a useful skill for practitioners of any faith. And this seems to be the new faith. But I'm done with lying.

suvigirl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122452980#Comment_122452980

No. Claiming a painting is a Christian anything makes you look ridiculous.

volchitsa

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122432829#Comment_122432829

He has a point that we can make - and get - jokes about our own foibles more easily than those of others, because we're all familiar with the references, but OTOH most people don't know much about Judaism, and yet there are loads of jokes about Jews. Maybe we just need more Muslim comedians to start poking fun at their own religion? Shazia Mirza comes to mind.

https://youtu.be/QIsY6z8FmF8

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453287#Comment_122453287

As I said - I don’t know about you, but mausoleums aren’t places where worshippers hang out, and the pomp and finery is much like the pomp and finery found in Pyramids - popular with tourists centuries later, but let’s not pretend that at the time they were built, the intent was any form of religious worship. Your characterisation of ‘art of religious significance’ is no more accurate than the previous attempted characterisation. The painting isn’t famous because it’s associated with Christianity, it’s famous because it’s associated with the Renaissance period.

That’s why you’ll be waiting for an image of Christian art that’s more iconic than the Last Supper. You maintain its Christian art, whereas the point I was making was to do with the many examples of works of art from the Renaissance period in European Art history. The painting has greater significance among art historians than any claims of significance it has among Christians or any significance whatsoever to Christianity.

Sudden Valley

I remember the tv shows Lost and Battle Star Galactica had promotional posters with their characters mimicking those on the last supper. I dont think either show was referencing the historic event just using a well know painting know in pop culture. BSG in particular had an actress in the Jesus pose. I guess this wouldn't fly now, people being more sensitive to being offended.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453535#Comment_122453535

As long as it was done in the best possible taste 😏

https://youtu.be/ZkqxagJglaI?si=c9qQQBvn8AkCiDqR

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453535#Comment_122453535

Yes, the triggerers have become the triggerees.

Nermal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453291#Comment_122453291

It's worth telling the truth to ourselves. People argue in public, but change their minds in private. Perhaps the spectacle of people flatly denying the Last Supper is Christian art or being unable to put forward a distinction between black face and drag may yet open some eyes.

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122454112#Comment_122454112

You’re making the association between the painting and Christianity, would be nice if you had even a remote smidgen of any evidence to support your claim. Like you’re obviously aware that Christianity existed for at least 1,500 years before the painting and many like it were commissioned at a time when being a patron of the Arts was of much greater significance and importance than it is today.

https://thoughtsonpapyrus.com/2019/09/19/5-the-last-supper-paintings/

The actual painting you’re referring to, has been reproduced many times and carries no great significance in Christianity. It’s the event depicted in the painting that is of any significance to Christianity, but as has been pointed out in the thread already - it’s been memed numerous times in popular culture. It was only because on this occasion it was done in drag that there were complaints from people claiming the performance was blasphemy! 🙄

https://youtu.be/SYkbqzWVHZI?si=JidLoeElRj6opMG_

extra-ordinary_

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122448875#Comment_122448875

Shaming sex-worker shamers now?

This thread just keeps giving and giving….

sonofenoch

Whatever about a 'painting' it's subject matter is that of an event 2 billion or so people believe took place, whether they are right or wrong in that belief is neither here nor there …..the last drag supper was a mockery of that event they believe in, just fking own that fact on move on from it

Real Donald Trump

The same people complaining that Christians are making a big deal over this would be the same ones complaining if it was Islam being mocked. One religion is fair game while the other is treated with kid gloves. I'm not even religious btw

One eyed Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122454497#Comment_122454497

Christians though, aren’t making a big deal of this. A small handful of people, are making a big deal out of it simply because it was a drag performance and it didn’t sit well with their idealistic vision of what the Olympics are about.

There was no intent to mock Christianity, so the question of your false equivalence just doesn’t arise - mocking Islam stands on its own, and the reason we don’t hear much mockery or criticism of Islam is simply because it doesn’t have anything remotely like the influence that Christianity has had on the West. The primary reason there’s fcukall mockery of Islam is because the same people who want Islam to be mocked, are afraid nobody would laugh at their jokes. That’s why they don’t make any jokes about Islam, but they’ll happily join in if other people start. That’s not mockery, that’s cowardice.

Being religious or not doesn’t change the facts, and one would need to be very insecure in their own faith to complain that their religion is being mocked by people who that same religion has taught are somehow intrinsically disordered (because they don’t fit with the Christian master plan), or taught that women are to be subservient to men, or that anyone who disavows their religion is an apostate or criticises their religion is a heretic or committing blasphemy (thank goodness that was removed from Irish law*), and a whole other load of nonsense teachings which have long been discarded, discredited or just outright ignored since their inception.

*Only fairly recently too:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_law_in_the_Republic_of_Ireland

Serad27

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122446156#Comment_122446156

So, yeah uh, that "screenshot" started on Twitter (X)… I've never known Twitter to be the birther of truth… Have you?

Additionally, since when do legit screenshots have a header that is noticeably more pixilated than its text?

Just sayin.

Quantum Erasure

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122453050#Comment_122453050

Now you're getting there, just develop that idea a little bit further and you'll see why some people might be a wee bit annoyed.…

Quantum Erasure

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122452211#Comment_122452211

Ill just quote myself from a couple days ago:

I've asked that on thread already, if it wasn't Bacchus at the queer last supper, I'm not sure where else it was referenced

Speaking generally, Mr Jolly expanded on the vision for the ceremony's messaging, saying: "We have the right to love who we want. We have the right not to be worshippers. We have a lot of rights and this is what I wanted to convey."

That's his vision of what he wanted the ceremony to be, in his own words. How was this right not to be worshippers conveyed, if not in the form of a bacchanalian last supper?

Brian?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122454497#Comment_122454497

This is pretty simple, I don’t know why it’s being ignored: no religion was being mocked.

Brian?

Mock

verb

1. tease or laugh at in a scornful or contemptuous manner.

Can someone explain to me how the performance mocked Christianity.

Nermal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122454172#Comment_122454172

I am indeed aware that the painting was done after Christianity began. I would be extremely surprised if it pre-dated the events displayed within it; that might make me reconsider my lack of belief.

Did you ever pick up a brush yourself? You might have an undiscovered talent, seeing the job you've done painting yourself into a corner here.

Calahonda52

Verse 1]

Jesus was a Capricorn, he ate organic foods

He believed in love and peace and never wore no shoes

Long hair, beard and sandles and a funky bunch of friends

Reckon they'd just nail him up, if he come down again

[Chorus]

'Cause everybody's gotta have somebody to look down on

Prove they can feel better than at any time they please

Someone doin' somethin' dirty decent folks can frown on

If you can't find nobody else, then help yourself to me

[Verse 2]

Eggheads cussin', rednecks cussin' hippies for their hair

Others laugh at straights who laugh at freaks who laugh at squares

Some folks hate the Whites who hate the Blacks who hate the Klan

Most of us hate anything we don't understand

[Chorus]

'Cause everybody's gotta have somebody to look down on

Prove they can feel better than at any time they please

Someone doin' somethin' dirty decent folks can frown on

If you can't find nobody else, then help yourself to me

[Outro]

Help yourself right on

Help yourself, Jim

Help yourself, Reverend

kippy

The less fuel added to this fire the better really.

The folks behind this were just looking for 'engagement' and managed to do it long after the ceremony was finished to the point it is likely to remain in the news or online for a long while after.

As for the 'mocking' of a religion, well no one should really car. The religions themselves and the activities of the people looked up to in these religions have done enough themselves to deserve a bit of mocking in fairness.

The issue really when you boil it down, should be tied back to sport and fairness. And while there's no issues with being representative in an opening ceremony or having a bit of fun, the issues with transgender women competing against biological women in physical sports is at the core of what should be exercising people's conversations.

Brian?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122455419#Comment_122455419

There are no trans women at the Olympics, that we know of. There are 2 boxers who are intersex and assigned female at birth.