The Blog

A 99 year old man was offered the deal of a life time: a deal initiated by God, but not void of human responsibility.

God made an eternal promise of land and a lineage of kings.

Kings wear crowns, but King Jesus, born of Abraham, gave up his crown of gold for a crown of thorns.

“He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” – Genesis 15:5

At any given time there are less than 2,000 stars visible to the unaided eye in the night sky. By now, Abraham has had a lot more than 2,000 descendants, especially if you count all of us in Christ who have been “grafted in” to his family tree. God’s blessing goes over and above even his lavish promises.

Inspired by Genesis 12:1-9

Cities are overwhelming when you are not familiar with them.  Sometimes people are hostile.  You might not know or understand the culture.  You may not even know the language, but you know you’ve been sent by God.  His promise to you is that this land will be the land of your descendants.  You will be a blessing to this land and your name will be great.  All you have to do is obey God.  How would you respond?

This image illustrates the Tower of Babel story by showing a mix of languages in speech bubbles and showing a sketch of a tower-like image in the center of the design. The whole thing is created on and in an old book and of course books are about language. The word ‘Esperanto’ shows up numerous times. Esperanto is a language created in the early 20th century in an attempt to make a politically neutral, world-unifying language. Of course, not that many people speak it and we’re still separated by languages.

This piece illustrates Noah’s obedience to God as He spares only Noah, his family, and a pair of each species through the flood. Noah’s faith is proven not in vain when God’s promise of never destroying the earth again with a flood is displayed by a rainbow. The tree beneath the rainbow represents Noah’s family and God keeping His promise to the coming generations.

Amanda Nichols seen during the reception for her BFA exhibit at UofL.

written by Julie Gross

The great thing about finishing an art degree is that you get to show the public the results of all your hard earned efforts. Sojourner Amanda Nichols finished the Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) program for Fall 2011 at the University of Louisville. She is part of the BFA Thesis Exhibition that is currently on view at the Hite Art Institute galleries located in Schneider Hall. She was also given the William Fischer Outstanding Student Award for 2-D Studio Art which is a senior project grant given to BFA candidates to complete their senior show.

Amanda paints beautiful ruins. She concentrates on the cracks and peels that naturally happen to surfaces over time and magnifies this deterioration in her large-scale paintings. Amanda cleverly employs the trompe l’oeil (deceive the eye) technique leaving the viewer curious as to if the cracks are real or not. They are and they aren’t. Although her overall composition is an illusion of decay, the paint is built up in such a way that it only adds to the realistic imagery. In her statement she says, “I am exploring the purpose of paint which alters our perception of a surface, and the temporality of paint which is subject to decay like all things in nature.” Initially, the UofL Art Department faculty wanted her to paint her creations directly onto the wall for the exhibit, but being as though she only had about a week’s time frame, she choose to show her original canvases instead. However, it leaves her with an idea to explore in the future.

Congratulations Amanda!

The Fall 2011 BFA Thesis Exhibition is at the Hite Art Institute Galleries in Schneider Hall on the Belknap Campus/UofL and will be on view Dec. 1^st through the 21^st. It is free and open to the public.

“The LORD saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.” – Genesis 6:5

Evil had so entered the lives of men that not just the thoughts, but even the prelude to the thought was wicked. Our sin nature is so saturated in our being that it’s impossible for us to live without always fighting it.

Thank the Lord for his grace and grievance towards us, for the pain that his heart feels (6:6) when we go against his desires.

Inspired by Genesis 5

God created individuals like Adam and Eve and you and me, but God’s creation also includes his plans for how individuals all relate to one another from generation to generation. God is sovereign over everything from the genes in our DNA to our family lineages all the way back to the beginning of time.

Based on Genesis 4:1-26

“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” – Ecclesiastes 1:9

“God is doing everything so that Cain can repent. Why? Sin is man curved in on himself. Sin is always choosing yourself over God and others, placing yourself at the center. Sin determines that even when you do good things – even when you help the poor, enter into friendships, go to church, try to obey the Ten Commandments – it’s always about you. Sin determines that you relate to God and other people only in such a way and only to the degree that it furthers your agenda – doing things the way you think they should be done, giving you the self-image you want. As soon as a relationship with God or other people becomes costly, we’re out of it. Why? Because even when it looks like we’re serving God and other people, we’re really serving ourselves. That’s how insidious sin is.

“Repentence gets to root of that. It means you get out of yourself. You get out of the center. You get the favor of God and you begin to heal the blindness and hardness and the pride that sin brings into your life. Therefore, there is nothing more important than repentence. Nothing.

“Look what Cain does. He is weeping, ‘My punishment is more than I can bear!’ There is a kind of sorrow, a kind of weeping, that is just as self-absorbed as the sin you are crying about. Cain is sorry for the consequences of the sin, but not for the sin itself.” – Tim Keller

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.” – Genesis 3:6-7

With their backs to each other, hiding their nakedness with fig leaves from themselves, each other and God, the piece tries to capture the moment after Adam and Eve take the forbidden fruit, represented here by an apple.