“To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.”
- Genesis 3:17-18
This image pairs a traditional farm tool against the image of thorns to symbolize the cursed nature of work and our relationship to the land. Though work was created as a gift from God, after sin entered the world, work became fraught with struggle.
“When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.” – Genesis 3:6
The scene of Adam and Eve together with the snake and the forbidden fruit is one of the most pervasive images through western art. This makes sense given that it marks one of the biggest turning points in human history.
MAKE ARTWORK FOR THE SERMON NOTES COVER
During the Genesis series, we’ll be making a new image each week for the cover. If you’re interested in making one of the images, write mwinters@sojournchurch.com and send a couple sample images of your work.
A few years ago I happily discovered a Blog entitled Diary of an Arts Pastor: A diary of ruminations and happenings of an arts pastor who never wanted to be a pastor and never thought he could be an artist. This titled resonated with me. I found David Taylor’s thought-provoking blog entries about the intersection of Christianity and the arts to be inspiring. He also had an insane beard! I shared the blog with my wife, and we both found ourselves checking it daily so as to read his latest entry. I remember reading through old blog posts and thinking, “This guy needs to write a book.” Apparently I was not alone in my thinking, and while he did not write a book, he did compile/edit a book and then contribute to it.
For the Beauty of the Church: Casting a Vision for the Arts, is the product of a symposium that Taylor put together back in 2008. Several of the speakers (Andy Crouch, Eugene Peterson, Lauren Winner and Jeremy Begbie) from the event with various backgrounds contribute chapters to Taylor’s book. Taylor and his counterparts seek to show that the arts and artists are needed in the Church.
It has been my experience in reading books about theology and art that the focus tends to be more on the support of these and/or the relationship between the two, rather than a more practical “how to.” For the Beauty of the Church is different in that it shows us how to engage the arts and shepherd artists in the local church. Taylor gives us clear vision and direction for creating art programs within the church and making the arts a normal part of church life. All the basics are covered: Andy Crouch speaks about the gospel and creating culture, John Witvliet addresses art serving corporate worship, Eugene Peterson shares how he has learned from artists as a pastor, Barbara Nicolosi writes on the shepherding of artists, and Jeremy Begbie casts a hopeful vision for the future. These chapters work together to provide an excellent variety of ideas and suggestions for cultivating art in the church.
No matter what your background is— artist, pastor, church member, art lover, I would recommend giving this book a read.
Very few images have been made throughout history trying to imagine Adam and Eve before their encounter with the serpent and the forbidden fruit. I don’t believe Christians spend enough time trying to imagine Eden, or heaven. This image is an opportunity to imagine what life could be like without the entrance of sin into God’s creation.
Wednesday, October 26
9:30 – 2:30
Meet at The 930 Gallery
Bring $10 for the Frazier exhibit (or skip that) + cash for lunch
All of the art galleries of Louisville are participating in the Photo Biennial. What is the Photo Biennial? The Photo Biennial is Louisville’s premier photographic festival that started in 1999 by Swanson Cralle East Market (now Swanson Contemporary), Galerie Hertz, Zephyr Gallery and Erin Divine Gallery (a predecessor of Pyro). With more than 30 exhibitions citywide, we thought it would be fun to take a field trip and visit some of the exhibits.
We’ll visit Hite Galleries at UofL, McGrath Gallery at Bellarmine University, Land of Tomorrow, Salvo Collective, Cressman Center, Swanson Contemporary, Zephyr Gallery, Frazier History Museum, and Gallerie Hertz and we’ll get lunch somewhere extra yummy.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.- Genesis 1:1
This image attempts to capture the creation that God was forming when everything was a complete void. Out of darkness He created: night and day, land and ocean, plants and trees, sun and moon, creatures of the sea and sky, livestock and wild animals. Then God did something incredibly remarkable. He “created mankind in his own image” (v.1:27) and gave us dominion over all the created things of the earth. Out of nothing came something quite sublime “and it was very good.” (v.1:31)
Come out for the evening to see the film and learn more about how you can engage in fighting against child sex trafficking. This is one of 100 screenings that will be taking place as the Sex+Money team travels on tour to all 50 states!
In 2007, a group of student photojournalists embarked on a journey through 20+ nations on every inhabitable continent, motivated by their love for photography and their passion for justice. At the outset, their experiences seemed diverse, even random. However, a common thread of human suffering would soon emerge as their travels exposed them to a dark, seldom discussed side of humanity– children being bought and sold to satisfy the sexual pleasures of other humans.
Upon returning to the United States the students produced a book called Sex+Money: A Global Search for Human Worth. This collection of photographs and stories explores the realities of human trafficking and offers readers a global perspective on the consequences of abusing two of the most powerful forces in the world: sex and money.
While researching to write their book, the young journalists were shocked to discover that the same injustice was happening on their own soil. Currently, across America, between 100,000 and 300,000 minors are being sexually exploited. Meanwhile, most Americans are oblivious to this staggering truth. As a result, what started as a Global Search for Human Worth became a National Search for Human Worth.
Sex+Money: A National Search for Human Worth is a feature length documentary that follows this group of journalists as they travel in an RV for a second journey, this time across the United States, seeking to understand how the sexual exploitation of children has become the nation’s fastest growing form of organized crime and what can be done to stop it.
The goal is that the Sex+Money documentary will result in bringing freedom to those enslaved.
For the Genesis sermon series starting in just a few weeks, we’ll be inviting Sojourn artists (and others) to create an image that illustrates the story we’re looking into each week. It’s a one-year series, so in the end we’ll hopefully have 52 new artworks illustrating the book of Genesis.
In the past, projects like this have been made merely in response to a biblical text. However, for this Genesis series, we’d like the images to illustrate the story. This doesn’t mean the images need to look like Sunday school coloring sheets, but it means that the image should literally show something from the text. This might be in the form of realism or not.
Here’s an example of a successful image that Alan Vales has made to illustrate the Tower of Babel story. It illustrates the story by showing a mix of languages in speach 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.
Stories + Due Dates
4:1-26 – Cain and Abel oct. 16
6:9-9:17 – Noah and the Flood oct. 23 11:1-9 – The Tower of Babel oct. 30
11:27 – 12:9 – The Call of Abram nov. 6
17:1-27 – God’s Covenant with Abraham nov. 13
21:1-7 – The Birth of Isaac nov. 20
22:1-19 – The Call to Sacrifice Isaac nov. 27
23:1-20 – The Burial of Sarah dec. 4
24:1-67 – A Bride for Isaac dec. 11
25:19-34 – Jacob and Esau dec. 18
27:1-45 – Jacob’s Deception of Isaac dec. 18
28:10-22 – Jacob’s Dream of Bethel jan. 1
29:1-35 – Jacob’s Marriage to Leah and Rachel jan. 8
32:22-32 – Jacob’s Wrestling with God and Peniel jan. 15
37:2-36 – Joseph’s Sale into Slavery jan. 22
38:1-30 – Judah and Tamar jan. 29
39:1-23 – Jospeh in Potiphar’s House feb. 5
41:1-57 – Joseph’s Rise to Power in Egypt feb. 12
43:1-45:28 – Joseph’s Testing of His Brothers feb. 19
46:1-47:31 – Jacob’s Move to Egypt feb. 26
48:1-50:26 – Jacob’s Death and Burial mar. 4
Email mwinters@sojournchurch.com if you’d like to participate. If we’re not familiar with your work, we’ll want to see some sample images.
Requirements
8×10 vertical dimensions
no white backgrounds
Don’t make images of God the Father or the Holy Spirit, unless it’s a depiction of how God chose to physically appear (burning bush, etc.)
Write an artist statement in 4 sentences or less.
Over 30 artists and crafters came out to sell their creations at this annual event. They were: Erin Althaus, Lauren Argo, Rebecca Crutcher, Robby Davis, David Dawkins, Female Art Collective, Christal Harkleroad, Danielle Hudson, Tessa Janes, Brittany Jennings, Kristen Koenig, Lee Kristen, Mary Le, Madpixel, Andy J. Miller, Adrian Minotti, Nasha Creations, Only Embry, Jenni Owens, Pedale Design, Posies and Plume, Pretty the Fool, Red Poppy Jewelry, Royal Buttons, Pamela Muss Runningwater, StudioWorks, Deborah Thomas, Sarah Truman, Alan Vales, Lindsy Wallace, Kristen Warning, and Mickie Winters.
I love the feeling after commissioning a project, seeing the results come back, and thinking “That’s not quite what I imagined, but it’s BETTER than I imagined”. Yesterday I was able to experience that feeling twice.
First, I saw the PROOF sermon series logo design by Tyler Deeb (Pedale Design). Not only is this a killer logo, but we’re also going to recreate this text with hundreds of small mirrors. The sermon series “Proof” is about seeking Proof of God’s Love and Grace. In many ways the church body is proof of God’s grace, so the mirrors become a symbol for that reality at the front of the worship space, reflecting the congregation.
This white version is basically a map of where we’ll place the 596 round mirrors that make up the text. We’ll project this and start taping them to the wall. That will be a big job we’ll do August 16-19 and you better believe we’ll be asking for help. We’re doing this at each campus, so that’s 1,788 mirrors.
For the Proof sermon series we’ll also be working on a short preview film with William Wallace that explores the meaning of “proof.” This will involve a courtroom, bourbon, fire, and making much of God’s grace. More to come on that project.
The other image I received yesterday was this awesome concert poster design by Ray Rieck. He took a boring band photo and illustrated it into something fantastic. The 930 has a lot of great shows coming up, plus a couple more to be announced later this week, so I hope you’ll come and enjoy.
So many diversely talented people in our church. I love serving with you all to let our creativity honor God and serve the church (and others).
The blog is a melting pot of interesting links, art pieces, local color and amusing trifles.
The Resources category contains essays, lectures, media, recommended reading, etc., of more substance that reinforce the mission and philosophy of SVA.
This helpful document by Andy Farmer provides 14 solid values for Christian artists along with great quotes from significant art and theology writings.
