ArtWay meditation: Emmaus mosaic by John Piper

My latest meditation for ArtWay has been published today. It concerns the Emmaus mosaic by John Piper at St Paul's Harlow.

Here is some brief context to the production of the mosaic:

Visitors to British Design 1948 - 2012, an exhibition in the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Year at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, were confronted by one third of John Piper’s huge mural created for the Festival of Britain and depicting varying forms of British architecture. Home and Land were key themes of the Festival of British where the English Neo-Romantic sensibility exemplified by Piper was prominently featured. Often viewed as nostalgic for its recognition of indigenous tradition and landscape, Neo-Romanticism actually aimed, as art critic Peter Fuller argued, to redeem the threatened and injured land.

Piper’s mural was selected by Frederick Gibberd, masterplanner of Harlow New Town, to be gifted to Harlow at the end of the Festival of Britain. The mural was installed on the wall of Harlow Technical College's main assembly room, where it remained until the college re-located in 1992. The design of Harlow New Town reflected the Festival of Britain style; light structures, picturesque layout and incorporation of works of art. So it was appropriate that the huge collection of public art Gibberd assembled for Harlow (to the extent that the Town is now known as a sculpture town) also included a mosaic by Piper for St Paul’s Harlow.

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Leigh Nash - Saviour, Like A Shepherd Lead Us (Blessed Saviour).