still small voice: creating sacred space

My latest exhibition review for the Church Times is of still small voice at The Wilson in Cheltenham. The collection of British biblical art currently on show there 'begins with the Nazarene and Pre-Raphaelite styles of William Dobson and William Bell Scott, and continues, with Eric Gill as the bridge between Modernism and the earlier Arts and Crafts movement, through the inter-war period of the 1920s and 1930s, the Second World War, the post-war era, and the later 20th century, into the early 21st century.'

Included is a stunning Craigie Aitchison piece: 'Completed just a year before his death, Body of Christ (Red Background) is an example of the spiritual depths of modern art, with its full-on expressive use of colour combined with the stripped-back minimalism of its imagery. Christ is the cross, the cross is the wound at the heart of the canvas, and this gash in the blood-red background is the point at which light enters the space ...

this is art that creates sacred space by taking you "somewhere beyond yourself and outside of your own little world".'

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Krzysztof Penderecki - St. Luke's Passion.