Between: bowden

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Tuesday, 29 October 2024

A Prophet in the Darkness: Exploring Theology in the Art of Georges Rouault

I've given an endorsement to A Prophet in the Darkness: Exploring Theology in the Art of Georges Rouault, edited by Wesley Vander Lugt.

Many consider Georges Rouault (1871–1958) to be one of the most important religious painters of the last few centuries. Yet both the secular art world and the church have struggled to engage with his work, which is profoundly shaped by his Christian faith and also starkly explores the pain and darkness of human experience.

In this volume, a group of theologians, artists, and historians seek to bring Rouault out of the shadows. They offer a deeper understanding of the theological impulse of modern art and of Rouault's distinct contributions. Chapters explore how Rouault's unique work was influenced by his historical context, by personal suffering, and by biblical themes, especially the Passion of Christ. Essays are interspersed with original artistic responses to Rouault in the form of images and poetry, with contributions from Sandra Bowden, William A. Dyrness, Thomas Hibbs, Soo Kang, and others.

Rouault displays our need for mercy within a world of anguish. This book explores how his prophetic creativity continues to inspire artists and thinkers seeking to understand the powerful intersection of lament and hope.

The Studies in Theology and the Arts  series encourages Christians to thoughtfully engage with the relationship between their faith and artistic expression, with contributions from both theologians and artists on a range of artistic media including visual art, music, poetry, literature, film, and more.

My endorsement is as follows:

'As is noted in this volume, despite the mid twentieth century prominence that Rouault enjoyed, his work is now lesser-known than contemporaries such as Henri Matisse and Marc Chagall, whose work and commissions often engaged with similar themes. The range and variety of engagements – both artistic and academic – with Rouault’s work found in this book serve as a corrective to the partial neglect of his work and achievements, including his legacy in artists engaging with Christian themes, by demonstrating the richness, depth and variety of his oeuvre and the many routes possible to connecting with it.'

See also my paper Rouault and Girard: Crucifixion and Resurrection, Penitence and Life Anew which was published by ArtWay and delivered at the ASCHA conference in Paris on Georges Rouault in 2022.

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Michael McDermott - Carry Your Cross.

Tuesday, 1 November 2022

Artlyst: Soulages And Strange Clay November 2022 Art Diary

My November diary for A rtlyst has mention of 'Sarum Lights - Renaissance' at Salisbury Cathedral, 'Gaia' at Southwark Cathedral and Chelmsford Cathedral, Marta Jakobovits at Elizabeth Xi Bauer Gallery, Sandra Bowden at Gordon College, Lakwena Maciver at Yorkshire Sculpture Park and windows by Pierre Soulages at Conques abbey-church:

‘Under an image of Richard Woods’ ‘Small House’ installation at Southwark Cathedral, Fergus Butler Gaillie, in a recent article for The Spectator, criticised Cathedral art exhibitions as gimmicks bringing the temporary stimuli of consumerism into “places dedicated to the majesty of the eternal.”

His concern was that such temporary exhibitions disrupt spaces built for solemn reflection with their heightened engagements and the number of people they attract. On one level, his piece seems to be a plea for greater space and stillness in already cavernous spaces, while, on another, it seems to be predicated on an unhelpful and unnecessary sacred-secular divide. Fundamentally, it claims that much modern stimuli are antithetical to solemn reflection or reflection per se. Recent and current Cathedral exhibitions, including Luke Jerram’s Gaia installations at Chelmsford and Southwark Cathedral’s and Luxmuralis’ Sarum Lights – Renaissance light and sound spectacular at Salisbury Cathedral, would seem to call Butler Gaillie’s contentions into question.'

See also my Artlyst interview with Lakwena, my Visual Meditation for ArtWay on Lakwena's work, and my Church Times review of her Jump paintings. See also my review of Richard Woods' 'Small House'. Reviews of other exhibitions at Salisbury Cathedral can be found here.

My other pieces for Artlyst are:

Interviews -

Monthly diary articles -

Articles/Reviews -

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The Revolutionary Army of the Infant Jesus - Song of the Soul.

Thursday, 23 June 2022

Sandra Bowden and Bowden Collections

One of many joys in attending 'The Artist as Truth-Teller and the Legacy of French Artist Georges Rouault' last week was that of meeting the artist Sandra Bowden.

Sandra Bowden has been interpreting Scripture and her own spiritual walk through mixed media for more than forty years. She has been acclaimed as one of the most unique, impressive and inspiring Christian artists in America. Bowden’s work has been featured in books, magazines and gallery shows across the United States, Canada, Italy and Jerusalem.

Her work fuses the vivid yet traditional imagery of the Old Testament – stone tablets and artifacts, Hebrew inscriptions, architectural depictions – with images of Christ’s passion, important music scores, and God’s natural creations. She has issued several series of artworks over the years: crucifixion scenes, artistic use of text and color, new interpretations of classic religious artwork, even altered books with applied textures and hues. God’s grandeur and creativity shine through in each piece of her art.

“My Christian faith has been the driving force behind my art,” Bowden says. “I look at the making of a piece of art as a kind of doxology, a prayer or conversation with God. I don’t mean this in any mystical way, but my ideas come out of my theology and thoughts about God. I am somewhat of a theologian, but one who translates those interpretations into visual form.”

In addition to being an exceptional artist, Sandra is also a collector who, through Bowden Collections, offers a variety of traveling exhibitions available for rental to museums, churches, colleges, seminaries and similar institutions.

Bowden says:

'I have always wanted to own art by other artists. My first pieces were pottery or works that I could swap with other artists. Then I began to make a greater commitment to strategically collecting. However, the most important reason is that it is enjoyable. What a thrill to “find” a piece, recognize its value and have it become part of my collection.

I feel like a caretaker, so to speak, of each piece in our collection, preserving it for the future. With every new acquisition comes a world of knowledge, a reservoir of information surrounding the piece that adds to the fascination and enjoyment.

The Bowden Collections focuses on religious art for several reasons: first, it is the subject I am most passionately interested in; second, it is a wonderful time to be collecting work with biblical themes because the art market in general is not particularly interested in art with religious content. I also feel that religious art needs exposure within the Christian community, and it is my intent to make these pieces available whenever possible for that purpose. I see my collector's role as a calling—something that is critically important to do at this particular time.'

Click here to see the range of collections available which include work by Marc Chagall, Otto Dix, Alfred Manessier, and Georges Rouault, among others.

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Morten Lauridsen - Lux Æterna.

Saturday, 16 July 2016

Artists of the last century artistically wrestling with the Crucifixion

The latest ArtWay meditation is by Sandra Bowden who has organised an exhibition centred on the work she explores in her meditation, Modern Crucifixion by Frederick Wright.

She write: "For centuries artists have imagined the crucifixion not only as a biblical narrative, but also as an event happening in their own historical context. This strategy of depicting the crucifixion in contemporary terms, both makes Christ more directly present in the time and place of the contemporary viewer and employs the crucifixion as a point of reference for critically understanding modern life. Working in the early 1930s, Frederick Wight imagined the crucifixion as happening in Chatham, MA, USA with the sea-faring folk of the town that he knew."

In the exhibition Bowden explores other modern crucifixions noting that:

"By the end of the 19th century, artists viewed the Crucifixion through the lens of the Academy and many of the works had become banal, lacking the intensity that it merited. Thomas Eakins’ Crucifixion, painted in 1880, was seen by many as an academic exercise to portray Christ as realistically as possible, but with little religious feeling. Also in the late 19th century, Gauguin’s Yellow Crucifixion places the event in the countryside of Brittany. Three women near the cross are wearing the typical peasant dress and the entire scene, including the body of Christ, are cast in yellow tones of the season’s harvest. Time and again artists have placed the crucifixion and those present at the event against a local background and dressed in the apparel of the day.

The Crucifixion continues to appear as a theme during the 20th century, but with a renewed perspective. German Expressionist artist Emil Nolde was fascinated by the expressive intensity of the Isenheim Altarpiece and created his own version with a stylistic fusion of primitive forms and the exaggerated colors of the Fauves. Salvador Dali famously painted his Crucifixion representing the cross as a hypercube. Marc Chagall, a Jewish artist, broke with his religious tradition to paint several crucifixions, one of which is in this exhibition. Stanley Spencer, an English painter, set his biblical stories in his home village with local people filling the scene much like Frederick Wight has done in his Modern Crucifixion."

This exhibition has similarities to the Cross Purposes exhibition organised by Mascalls Gallery and Ben Uri Gallery which included Santiago Bell, Susan Shaw, Maggie Hambling and Craigie Aitchison. Centering on Chagall's drawings for the windows of Tudeley Parish Church, this exhibition explored the uses of the crucifixion by a broad range of artists featuring the work of many artists including Stanley Spencer, Graham Sutherland, and Eric Gill. The exhibition addressed both meditative religious works as well as more horrific secular works and thereby demonstrated the breadth of modern treatments of the crucifixion.

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James Macmillan - Veni, Veni, Emmanuel.

Thursday, 25 August 2011

Art that tells the story

Art That Tells the Story is a new book by Christopher Brewer which seems interesting for several reasons. First, it includes a range of evocative art. Second, it tells the story of the Bible in terms of Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation iniating a conversation about the Story God is telling. Third, because the book is an example of Gospel through shared experience, a conversation about reinventing evangelism for a postmodern world.
Here is an article about the book from ImageUpdate:

"Art That Tells the Story, is exactly what its title indicates: page after page of precisely curated visual art, coupled with bible verses that tell the “grand old story” with grace, drama, and spiritual acuity. The pieces Brewer chooses are not simple illustrations of their accompanying verse; instead, they embody the living narrative and continuing discussion of these biblical moments. Each piece builds on what has come before, inviting the reader into a growing conversation about both the art itself and its place in the narrative whole. As Makoto Fujimura says in the book’s foreword, “Art is about asking questions more than giving straight answers.” Brewer separates the art, story, and questions into four sections: Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Consummation. “Creation” compares the physicality of our world and the physicality of art—we see the breath of life lifting Adam off the ground in a bronze sculpture by Clay Enoch and feel the text of Genesis 1:2 nearly melt as it ripples across the pages of a mixed-media ‘book’ by Sandra Bowden. “Fall” is bookended by dramatic oil and acrylic pieces by Wayne Forte, which show the pain of Adam and Eve’s expulsion and Cain’s betrayal through thick red and black lines. In “Redemption,” the book’s longest section, the story moves from the flood to Paul’s letters. Brewer contrasts photorealistic paintings, like Jonathan Quist’s reimaginings of Moses and David, with Julie Quinn’s Access, an abstract acrylic piece in light blues and grays that is linked to Romans 5:1. Finally, in “Consummation,” the eye turns to the apocalyptic future of the biblical story, highlighted by Scott Laumann’s block prints that show the reader bold, primary-colored representations of heaven in an open palm and hell in a closed fist. An afterword by Alfonse Borysewicz brings the themes of the entire book into further focus, as he discusses the transformative process of faith-based art on a biblical and personal level. Borysewicz’s four Emmanuel paintings carry viewers through Christ’s life story but are also reflections of Borysewicz’s own artistic journey of rebuilding. Through each of these themes and explorations, Brewer’s descriptions and page layouts remain sparse. It is in these empty spaces that Art That Tells The Story ultimately encourages our deeper exploration of the true mystery and ephemeral nature of biblical art."

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Duke Special - Portrait.