Lesli Pepper

Grant That We May

Text by St. Francis of Assisi

acrylics and prismacolor pencils

3' x 3'

This piece was created for a prayer vigil for the Middle East at All Saints by the Sea Episcopal Church.

Urban Spirituality
The Liturgy of St James, 1st century.
The writings of Thomas Aquinas, 13th century.
French carols, 15th century.
Plainsong, 15th century.
French carols, 17th century.
Piano.
Keyboards.
Didjeridu.
Electric Guitar.
Blending electronica, rock, jazz, traditional middle eastern, and chamber music with ancient liturgical texts and melodies.
Rotation, a CD by Isaac Everett.

The Hours

The textual source in the series is the Divine Office, the book of monastic prayers set for the hours of the day: matins (the morning prayer), terce (the third hour), sext (the sixth hour noon) and vespers (the evening prayer). Each abstraction deals with the meditation on salvific light at different times of day and night. Based on the emergence of light across a horizon, the light emerges from the interior and pushes against the outer influences in its attempt to fill the depicted space. The paintings were done from two angles, horizontal, with the light emerging above the horizon line, and vertical, with the light moving out from the center towards the right. These pieces are part of an unfinished series. - Tony Morinelli

On View: from his series 'The Hours', Matins (the morning prayer) by Tony Devaney Morinelli. Read more at ecva.org

Hope always draws the soul from the beauty which is seen to what is beyond, always kindles the desire for the hidden through what is constantly perceived. Therefore, the ardent lover of beauty, although receiving what is always visible as an image of what he desires, yet longs to be filled with the very stamp of the archetype. — Saint Gregory of Nyssa

On View: The Fourth Day of Creation, by Betsy Porter, as seen in the Visual Preludes 2003. From 'Byzantine-Style Icons' by Betsy Porter at ecva.org.

Oculus Cordis

Lately my participation in the eucharist is requiring more attention, more care. It's not like I'd been holding out; at least, I don't think so. But there is a distinct change in my private worship that I can measure, in intensity if not in inches. This happens to me every so often, and when it does I find that in order to embrace the prayers of the priest and the congregation, I need to stretch my imagination almost to breaking point. It's the ordinary and the extraordinary again that confound me; the seen and the unseen. I know both to be true, and even so every few months it seems that my mind gets caught in a loop of trying to use its cleverness to dissect the details. It's a fools game, I know. Only love is needed. Oculos cordis, Ambrose and other church fathers called it, eyes of the heart.

On View: Pouring Vessel with Goblets from Hjalmarson Pottery. Halldor and Gail Hjalmarson have maintained a pottery studio in the Roosevelt Historic District of central Phoenix since 1973 and produce a body of creative work which reflects the imagery and feeling of their Sonoran Desert.

Choosing Transcendence
Artists are as able as any to address the deep moral and theological questions that face us all. And, they're equally able to contribute to reconciliation and renewal, or not, as any. Art serves to keen its audience's relationship with the world situation. Art takes on an entirely new dimension, a transcendence, when an artist’s insight into the pain and suffering of the world is paired at its core with the redemptive promise of Christ.

On View: from Mourning to Morning by Dorothy Ralph Gager. From her series of six sculptures on view at ecva.org.

Bearing the Light
These illumined figures are part of my newest series, “Bearing Light”. They incorporate raw linen, which is distressed and then applied to canvas or board and painted in oils.

Bearing the Light of Being
Light enters, filling empty spaces,
Opening heart with untold graces,
The shadowed path illumined now,
In Light we see Light.

On View: Bearing the Light of Being by Camilla Brunschwyler Armstrong, Oil on canvas, 2006, 22" x 18". St. John’s Episcopal Church – Montgomery, AL, camillaarmstrong@aol.com

As seen in: Visual Preludes 2006, a production of Episcopal Church and Visual Arts, now available as a Visio Divina resource in DVD format.

Afternoon Tea by Kathie McCarthy (excerpt)

Weary,
I come into this small bit of earth
and sit,
cup of tea for companion,
and sit.

On View: Open Door By Donna Shasteen, Acrylic, 2005, 18" x 14"
As Seen In: The Illustrated Word, online at ecva.org

Half-Light & Silence
Painting from the soul makes use of these elements, these
half-lights and silences. In and through and under the
paint, above and beyond the tools there is a communion. A
coming to the table, where we offer our work, in faith and
hope and most of all love. In half-light we greet the
shadow that guides disappointment along a path to
redemption. Witnessing the silent passing of a rose into
dust, we learn that beauty lies not only in the rose, but
also in the dust. We prepare the gifts we offer, and we
receive them back again, in half-lights and silences.
- by C. Robin Janning

On View: Half-Light & Silence by C. Robin Janning.

C. Robin Janning is an abstract painter in the Diocese of Michigan. She serves as Deputy Director of Communications for ecva.org.

On View: This is my son, by Sr. Claire Joy. Digital image, 3.5” x 4.25”, 2007.

Sr. Claire Joy is in her final year of candidacy with the Community of the Holy Spirit, an Episcopal order of women in New York City. She is sixty-one years old, going on nine.

As seen in: Image and Likeness, an exhibition of Episcopal Church & Visual Arts.

As a priest and an artist I am interested in process both in human relationships and in the making of art. These paintings from nature, rather than a replication of what one sees, are created in such a way as to reflect and incorporate the process of natural growth itself. Form, juxtaposition, chance, accommodation, essence, survival, symbiotic relationships are all aspects of the growth process. By applying a variety of media in nontraditional ways the resulting work attends to this process and I hope gives an impression of nature that reflects both natural and spiritual growth. - John Moody
ECVA New York Chapter

John Moody is an artist and an Episcopal priest in the Diocese of New York.

On View: 'Lake Branches', Mixed media on canvas, 36 x 48, as seen in 'Inside Outside', an exhibition of Episcopal Church and Visual Arts.

The Sacred in Cyber Space - Part 1 of 2

"The electronic age is an age of 'secondary orality,' the orality of telephones, radio, and television, which depends on writing and print for its existence." from 'Orality and Literacy' by Walter Jackson Ong, 2002, Routledge. ISBN 0415281288.

A lot of experience tells us that web communities are quite real and effective, beginning with The Well back in the prehistoric days of cyberspace (what we would call now a listserv but with a stronger sense of interactive community over time). Nathan Brockman writes about how the website of the Parish of Trinity Church is a 'sacred parish space." A Jesuit and philosopher Walter Ong, who died a few years ago, wrote a book on the the relationship between oral culture and technology, which is applicable to the web as a technology that in a strange way it returns us to oral community. If you think about it, much of what we do online is like speaking--dash off a word here, show a family photo, have a multiple conversation, tell stories. Kids with text messaging know that their form of communication makes and supports community. Those of us interested in the once and future church need to be online as a community of Christians; cyberspace is where the future is being discussed and formed. If you like, to borrow a prehistoric image, www is the cave where everyone is hanging out (and because this is ECVA--where the cave paintings are). - Ken Arnold

Next Week: The Sacred in Cyber Space - Part 2 of 2, On Walter Ong and Technologizing the Word.

On View: "Christ on the Cross", a painting by Patricia M. Brown, 1998, 9.5" x 5". As seen in Visual Preludes 2006

Patricia Brown is a painter living in San Francisco, and a member of St. Aidan's Episcopal Church.

Ken Arnold is a writer living in Portland, Oregon. You can read more of his work here.