My Bright Abyss: Paintings & Prints

The Work of Makoto Fujimura

In collaboration with Covenant Presbyterian Church (Nashville), St. George’s was pleased to show a collection of work by globally-renowned contemporary artist Makoto Fujimura.  The exhibition, entitled My Bright Abyss: Paintings & Prints, includes works shown publicly for the first time as well as Van Nuys monotypes and Silence and Beauty, a diptych made with gesso and mineral pigments. Fujimura comments that the paintings in My Bright Abyss: Paintings & Prints came out of a period of severe darkness in his life. However, when looking at these works recently to consider them for the show, he was surprised by the “brightness of their countenance.”

Makoto Fujimura’s process-driven, refractive “slow art” has been described by David Brooks of The New York Times as “a small rebellion against the quickening of time.” His bicultural arts education led his style towards a fusion between contemplative art and expressionism, using the traditional materials of the Japanese art of Nihonga. Put succinctly, for Fujimura, “God is not just restoring us to Eden; God is creating through us a garden/city, an abundant city of God’s kingdom. What we build, design, and depict on this side of eternity matters, because in some mysterious way, those creations will become part of the future city of God.” 

Seeing Christ in the Darkness

Georges Rouault as Graphic Artist

Seeing Christ in the Darkness is an excellent collection of the world-class prints of Georges Rouault, one of the most important printmakers of the 20th century. The graphic art in this exhibition, done at the height of the artist’s skill, shows how deeply he identified with people’s suffering and, indeed, saw within this darkness the salvation of Jesus Christ. It is appropriate that the focus of this exhibit is on Rouault as a printmaker, for it was especially in his graphic work that his religious vision took shape.

This show featured eighteen pieces from the Miserere series, five etchings from Fleurs du Mal I, several colored pieces from The Passion and Fleurs du Mal III, along with two signed works and several other prints. 

It Was Evening, It Was Morning

A Collaborative Photography Exhibit with James DeMain, Bill Franson, Beth Trabue Gorham, and Price Harrison

This group photography exhibit explores three themes derived from the Genesis account of creation: boundary, rhythm and rest. God creates boundaries between day and night, the heavens and the earth, the dry land and the waters. In each case the separation allows the cultivation of something special in a defined space. From the beginning there is rhythm: a time of night, of morning, another night and another morning. This rhythm points us to consider something beyond linear time. And finally, the creation account culminates on the seventh day when God rests. He does not rest because he is tired, but because creation was made for the seventh day which lasts into eternity.

Ordinary Saints

The art of Bruce Herman, music of J.A.C. Redford, and poetry of and Malcolm Guite

Saints live with unveiled, unguarded faces because they trust in God.

The artists' hope is that this project—paintings of “ordinary saints” by Bruce Herman, ekphrastic poetry by Malcolm Guite in response to the art, and integrative instrumental and vocal music by J.A.C. Redford—will plumb the liminal space between portrait and icon, bringing the viewer and listener into deeper communion with the Face of One who formed each of our own faces.

Pillars of Faith

The Art of Ted Jones

Ted Jones of Hendersonville, TN was our first featured artist in the Bradford Gallery.  A New Orleans native, Jones earned his BA at Xavier University, his MA at Michigan State University, and MFA at the University of Montana. Among many other artistic accolades, Jones was an art professor at both Fisk University and Tennessee State University. His work is in the permanent collections at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Arkansas, the Museum of African Art in Washington, DC, and Fisk University.

His rich colors and various techniques bring to life biblical Pillars of Faith and important scenes from their lives. In paintings, block prints, repoussés, and sculptures, Jones makes vivid portraits of men and women of the Bible to inspire our personal faith journey. His work brilliantly evokes the great cloud of witnesses who light our Christian path.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (Hebrews 12:1-2a).