Church of the Good Shepherd

I was at a dinner party a few weeks ago where a heated discussion got underway about the merits and demerits of the contents of the Tate Modern. One enthusiastic champion of “Modern Art” waxed eloquent about the wonderful nature of many of the exhibits on display whilst an erstwhile protagonist, someone of rather conservative taste in painting, spluttered “it’s all a load of rubbish; it’s not art at all!” As the only priest at the table I felt that I had to play the role of mediator and so I, helpfully I felt, said, “Well the building has a lot to commend it (after all it was a ‘converted’ power station) even if some of the paintings are a little strange and not to my taste”. The modern art enthusiast was having none of it and came up with the cultural version of the theological statement, “you can’t tell me I’m wrong ‘cause God told me”, by saying to the assembled and by now embarrassed company, “well art is supposed to provoke discussion, we are discussing it, so it must be art”. “Care for another glass of wine?” said Julia; sensible woman my wife!

To be honest I do like some of the paintings in the Tate Modern but I do scratch my head a bit and wonder what is going on when the Turner Prize is given for a pile of bricks or an unmade bed. I am however of the opinion that a painting, or any work of art for that matter, should convey something to the viewer without explanation. Now what I am leading up to is this – during the Sunday evenings of Lent at 6.30pm in the Good Shepherd I am going to lead some discussion sessions utilising the paintings I did during my Sabbatical way back last summer. I will be giving some information about how each painting came about and the dreams that inspired it during the evening but first I would like to show the painting prior to my input to see what other people make of it. I had a little taste of this when Julia my wife first saw the pictures in their finished form and it was very interesting to hear what she made of them.

Visual art has, from the earliest days of the Church, formed an important means of communicating the Christian hope and exploring spirituality and it is enormously varied in its form; everything from early Icons, the masters of the Renaissance to the modern era and the work of artists like Marc Chagall. The visual artist, like the musician, responds to the creative Divine Spirit within and seeks to express the contents of the soul in colour and shape. My paintings are very personal, an expression of my own spiritual pilgrimage and I want to share them in the hope that they will resonate with others and in that sharing together we will all be strengthened and encouraged. Lent seemed a good time to do this as it is a period when the Church encourages us to engage in self examination. This can be a painful process as some of my paintings illustrate but it can also be the route to an expanded sense of self and an opening up of our personalities to God’s boundless grace.

I mentioned Marc Chagall a moment or two ago, he is one artist of the modern era that I am very keen on. Not only did he paint and draw he also worked in stained glass. St Stephen’s Roman Catholic Church, which was reduced to a burnt out shell during the bombing of Mainz in the Second World War, contains some of the best examples of Chagall’s work. Chagall was a Jew and steadfastly refused for many years to visit German as a protest against the appalling cruelty his fellow Jews suffered under the Nazis. Finally, under heavy pressure from his wife, he relented and undertook the commission at St Stephen’s. When you enter the church you are bathed in a deep blue light which is almost like being under water, but unlike the physical reality of being underwater this is a place where you can breath and find tranquillity. I find it deeply moving that a place of Christian worship in Germany destroyed in war should be beautified in its restoration by a Jewish artist who not only understood the Old Testament but also resonated with the idea of the crucified and risen Christ. In his work Chagall became an instrument of reconciliation and integration as well as sublime beauty.

I am calling my Lent series “Icons of the Unconscious”. Art can connect us to that unconscious side of our nature, the very deepest part of our soul, the place where God can be found. Whilst I would not dare to compare my humble efforts with the genius of Chagall, the images I painted back in the summer come from that deep place where we find God and resolve our personal struggles thus getting to know ourselves better and so I hope these sessions may prove helpful to those who decide to attend. Well I don’t suppose I will be put up for the Turner Prize but if I am up against a pile of bricks I not sure that I want to enter. Sorry to my fellow dinner guest and lover of the more excessive forms of modern art – “have another glass of wine”.

All the best – Fr Mick

PS: if you want to see a wonderful example of Chagall’s work in stained glass without travelling as far as Mainz then visit All Saints Church, Tudeley.