Star in the East

And finally, this is Star in the East, part of the 8x8 Show at the Museum of Biblical Art last evening! Being so far away, I really have no idea how it went, so I'll just have to wait to hear... I was so honored to be able to participate in this event, which is only by invitation. It confirms that my calling in art is truly a gift from God and that I should continue to put an emphasis on him and his word in my work - maybe even emphasize it more, which can be a frightening thing in the open market where I show and sell my art. I would appreciate your prayers and support in this...

This piece is once again a depiction of a piece of the story of Christ's birth in Luke 2 and Matthew 2. Specifically Matthew 2:1-2, "Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, 'Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.'"

The photo that I chose had a natural spot where light was shining through the branches and it made the perfect location for the star, in fact, this is where the concept of the star came from for all four pieces. There is a map of Bethlehem, where the star would lead the wise men to find Christ, and a cow that marks his birth in a stable. While it is easy for the story to get old in the retelling, it is still an amazing thing that the king of glory would come to earth in such a humble manner, first into the lives of such young and inexperienced parents, so completely humble. Like the wise men, we have to be looking for his signs to find him, then seek him out. When we do, we are warmly welcomed, whether we are rich and kingly or the lowest in our society as were the shepherds. It's most often a quiet thing, but the most important thing we could ever do...

In the Field

I forgot to post this yesterday, so I guess I'll just post both remaining Christmas works today...

Titled "In the Field" this piece refers again to the shepherds who were watching their flocks just outside Bethlehem when angels appeared to them and told them about the Christ child. You can see the sheep in the foreground along with another map of Bethlehem. The barn in the photo recalls the stable the Messiah was born in and the little seedling represents a new life. (Christ is also referred to as the sprout out of Jesse's family in Isaiah.) A few words of the scripture from Luke is in the upper left corner and the star is once again present. This was actually a close runner up in my decision making process for which piece to put in the show.

In the City of David

The second Christmas work I'm sharing is titled "In the City of David" from the passage in Luke 2:10-14 spoken to the shepherds in the field...

 "And the angel said to them, 'Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.' And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!"

Again, you'll find a map of Bethlehem, sheep, nearly hidden scripture and the star that shown over where the Christ child was born. And once more there is a photo of palm trees, which refer not only to the Holy Lands, but are my personal symbol for heaven. Appropriate, since the birth of the Messiah is what ultimately opens the gates of heaven for us all.

Go to Bethlehem

Just in time for Christmas...

 A little more than a month ago I was invited to a special museum show, asking for a Christmas themed work (and to keep the whole thing hush-hush.) I felt incredibly honored even on the crazy short deadline I was given and I said yes right away. But I didn't have time for pressure and over thinking to screw up my creative process, so I decided to make not one piece, but four, and then to choose the one I liked best to submit. Since there was no pressure for any single work, I was able to work out my chosen theme in four different ways and in the end I was quite happy with all four. So I'll present them here in the next few days and by the time I show you the final one, I'll be able to say where it went as well.

All four works were based on the familiar story about the birth of Christ from Luke 2 and Matthew 2. This work is called "Go to Bethlehem" as that is where Joseph and Mary had to go and so followed the shepherds and the wise men...You can see in this piece a map of Bethlehem, a sketch of animals that could have been in a stable, scripture from the Bible story and the photo of palms to help you envision the town of Bethlehem.

commit your works...

This is an assemblage artwork by Terry Flowers titled, "Commit Your Works to the Lord" (I'm pretty sure.) I'm going to ask Terry to comment on this post and tell us more about it.

commissioned visions

Recently I was asked to do some artwork inspired by the cemetery in Davis, a smaller town west of Sacramento. There was just no way that I could create work that addressed our mortality without addressing what the Bible says about it...


"Renewal"
acrylic image transfer from digital capture in mixed media collage on 16x20" canvas

"Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day." 2 Corinthians 4:16-18


"Breath"
acrylic image transfers from digital capture in mixed media collage on 24x30" canvas

"No wonder my heart is glad, and I rejoice. My body rests in safety. For you will not leave my soul among the dead or allow your holy one to rot in the grave. You will show me the way of life, granting me the joy of your presence and the pleasures of living with you forever." Psalm 16: 9-11

"Each of us is but a breath" Psalm 39:5

new visions

New versions of some of my original Visions of Heaven work, all three here are black & white photos collaged onto 8x8" canvas with mixed media.



"River of Life"



"My Father's House"



"City of God"

box art gospel

Covenant Artists have been growing to encompass more of our community and I've been very lax about posting to our blog - we've been meeting in different locations around the Sacramento area, making new friends and seeing more great art inspired by the Spirit.



One of our newly added artist is Terry Ray Flowers, who I met as curator to the Artisan gallery, but who is a gifted self-taught artist in his own right. Terry is driven to share the good news through every piece of art he creates and he has just launched his website to share his work and his passion. Check it out at www.boxartgospel.com.

planted by the river

This is my newest mixed media collage (you can click on the image to see it larger) I call it "Trees Along the River" from the text that I added to it from Jeremiah.

"Blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence. They are like tree planted along the riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves sty green, and they never stop producing fruit."

You might also notice the sparrow - that little reminder of God's concern.

sharing visions

Today I helped hang some of my original "Visions" with some newer visions at Oak Hills Church in Folsom. I've been planning to write a new artist's statement and this was finally the impetus to do so:

When I first started working as a visual artist, I didn’t sit down and say, “I’m going to try to put the spiritual world into my artwork” or “I think I’ll make the invisible visible” but that is exactly where I have found myself. As I created my art, I was just reacting to what I saw and felt at a particular time and place and it wasn’t until much later and after much reflection that I even had an idea of what it was that I was doing.

For a long time, I thought I was just reacting to nature and my love plants and growing things, then I began to realize that those times outside and alone were the times I felt closest to God, without the distractions of other people, and I was wanting to recreate that feeling through my art. I found myself longing for Eden, for a time to walk in the garden with God, enjoying the earth as it once was and a relationship with each other as it was intended to be; I was saddened that Eden was lost but somehow felt like it wasn’t completely out of reach, that somehow God could make it happen again.

All of this thought process happened over the passage of years, and finally I found myself in a Bible study of heaven when the “aha!” moment happened. All of those years, I had been trying to catch a glimpse of heaven, just getting a tiny taste of the goodness to come, and preserving it in my artwork.

I decided to become more intentional in my work, and then encouraged a group of artists at my church to join me in my quest to share our visions of heaven with others. “Visions of Heaven” originally was a group art project by Covenant Artists based on a Biblical study of Heaven. We wanted it to be God working through us, so our whole process began and ended with prayer and was thoroughly rooted in Scripture. It was a year-long project that culminated in a group showing at our own church as well as at the Artisan Gallery, but it was just a beginning for me.



Now, every piece of artwork I create is an effort to experience and share a little bit of heaven. I believe that one day this poor old planet will be made new again, cleaned up and perfected, and that if we look hard enough, we can see how wonderful it will be. My process for creating art often reflects the dichotomy of the old becoming new again; my black and white negatives are often less than perfect, like this earth right now, then I add to them, using them to make something wonderful and new, rich with color and texture in a way photographs just can’t be when untouched. It’s a little like the way God will take the old earth, and reunite it with paradise, restoring Eden on earth and fulfilling the longing that he’s put in my heart.

mustard tree complete

As part of my catching up with all our visions, I've discovered I hadn't posted the completed Mustard Tree piece that I had first written about last July... of course, it was complete and on display for the show in December, but I'm just now getting it posted here. (As always, just click on the image to see it larger.)

This is also part of my Tree Stories series, and is titled Tree Story #30: The Mustard Tree. It was inspired by Matthew 13: 31-32, "The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed planted in a field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of garden plants; it grows into a tree, and birds come and make nests in its branches." (See also Luke 13:18-19.) You can see the whole explanation about the mustard tree on the previous post.

This piece is available as limited edition pigment prints:
8x10" (matted to 11x14") - $65
11x14" (matted to 16x20") - $125
16x20" (matted to 20x24") - $250
20x24" on 24x32" paper - $500
Just email me at judith@judithmonroe.com if you're interested.

heavenly home

I'm going to do some catching up now, starting with a little surprise that came in at the last moment. Sandy Wenell Thornton is an excellent watercolorist who started the study of heaven with us in January, then had one family issue after another come up to interrupt her. I knew it had been quite a traumatic year for her and I figured that she had probabaly been a little too overwhelmed with life to take part in the final showing. But then she absolutely stunned me with this mixed media piece titled, "Home is a Place We've Never Been Before."

Her inspiration for the piece came from John 14:2-3: "In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there you may be also."

When dealing with the subject of losing someone near to us to death, Randy Alcorn writes, "At the same moment that they are overwhelmed with grief over what has happened to their loved one, the one they mourn is overcome with joy. For they are home at last. Home for the very first time." (This is from his book, In Light of Eternity, which we used for our study of heaven.) I think that Sandy might be drawing from some very personal experiences here, where we see an older woman opening a door to the home that Jesus has prepared for her, finally coming home.

For believers that mourn the loss of another believer we love, it can truly be a comfort to know that not only are they home, but someday we can be home with them again.

process and the river of life

Today I'm going to take you through the process for one of my mixed media photographs, "River of Life." I'll actually show you the step by step process I've gone through in my artist's journal I've been keeping just for this project.

The first step was reading through the book "In Light of Eternity" by Randy Alcorn and looking up all the scriptural references that he cites in his book. This has been the basis for all of the artwork done by all of the artists over the course of this past year. There were actually a couple of pieces of scripture that inspired this particular piece. First, in Revelation 22:1, it says, "Then the angel showed me a river with the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb."


One of the first things this scripture does is make me think of what river images I might already have, like this photo taken for no particular reason at the time but has been patiently waiting for me to print it. I made a digital copy to color and put in my journal, waiting for the next piece of the work to come together. You can see I also doodled some palm trees onto it, to see how I'd like to work in the palm tree element that I want to keep as a theme in this project.


Another verse helped influence this piece, Genesis 2:10-14, "A river watered the garden and then flowed out of Eden and divided into four branches. The first branch, called the Pishon, flowed around the entire land of Havilah, where gold is found... The second branch, called the Gihon, flowed around the entire land of Cush. The third branch, called the Tigris, flowed east of the land of Asshur. The fourth branch is called the Euphrates." I really like the link between maps of a place and the image of the place, and I've used maps for overlays before this project, so it wasn't a great stretch for me to think of a map of Eden's rivers to connect the River of Life in Heaven and the river that fed the whole earth from Eden, possibly even the same river? The thought intrigues me that there is a close link between Eden, referred to as Paradise in the Bible, and Heaven, also referred to as Paradise...


In my journal, I can overlap the photographic image and the map, to work out how the two will fit together in the darkroom, change it if I want to, mull it over, move it, or change it completely.


This is the black and white contact print, with the map and a single palm tree as an overlay. When you look at this image and the next one, you can see that the overlay can move around, making no two in the series exactly alike.


Finally, I use watercolors, then dry colored pencils to add the final dimension of color to the piece. In this case, I decided to make the sky yellow in a reference to God's light in Heaven, eliminating the need for the sun or moon, but not necessarily eliminating the sun & the moon themselves, as found in Revelation 22:5. "And there will be no night there - no need for lamps or sun - for the Lord God will shine on them."

So that takes you from beginning to end in the process. By the way, the first entry for this in my journal is dated February 2007, and I just finished it November 2007: about nine months, so I guess it's appropriate for me to think of the finished piece as one of my babies.

river of healing revisted

This is a pair of images I first showed some time ago as they appear in my journal, and now they're finally finished. They form a diptych, or two images that are considered one piece, and they actually have elements that run from one image to the next.





They were inspired by Ezekiel 47:7 & 9, "When I returned, I was surprised by the sight of many trees growing on both sides of the river... There will be swarms of living things wherever the water of this river flows... Life will flourish wherever this water flows." All this from a vision Ezekiel was having of heaven. Of course, we are also told about the river of life in heaven in Revelation 22:2, "It flowed down the center of the main street. On each side of the river grew a tree of life... the leaves were used for medicine to heal the nations." So the vision of John is different but certainly has commonalities with Ezekiel's vision.

The overlay images I used for this piece are actually maps of the rivers that flowed around Eden, or at least an interpretation of where they could have been, since Eden's exact location was lost to us when Adam & Eve sinned. It's thrilling to think that Paradise lost will become Paradise restored when Heaven is at last brought down to earth, which is what the maps signify in this piece.

I've continued that concept in the next piece I've finished, which I'll try to post tomorrow.

heaven in the studio

This is actually my entry for today on my personal art blog, which you can find at www.judithmonroe.com/journal.html, but it's about my work for this heaven project, so I figured I'd just post it here, too:

More studio work today - and last night -



Wet watercolors on the New Jerusalem Palms mini series (and here you thought that was only on tv.)



This morning, I was working on two things at once - actually alternately, but saying at once is more impressive - in the foreground you can see the new Polaroid transfer wall art plaques I'm working on for a couple venues and back on my drawing table I'm doing the pencil work on the New Jerusalem Palms quartet.

By noon I've already finished the New Jerualem Palms, so I'll share...

My Father's House 1/5

Heavenly Homeland 1/5

City of God 1/5

Times of Refreshment 1/5

up close & personal

So now that I've teased you with the big picture, so to speak, I'll fill in a couple details. Here are a couple smaller images that you can see framed on the wall in the first photo on the previous post, but that you can't really SEE. I happened to have good scans from a couple of the works that are up but haven't been shared on the blog yet, so I guess it's time to share. Remember that you should be able to see a larger image by clicking on the ones below.

From left to right on the big wall, the pair of works stacked on top of each other are from Karen Fields, works in watercolor & mixed media. This first piece is "Postcard #1, Heaven's Lamb" and it illustrates Revelations 5:11, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and strength and honor and glory and praise."







Her next piece is titled,
"Postcard #2, Understanding" and juxtaposes the cross and a sense of mourning with 1 Corinthians 2:9, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him." This piece reflects the bittersweet reality that Christ suffered and died to give us the chance to share an eternity of amazing joy with him.

And way over on the far right hand end of the wall is a tiny gem by Sheila Stockton. This is the first of her "Trees of Life" series in bead embroidery titled, "The Tree of Life #1." She refers to Revelation 22:2, which says, “The Tree of Life was planted on each side of the River, producing twelve kinds of fruit, a ripe fruit each month.” Here you can see all the detail work, including some of the beads we shared with you in an earlier post.

final book installment

Finally, I'll share a couple more images from my "Visions of Heaven" altered book. This first image shows another Polaroid transfer image of an almond orchard here in Northern California. I happen to love almonds & my family owned an almond ranch once upon a time, so it sort of speaks a bit of the concept of home for me as well. I used it to illustrate the verse, "Fruit trees of all kinds will grow along both sides of the river, the leaves of these trees will never turn brown and fall, and there will always be fruit on their branches." (Revelation 22:12) The river mentioned is the River of Life, also referred to in my final inscription, opposite the "hole" in my altered book.

When the flaps covering the final recessed section of the book are opened, it reveals a triptych of hand colored Polaroid transfers of a river scene. The scripture across the page comes from Ezekiel 47, verses 7 and 9, "I was surprised by the sight of many trees growing on both sides of the river... There will be swarms of living things wherever the water of this river flows... life will flourish wherever this water flows." Which explains the fruit trees always fruiting...

more book visions

And so I return to this blog, after a week of computer problems... ;)

Here's another page in my altered book, "Visions of Heaven." I'm not revealing every page in this book, partly because it would be so tedious, and also to provide some little surprises for those who come to the actual show to see it. You'll notice I've again employed my palm tree motif on this page, it's a recurring theme throughout and you can find other posts that talk more about that by clicking on the tag at the end of this post. The image itself in an orignial Polaroid transfer, hand colored with pencils. On the facing page I put this verse: "The creation looks forward to the day when it will join God's children in glorious freedom from death and decay... We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us." (Romans 8:19-24) I find this whole concept of creation's redemption utterly amazing. We are so connected with the earth that it suffered the curse with us, which is found in Genesis 3, and then is redeemed with us as well, which is shown in Revelation 21.

You can see this theme continued on the next page of my book, where I have revealed a sort of hidden code in the book's original text. Of course, I could have chosen to say most anything in this hidden code, but that is the beauty of this device. I first adopt the initial sentence of the page, as it was quite apt for me, "I began asking questions." Which is the beginning of any learning, and then reveal the letters r-e-d-e-m-t-i-o-n, then the word "of" and "the world." Finally I ask the reader of my book to "break free of the expectations" that they might come to the piece with. That is all any artist can ask, that a viewer be open to the message an artist is trying to convey.

first image posting: Timeline of Heaven

This piece is titled "Timeline of Heaven", a mixed media photograph by Judith Monroe (that would be me.)

I hope we can post more images soon - maybe something cool from Jared?