time for refreshments!

And finally, the notes for my last New Jerusalm Palms image, "Times of Refreshment." This inspiration for this piece comes from Acts 3:20-21. "Then times of refreshment will come from the presence of the Lord, and he will again send you Jesus, your appointed Messiah. For he must remain in heaven until the time for the final restoration of all things, as God promised long ago through his holy prophets."



Here's the whole page with overlays in my journal - you can see the scriptural reference noted to the right -



Here's the map overlay by itself, again a map of ancient Jerusalem. I really like the idea of the old Jerusalm connecting with the New Jerusalem, illustrating God's timelessness in his city.



And finally the palm image by itself. Of course, I ended up painting them somewhat differently, but that just shows that the creative process can take twists & turns...

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

dad's house

I spent a couple hours in the darkroom today, printing what I'm now calling my New Jerusalem Palms series. I've shared my journal pages of two of the four pieces already, so I'll share another today, then the uncolored prints (which are drying right now) and finally the finished pieces.


This is the page complete with overlay and miscellaneous notes. The Scripture I'm basing this image on is John 14:1-3, "Don't let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. There is more than enough room in my Father's home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am."


My first thought coming from this verse was of a long driveway lined with palms leading to a grand house, like can be found here in the Central Valley. Actually finding what I had in my head proved to be a challenge, and in looking for palms for other images in this series, I found my rows of palms and then thought I could overlay a small image of a home, or an architectural sketch but then realized I already had found an image of a mosaic map of ancient Jerusalem which portrayed buildings, bringing to my mind the idea of a home with many rooms, almost like a city...


So I created an overlay based on the mosaic to use with the palm trees and also create another visual reference to Jerusalem. Of course, the images never work out quite the same in the darkroom as they do in my journal. In this case, the image of the palms was too busy when the overlay was completely over it, but I like the effect on the wide black border around the image, so I cut a hole in the overlay to allow the palms to come through more readable.

It's really exciting for me to have all the pieces come together after messing around with them. This whole conceptual process is new to me, but I'm finding it rewarding in a whole new way.

heavenly homeland

Today I'll take you back to my personal journal work for this show, and the palm theme I've presented before. First, here is the layered image, as seen in my journal:


You can faintly see the map & then the image of palm trees underneath it. Also the last part of the scriptural reference, Hebrews 11: 13-16. "All these people died still believing what God has promised them. They did not receive what was promised, but they saw it all from a distance and welcomed it. They agreed that they were foreigners and nomads here on earth. Obviously people who say such things are looking forward to a country they can call their own. If they had longed for the country they came from, they could have gone back. But they were looking for a better place, a heavenly homeland. That is why God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them."

The people referred to in this passage were many of the faithful from the Old Testament, including Noah, Abraham, and then Moses, Rahab, David and many others. The map overlay I used for this came from a map of Jerusalem in 1947.


I did this to tie together the homeland of the ancient Jews, the modern land and then the future homeland referred to in the scripture. There are many references in the Old Testament to the land of Israel being God's permanent home. Leviticus 26:11 & 12 says, "I will live among you, and I will not despise you. I will walk among you; I will be your God, and you will be my people." And in Zechariah 2:10, "The Lord says, 'Shout and rejoice, O beautiful Jerusalem, for I am coming to live among you.'" The concept is a recurring theme among many of the minor prophets.

Finally, I place this all over one of my images of palm trees.


Palm trees can be a symbol for Israel itself, for the tree of life, and they also decorate the true temple, as I've noted before - check out Ezekiel 40 & 41 for yourself.

a real home

The next page I'll share with you from my altered book, "Visions of Heaven," has another Polaroid transfer on it, accompanied by Colossians 3:1. "Since you have been raised to new life with Christ, set your sights on the realities of heaven, where Christ sits in the place of honor at God's right hand." This speaks volumes, first of all, that heaven is a reality, and that it is something that we should be looking forward to. I especially like this New Living Translation, which I think emphasizes the tangible qualities of heaven, mush more than a purely spiritual realm.

One of following pages in this altered book, emphasizes a different aspect of heaven, spelled out in the selected letters of the text, h-0-m-e, and illustrated with a Polaroid transfer and my ubiquitous palm motif. The preceding page has a quote from Jesus on it, "Don't let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. There is more than enough room in my Father's home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am." (John 14:1-3) While Jesus does not use the word heaven, by calling it his "Father's home" he is giving the very definition on heaven, that is, God's dwelling place. Wherever God is, that is heaven, and Christ is making the place ready for us - we should get ourselves ready, too!

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.

back to visions

Nearly a month has passed since I've posted here, but that's not to say that work hasn't been getting done... I have been pretty busy on a particular piece that I'll share bit by bit, an altered book titled, "Visions of Heaven." For those unfamiliar with the medium, an altered book is literally a standard published book that has been altered, or changed, into a work of art. Altered books can be written and drawn in, painted, collaged, even cut and glued to express the artist's intent. It's a medium I don't emply often, but it works well with photography, as I can incorporate my images into the book form - something many photographic artists do.

The first detail of the book that I'm sharing is the palm trees that I've added to most pages of the book. This is a recurrance of my palm tree facination, a reference to Ezekiel's tour of the true temple in heaven, which is adorned with carvings of palm trees (see Ezekiel 40.) (You should be able to see any image enlarged by clicking on it.)

The other detail that I'll share this time is the cover, which I have collaged onto with gold paper, a reference to Revelation 21:18, "The wall was made of jasper, and the (holy) city (of Jerusalem that descended out of heaven) was pure gold, as clear as glass." The other item collaged onto the cover is an actual Polaroid transfer of a cross, symbolizing that accepting Christ is the way into heaven, as in Romans 6:23. "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord." Thank you, Jesus!

jerusalem palms

Last week I finally got some new palm tree shots for this project - sometimes squeezing in a long term project like this is tricky amongst the current deadlines - you can see my journal for the shooting session at my Wanderings blog (http://www.judithmonroe.com/journal.html.)

So I was able to insert a copy of photos into my heaven journal, to help guide me when I go into the darkroom - also tricky to squeeze in sometimes - this is what the whole thing looks like when layered, a sort of approximation of the final image, much less refined, but the basic idea.



The topmost layer is a map of ancient Jerusalem, showing the history of the city.



The center layer is the colored photograph of the palms and a clock tower, representing the future Jerusalem.



The bottom layer in my journal will likely be part of the overlay in the finished product, but it's appropriate here as the foundation of the work, the scripture that the whole concept of heaven is based on.



This particular scripture comes from Zechariah 2:4-5, "Jerusalem will someday be so full of people and livestock that there won't be room enough for everyone! Many will live outside the city walls. Then, I, myself, will be a protective wall of fire around Jerusalem, says the Lord. And I will be the glory inside the city!" This ties in with the references to the New Jerusalem in Revelation, speaking of a huge cube-like city brought down from heaven to earth, so much larger than the Jerusalem of the past, that it could house incredibly large numbers of people. We can only begin to imagine the glory of it all...

palm trees in heaven?

It all started during my regular cruise through the Bible. You know, that daily reading thing? Well, I just cruise through it, front to back, over and over again - eventually, anyway. So I just happened to be reading Ezekiel 40 one bright and sunny day and Ezekiel has this vision...

A guy who looks like bronze (no, really, like bronze) shows Ezekiel the temple area, first the east gate to the outer court, then the outer court, then the north gate, and so on. Mr. Bronze has a measuring stick and is measuring all these rooms for Ezekiel and Ezekiel dutifully tells us all the dimesions of these rooms. I'm thinking that this is an unusually slow day's worth of reading when I begin to notice something: each room is described in painfully measured detail, so long by so wide by so high, blah blah blah and then, "The doorjambs between the alcoves were decorated with palm trees." No really - boring measurements, then a little detail about decoration, the same decoration, six times over - go look it up for yourself.

The vision continues on through Ezekiel 41 and then in Ezekiel 43:7, "This is the place I will live with the Israelites forever." (That's God speaking.) I find this utterly facinating. God is showing Ezekiel his holy temple where he'll live forever, so that's on the New Earth, and he bothers to mention decorating the place with palm trees. Six times.

So being slightly obsessed with trees (you can see my Tree Stories blog by looking at my profile) I look up the significance of palm trees to Jews. I discover it has been a symbol of Judah and - drum roll, please - a symbol for the tree of life. The tree of life that was planted in Eden and is now in "the paradise of God" and will be alongside the river flowing out of the temple in the New Jerusalem. Pretty cool, huh?

I've decided to make the palm tree my own recurring theme for all my Heaven artwork, most likely always up the sides of my images, like the carvings on the temple doorposts. And no doubt, a few will show up in my photos, as they already have.