“Creativity is part of our nature; we, not the ostrich, have been given the ability to create. God breathes life into our dusty forms. His Spirit hovers over us, calling to the depths and leading us into abundant living. We are creative because we are made in God’s image.” ~ Alice Bass, The Creative Life
“I really think that cleaning up in between projects is a great way to also clean the palette; so to speak. It helps to organize your thoughts and focus on what you are doing next.” ~ Joanna Figueroa, fabric designer, featured in Where Women Create
Worked on my creative space this week. Mr. G. put together another tabletop area for me to spread my beads. Designing jewelry is such fun when I’m not writing! I also save old Mary Englebreit calendars. Framed a few of her prints from the calendars this week to hang in a collage in the corner. Her art inspires and delights me!
What does your workspace look like? Does it inspire you? It should! Found a magazine to help with that:
Enjoy!
Occasionally I peruse my database of quotes, sifting for just the right encouragement for us. Here’s a few insights from Walking on Water by Madeleine L’ Engle that you’re sure to ponder. While I don’t always agree with her viewpoints, here is much to distill:
“I lived far too much in an interior world, but I did learn that I didn’t have to be qualified according to the world’s standards in order to write my stories.”
“Creativity is a way of living life, no matter what our vocation or how we earn our living. Creativity is not limited to the arts or having some kind of important career.”
“If our lives are truly ‘hid with Christ in God,’ the astounding thing is that this hiddenness is revealed in all that we do and say and write. What we are is going to be visible in our art, no matter how secular (on the surface) the subject may be.”
“The artist cannot hold back; it is impossible, because writing, or any other discipline of art, involves participation in suffering, in the ills and the occasional stabbing joys that come from being part of the human drama.”
“In a very real sense not one of us is qualified, but it seems that God continually chooses the most unqualified to do his work, to bear his glory.”
“You can inspire others by sharing the historical context of your life and your values, experiences, accumulated life wisdom, and insights. Stories also mend the rifts between generations or individuals, because when you honor what was good, you find how to forgive what was bad and reconcile your past.” ~ Marlee Ledai, Living Spaces
Are memoirs valuable? According to Marlee Ledai, yes! To create an heirloom document to pass down to our loved ones is a wonderful idea, whether it’s written or video-taped. “Writing your memoirs, particularly at a turning point, in midlife, or toward the end of a long life, will preserve the most valuable resource you can give your loved ones: the love and wisdom you brought to this world.”
What can we share? In Living Spaces, Ledai suggests memories that lie on the surface of our experience. Much comes to mind - what we’re grateful for, our favorite vacations, recipes, and movies, events that shaped our lives, family anecdotes, traditions, beliefs, and so much more. One friend self-published her memoir to give to family at Christmas. It was a lovely keepsake, treasure rich with family history and love.
Consider, too, the time capsule. My oldest son tucked one away for his daughter a few years ago. Inside a protective capsule, one could put so many things - mementos, letters, photos. . . future notes to grandchildren yet to be born.
What personal defining moments would you love to share? What do you want your great-grandchildren to know about you?
Jot this down: there is value in reminiscing. All those memories? Pass them on!
“Art requires much calm and to paint the things of Christ one must live with Christ…” Fra Angelico
Today I discovered a New Zealand artist online. My heart is absolutely warmed by his contemporary art expressions, but not only that, his abiding faith in Christ. Allow me to introduce you to expressionist painter, Cornelis Monsma. When it comes to letting Christ’s life flow through us as artists, writers, and painters, this artist shares simple, yet profound truths:
“Like many other fellow Christians, I started out with a well meaning attitude of “wanting to do my part” for the Christ who gave so much for me. I ended up however, finding “me” wanting, and after nearly a lifetime through trial and error, I found that Christ doing His part Himself through me, was the only fruitful situation to be in. The difference between the two approaches, as I have learned, is as far the west is from the east, resulting in the decrease of the ever domineering “self” in the first instance, to the overwhelming preeminence and presence that Christ has become in my life under the second.
He is allowing and enabling me now to express the very nature of Him and His freeing redemptive work, thereby reducing “me” to the back seat. It is His presence which enables me to do, and produce the work at the intensity of the moment.”
Many focus on doing a work “for” God, but fruitfulness comes as we allow Christ’s life to be formed and expressed through us.
Looking forward to more from this artist!
Read more about the artist here.
Read and rejoice in his inspiration.
See art gallery, scriptural inspirations and thoughts here.
“A work of art introduces us to emotions which we have never cherished before. Great works produce rather than satisfy needs by giving the world fresh cravings.” ~ Abraham Heschel
I’ve been pondering the works of Vincent van Gogh. Long ago, I criticized the man’s work. So ordinary, I thought. I didn’t get it. Having missed his heart, I walked away, unaroused by what he shared. But it wasn’t Vincent’s fault. I was young, naive. What did I know? Now, the more I learn about the man, the more his longings speak to me. I see sorrow lurking behind his landscapes:
“There may be a great fire in our soul, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passers-by see only a wisp of smoke coming through the chimney, and go along their way.” Vincent van Gogh
When we encounter a work of art, what do we see? Are we paying attention?
Before Van Gogh became a painter, he read the Scriptures, wanting “to sow the words of the Bible” to the working-class people, as Ken Gire shares in his insightful book, Windows of the Soul. Van Gogh said himself: “I read it daily but I should like to know it by heart and to view life in the light of its words.”
Vincent had a passion to minister to the poor and the downtrodden. He longed to become a pastor like his father, but the religious powers-that-be prevented him from pursuing a theological education. They viewed him as eccentric, fanatical, unsubmissive - and pushed him aside with a lay ministry role. But he gladly lived among the coal miners, visiting their sick, praying with them, binding up their wounds, sharing the gospel, planting hope and encouragement wherever he could. He wrote his brother, Theo, that he wanted to draw them one day “so that those unknown or little-known types would be brought before the eyes of the people.”
But his position as evangelist was soon terminated, and according to Gire, he left angered and embittered at age 27. It makes sense that he sketched the peasant woman sewing, farmers eating around a table, and women kneeling in prayer. He loved these people. Gire describes At Eternity’s Gate with Vincent’s own words: “In this print I have tried to express what seems to me one of the strongest proofs of the existence…of God and eternity - certainly in the infinitely touching expression of such a little old man, which he himself is perhaps unconscious of, when he is sitting quietly in his corner by the fire. At the same time, there is something precious, something noble, which cannot be destined for worms.”
By all accounts, Van Gogh suffered with mental illness. Over his lifetime, he grew distant and anguished and despairing. No wonder. He felt rejected much of his life and struggled with depression, possibly bipolar. Had he lived in this day and age, with medication and treatment, surely he would have enjoyed a more robust life, painting well into his old age.
“How sad life must have been for him,” Gire tells us. “To feel so deeply, to want to communicate those feelings so passionately, and yet to have people stand off at a distance, shake their heads, and walk away. Eventually his physical, spiritual, mental, and emotional states all deteriorated.”
I wish it weren’t so. But now I understand. Van Gogh’s life may not be a perfect model for us but you have to admit, he saw things in people we often miss. That, maybe more than his art, was the gift. I read each of his paintings with great interest now, searching for the man, empathizing with the longings of his soul. Whatever critics say, I’ll remember him by this quote:
“Christ is more of an artist than the artists; he works in the living spirit and the living flesh; he makes men instead of statues.” ~ Vincent van Gogh
