Steve Taylor's Pukehinahina Cross Call to Worship

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

I found this 2012 Pukehinahina Cross Call to Worship posted at sustain:if:able kiwi, the blog of Steve Taylor.  He is currently the Principal of Uniting College for Leadership and Theology in South Australia and the author of The Out of Bounds Church? Learning to Create a Community of Faith in a Culture of Change.  He also writes monthly film reviews for Touchstone and has blogged regularly since 2002.

The following are his posts from June 13, 2012 and June 20, 2012:


June 13, 2012
a contextual visual for mission 2
Other visual theologies of mission here and here.

Pukehinahina Cross, St Georges Anglican Church,
Gate Pa, New Zealand. Used with permission.

Carved by James Tapiata for St Georges Anglican Church at Gate Pa. Used by permission. Not to be used in any form without permission from St Georges.

The greenstone Maori fish hook is entwined around the cross, to remember Christ’s mission as a fisher of people and to show the ties between two people – Maori and Pakeha. Greenstone is of immense importance in Maori culture, both spiritually and historically. Although not stated on the church website, the fish hook is likely to reference “Hei-Matau”, a common Maori carving pattern, in which fishing was simply a way of gathering food. In this context, it would symbolise prosperity, determination, leadership and good health, as well as safe journey over water.


June 20, 2012
Finding words for worship

I’ve been asked to provide a call to worship at the Church Synod on Friday evening. My general rule of thumb is to work with what’s engaging me. Last week I posted this,

Pukehinahina Cross, St Georges Anglican Church,
Gate Pa, New Zealand. Used with permission.

Which, with a bit of research, over the weekend I have shaped into the following Call to worship -

Leader: The cross,
offering reconciliation, making enemies friends,
All: May we, reconciled and reconciling, feel again Your call to mercy

Leader: The greenstone,
an item of treasure and value in Maori culture
All: May we, Your treasures in earthen clay, hear afresh Your call to value each other

Leader: The fishhook, carved in reference to Jesus invitation,
Come follow me: I will make you fishers of people
All: May we, Your fisher folk, experience anew Your call to mission

Leader: The fishhook, a pattern commonly carved in Maori culture
a symbol for a journey, speaking of the need for shared courage, wise leadership and safety in troubled times
All: May we, Your pilgrim people, find together new courage, wise leadership and surprising joy,

Leader: In our shared journey, Shaped always by this cross of Christ. Amen

Beatus: The Spanish Apocalypse

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

If you're going to be in the NYC area on October 15, 2014, you might enjoy attending this documentary film screening at The Morgan Library & Museum.  I know very little about the subject matter but it definitely qualifies as an indigenous/celtic/etc. form of visual art.  For more info click here.

Beatus: The Spanish Apocalypse

(2014, 85 minutes)
Director: Murray Grigor


In about 776 the Spanish monk Beatus compiled his commentary on the Apocalypse in order to prepare his fellow monks for the end of time. In this world premiere screening, scholar John Williams examines the Beatus tradition, preserved in illustrated examples dating from the tenth to the thirteenth centuries. Their brilliant and provocative illustrations resonate to this day, and will be featured in the film, as will the monasteries that created them. Presented by MUSE Film and Television; Hamid Shams, Director of Photography; music by Rory Boyle. The Morgan's Beatus manuscripts will be on view.

Christian Altar Cross from the Solomon Islands

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

Rare Christian Altar Cross Inlaid with Pearl Shell
Solomon Islands, circa 1900. 62cm x 33cm x 19.5cm

Don Richardson To Speak Near Asheville, NC

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

Author, former missionary, and contextualizer Don Richardson will be speaking at a 10:00am breakfast on September 22nd at Asheville Christian Academy, near Asheville, NC.

Richardson will share his personal experience as a missionary in Papua New Guinea.  He will also share from his many years of missions development work including the Perspectives on the World Christian Movement course.

He is the author of Eternity in Their Hearts and other books. All of Richardson's books focus on what he calls his "redemptive analogy" thesis: the idea that each culture has some story, ritual, or tradition that can be used to illustrate and apply the Christian gospel message.

Don and his wife Carol served for 15 years among the Sawi, a Stone Age tribe of cannibal-headhunters who valued treachery as an ideal. Don designed an alphabet suited to their language, authored 19 primers, taught the tribesmen to read in their native tongue and translated the New Testament into Sawi. More than half of the Sawi came to Christ!

To sign up for the breakfast, click here.

Indian Christian Art by Brojoe Joseph

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

Below are some beautiful examples of Christian artwork by Indian artist Brojoe Joseph (perhaps his student work).  You can find more of his paintings at his blog, Indian Christian Art, which features an Introduction section where he briefly explains inculturation, as well as Christianity in India and various styles of Indian painting.

I Am the Light of the World

Supper

Soichi Watanabe: Bamboo and the Holy Spirit

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

Soichi Watanabe, The Bamboo-Emptiness-Flexibility-and-The Holy Spirit, 2008.
Oil on canvas, 18" x 15".

Soichi Watanabe, a Japanese Christian painter, was born in 1949.  In his work he seeks to answer the question, "What is the ideal form of art for Christian art in Japan in the present age?"  He teaches art at a private art school that he founded in 1982 in the city where he lives, Koshigaya City, Saitama. His influences include many ancient forms of art along with varioius 20th century abstract artists.

Watanabe writes:

"In 1972 I read in a book by Albert Schweitzer that when we encounter Jesus, we don't know who he is. When the disciples encountered Jesus by the seaside, they didn't know who he was. But they followed his call. Schweitzer heard God's call when he came across an appeal in a newspaper for doctors to be missionaries in Africa. After ten years of studying medicine he threw away the status of professor of theology and professional organist and followed Jesus. I was led to the Christian faith by some teachers, friends and books. Now I realize that these persons and these books were really Jesus by the seaside."

To read a devotional reflection on Watanabe's painting above, The Bamboo-Emptiness-Flexibility-and-The Holy Spirit, click here.  Another devotional reflection on a different painting by him can be found here. For more examples of his work, click here.  And here is a bio of the artist.

Below are two of my favorites:

Soichi Watanabe, We are One in Jesus Our Lord.

Soichi Watanabe, Lotus - The Grace of God (Ephesians 1:7), 2008.
Oil on canvas, 21" x 18".

Call for Entries: "Our Mob – God’s Story" Indigenous Christian Art Book

Please Note: All posts on this blog are intended for informational purposes only, not as an evaluation or endorsement of any artist, art form, organization or website.  If you have concerns about the accuracy of any information presented please contact the author at hmsarthistorian@gmail.com.

Birth of Jesus by Max Conlon has been featured in the project's promotional materials.
Conlon is also one of the book's selection committee members.

It's been nearly a month since I've posted, mainly due to an online class that ended in early June and lots of stuff to catch up on since then. Anyway, please check out a flyer here about the upcoming Indigenous Australian Christian art book that I posted about in 2013.  It's called Our Mob – God’s Story and is being produced by Bible Society Australia for publication in 2017.  They're asking for submissions of "paintings which tell Bible stories or depict Christian symbols" by Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander artists.  The deadline for entries is July 31 2014.

All proceeds from the sale of the book will aid in providing Bible translations into indigenous Australian heart languages.  The book's selection committee is made up entirely of Aboriginal Australians.

The hope for Our Mob – God’s Story is to show "the depth of spirituality among Indigenous Christians while showcasing their talent, and [to be] a creative means of engaging people with the gospel."  Click here for more about the book and one of its selection committee members, Christobel Mattingley.  For more about artist and selection committee member Max Conlon, click here.