The Scriptorium Daily

Category: Art

  • What is the What: Sudan, Manute Bol and Activistic Art

    —

    by

    Matt Jenson
    in ,

    Last week, Manute Bol died. The tallest and thinnest man in the NBA, he was a shot-blocker on stilts, an amusing presence, really, a trivia answer. He was also, it turns out, a very good man. Bol grew up in southern Sudan, a largely Christian region in an on-again, off-again civil war with the largely…

  • Z72

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in

    Freddy Age Nine is well known for his mastery of highly complex compositions, but his recent work has tended toward a stark simplicity. The image below is striking for its vast quantities of white space, so much that the two major figures in it seem to belong to separate drawings. The open triangle at the…

  • Seeing the Resurrected Son of God

    —

    by

    Greg Peters
    in ,

    Easter is not a day, it is a season. Thus, instead of remembering our celebration of Easter a few weeks ago as we polish off the last remaining ear of the chocolate bunny or choke down that final Peep, we need to be continually living in the Easter moment. The Lord is risen, alleluia! In…

  • Whiteboard Mathmachine Mousehouse

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in

    Freddy Age Nine isn’t opposed to math. But as an accomplished visual artist, he knows how to use visual design to add interest and motivation to the routine arithmetical functions required of today’s busy fourth grader. Simple operations can be carried out with this mouse-operated math machine: At the center is the mouse, facing the…

  • Kittens in the Air

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in

    Phoebe Age 7 combines word and image in this celebratory ode. That stylized text is: Kittens in the air Catnip in there lair Soreing over beare And you can see the beare over which they are soreing. The kittens are supported in their soreing project by a colorful assortment of birds. What with the catnip…

  • Yourself and the Air Around You

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Charles C. Ryrie has a hundred object lessons for teaching the young. No, really, a hundred. They’re all good for making doctrinal points clear to kids, and Ryrie tells you exactly what object to show the kids in each case: a chair, a comb, a sealed letter, a map, etc. But when he tries to…

  • Found Poem: Wrong Way — Right Way

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Wrong Way — Right Way Air An Invitation A Paycheck Hell Sinners All The World What Death Is Rejecting Ignoring A Stopped Watch All-Seeing “Be Ye Ready” Heaven No Savior Substitute An Anchor My Glasses Dark Glasses A Grade Book A Love Letter Mosquito Bites The Shadow How To Eat Necessary Parts Safe Keeping Clean…

  • The Baptism of Christ: 8, The Holy Spirit

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    In one sense, portraying the Holy Spirit in baptism icons is not a problem at all: the Spirit descended in the form of a dove. The iconographer does not need to try to get behind this simple assertion of the New Testament to ask “why a dove?” For the most part, painters just seem grateful…

  • The Baptism of Christ: Part 7: The Son

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Christ in icons of the baptism is identifiable just as he is in any painting or icon: his traditional bearded face, and a halo (nimbus) with a cross inscribed in it. Of course there are exceptions: the Arian baptistery in Ravenna featured a beardless Christ, and in the post-Renaissance West, halos fell out of popularity…

  • The Baptism of Christ: 6, The Father

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    In this leisurely exploration of the image of the baptism of Christ, we finally turn to a description of the three persons of the Trinity. They are linked in the center of the image by the vertical beam of light, running down from the Father through the Spirit to the Son. The question of representing…

  • The Baptism of Christ: 5. Light

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    The feast of Christ’s baptism is called “the Feast of Light,” linking baptism with illumination in a tradition too ancient to trace. The apocryphal literature surrounding the New Testament is full of Jordan light imagery. The Gospel of the Ebionites reports that simultaneous with the voice of the Father, “a great light shone around about.”…

  • The Baptism of Christ: 4. Angels and People

    —

    by

    Fred Sanders
    in ,

    Angels are not mentioned in the scriptural account of the baptism, but they are almost always presented in the iconography. Perhaps they are included because the baptism is read together with the temptation in the wilderness, which followed it immediately, and after which the gospels report that “the devil left Jesus, and suddenly angels came…