New Life for Dry Bones

I sat down at the table.  The man next to me muttered, “Might as well hang me now.”  The woman to the right of me picked up the block of clay in front of her and started kneading it enthusiastically.  I looked at my block of clay and waited for instructions, like a proper Presbyterian.  Yep, that’s the gamut of likely responses in an “Arts in Worship” workshop at the Next Church national gathering.

I was eager to attend this workshop, thinking it would give us ideas on how to incorporate various kinds of art into our worship service.  It turns out we were going to make art ourselves!  How fun!  Or how threatening!  Or both!

Despite the fear, I immensely enjoyed responding to scripture through painting, even though I have zero artistic skill.  I feel a great longing to be creative in connection with worship. I think that I am the only one who feels this way.  To paraphrase the prophet Ezekiel, ‘my bones are dried up, my hope is lost, I am cut off completely.’  God’s creative breath of life is in our worship, mostly through music, but perhaps we are missing out in not exploring other forms of creativity.

A longer description of the workshop is below, for those who are interested.

How do you like to express your creativity?  If you are part of a worshiping community, would you be willing to participate in an art project as part of worship?  Or would you make sure you had to be out of town that day?

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Details

As the workshop started, we were encouraged to fiddle around with the block of clay in front of us.  We had no instructions regarding the clay.  We continued to work with it if we wished, as we started the discussion.  There were two tables, with about 8 people at each table.

Some of our clay creations.
Mine is that thing in the forefront that is supposed to
 be "spilt milk".  It is not spiritually significant, but just
sort of ended up that way.

First we discussed how non-artistic adults generally feel about doing art.  Art (and any creativity, really) is viewed as fine for kids, but adults just don’t go there.  This workshop was about why adults should go there.

The workshop leader must have had a time machine on my life.  She described exactly what happened to me in second grade art class, when we painted a scene on a tile.  I was quite pleased with my scene of ducks and grass.  The art teacher denigrated it; the words are long forgotten, but the feeling is not.  Almost all of us encounter something similar on the way to adulthood.  Our human capacity for judgment and comparison takes over, and those of us who don’t have artistic talent stop making art at all.  It’s just too scary and painful to endure the judgment from others and ourselves.

 

At the crossroads of fear and creativity

Then we talked about confronting that fear and leaping into creativity. Making art unleashes freedom, joy, and wholeness, and that’s just for starters.  If you believe that you are created in the image of God (the original creativity maven) then exercising your creativity is an excellent way of showing it.  Why should only kids be able to do this?!  Why should only those with innate artistic talent be able to do this?!

In our workshop it turned out that the clay was just a warm-up to our main activity – painting a large banner.  Like most art, our painting was to be based on other art, and was to follow rules.  We were instructed to base our painting on our response to the Bible passage about Ezekiel’s vision of God breathing life into dry bones (Ezekiel 37). 

The blank canvas for the banner

We had a few minutes to discuss what images the passage evoked in us.  I think this discussion helped a lot, when it came time to start painting.  But before starting to paint, the rules: 

- First, paint on the space in front of you.  Paint your own response to the passage.

- After a few minutes, everyone is to move two spaces to the left and continue painting.  You may not erase, obliterate, or cover up what the person before painted in their spot.  You may embellish and extend their painting, or start painting in a new spot.  After a few minutes, go two more spaces to the left and extend that person’s painting.  Finally, return to your original spot and fill in spaces as you see fit.

- No talking!  This meant we could not collaborate. We could not form a committee to plan what to paint, or where.  (That is extremely unPresbyterian.)  It also meant we could not offer any evaluation of each others’ art.  We could not issue comments on our own efforts.  This was crucial – no compliments, no criticisms.  A compliment of one person’s art could be construed by someone else as an implicit criticism of their own art.  (“You liked her art, but didn’t say anything about mine.”)

- The workshop leader told us where the top of the banner would be.  She also said that there were pieces of tape running across the canvas, and she had prepared our canvas by painting blue over the whole canvas. After our art expressions had dried she would be pulling off the tape, creating bold lines across our art work.

We started painting.  At first I felt that familiar sense of self-criticism.   I started by drawing a kindergartenish slab of grass, thinking of "the fruitful land" from the passage.  Being more of a “words” person than a “drawing” person, I wondered if I could dare to write a word instead of just painting shapes and colors. I dared.  But which word?  I chose "fruitful".  I felt I should paint it upside down (my area was at the top of the canvas) so that the word would be displayed right side up. This was challenging.

Someone else enhanced my painting by outlining the words in gold
and adding other colors to the green part.

After a bit it was time to switch spots. I was perplexed after switching. It felt wrong to mess with what someone else had painted. It almost felt as if that spot was now sacred.  Instead of painting within that person’s area, I tried to extend from that area, reaching more into the middle of the canvas. 

By the time we switched again, I was feeling more bold, and reached into the middle to start a new shape. I painted the words "new life" in the middle of the canvas. Then I decided to paint a cell to represent a form of life and honor my sweet Younger Daughter and her interest in cells.

That greenish blob above the word "spirit" is my cell

When we were finished we had a great sense of ownership and accomplishment at having created a work of art together.  I do not know or care if it is beautiful in the eyes of the world, but it is ours, our expression of the scripture.  When our canvas was displayed in the worship space the next day, I again felt like a kindergartner, proud to have my work up on the refrigerator.

 

Our banner hanging in the sanctuary

Another group's banner

I just have to add that I believe that it is good and right to have beautiful art, created by truly talented professional artists, in our worship spaces.  It can be appropriate to evaluate sacred art and display what is inspiring.  In fact, if we non-artists are to do art, we need the professional artists, who figure out things like how big the canvas should be, what kind of paint is best, how long to let it dry, how to display it.

Professional art: Abraham
Tiffany stained glass window

Professional art (close up).
We amateurs just can't do this.

Professional art: wood carving

Our workshop group did not create our banner in order for it to be evaluated or compared to professional art.  It is valuable in that we ourselves made it as an expression of our connection to holiness.  For me personally, it felt like new life for my dry bones which are longing, aching, yearning to be creative in worship.

The third and fourth groups' banners