visual art

An Artist’s Perspective on Creating Visual Art for Worship

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The following article examines the process of commissioning and creating visual art for worship from the point of view of an artist, exploring, in particular, the unique concerns of the liturgical artist.

After fourteen years as a professional craftsperson, working in pottery and fiber, I have become increasingly interested in making things for use in worship. The occupation of “dressing the church” uses many of my past experiences and skills, but it brings with it a new set of problems—personal and professional. The following reflections developed as I wove vestments, hangings, and altar cloths. I hope they will strike a chord with others who can develop them more fully and more deeply.

A Question of Design

As I do liturgical design work, one question repeatedly comes to mind: What is the difference between designs for the liturgy and other designs? I don’t feel any different doing liturgical work, and there is no apparent difference in the design processes. I gather information from a client and find out as much as possible about the space in which the object will be used. I show samples, swatches, and sketches to elicit responses; then within the limits of available materials and technical skills, I produce the best design possible. That’s pretty straightforward, though not easy. Any artisan who does commission work or custom orders has a healthy respect for the difficulties involved in communicating with clients and in satisfying them with the resulting product.

Many conflicts and tensions are built into the design process, and picking one’s way through them is a balancing act. The artisan has to balance conflicting responsibilities. Details of planning or producing, for instance, require constant attention, while one’s vision or image of a beautiful creation shimmers in the future. Such a “stereoscopic vision” must be held in focus for the goal to be attained with any success, or the result will lack clarity.

Another conflict or tension exists between the desire to spare no expense to produce the most beautiful object possible and the real limitations placed on the artisan’s time and the client’s pocketbook. Sometimes the design process is unexpectedly prolonged by something as simple as the unavailability of required material. But such stumbling blocks, conflicts, and tensions can become the steppingstones to where one wants to go. This is a matter of making good use of the time at hand to think about and experiment with design possibilities.

The process is almost the same whether the commission is for an altar cloth or a bed quilt, but the completed works will be used in distinctly different ways. Liturgical design work is done for a community rather than an individual, and that community uses the work for a sacred purpose: to enhance worship.

Designing for a Community

Even though the artisan may deal with one individual who represents the worshiping community, that person must convey the needs and desires of the whole group. The artisan needs to ask the right questions and gather as much information as possible before proceeding, but the design is not produced by committee; it is the responsibility of the artisan alone. If the proposed design is not acceptable, it may be modified; another design can be worked out or another artisan hired.

The resulting design should express or reflect the nature of the particular community, but it should also point that community to what it might become. This prophetic quality, or prescience, is an elusive but important element of art that challenges the body of worshipers, encouraging response and growth. If “we become what we behold,” as Psalm 34 suggests, then all the visual elements in a church are vitally important. The community’s response to the completed work can be a powerful dynamic when it gathers to worship and when it goes forth into the larger community.

In addition to considering the community for which work is executed, one must also carefully consider the sacred purpose of the completed work. This purpose is realized when the object is taken out of the artisan’s control and put to use. At that moment this “work of human hands” is made holy. If the artisan is in the congregation, it is a humbling and poignant experience to see the vestment of chalice or altar cloth used in the context of worship.

A designer must understand that the object is made holy, not by human efforts alone, but by being offered and used for a sacred purpose. This fact frees the designer from the worrisome feeling that only saintly or religious people can make sacred objects. No human being is adequate to this task, and if this fact is not fully accepted, some problems are bound to arise. For one thing, if the artisan feels “unworthy,” there will be an almost compulsive temptation to multiply the use of sacred symbols on the work. This multiplication has a “desanctifying” effect, for the harder we try to “make” something holy, the more we are assured of failure. The multiplication of symbols weakens the power of the object. By accepting the fact that the object will be transformed more by use than by symbols, the artisan is free to do what he or she does best. Creative energies can then be focused on making a beautiful form through which the liturgy can come alive and flower in the community.

This topic of the object’s holiness has personal parallels for the artisan. On our own, we might achieve virtuous lives with great effort. But we cannot make ourselves holy; God alone does this. We can offer ourselves to God and cooperate with God’s actions in our lives, or we can choose not to. We can receive the Lord’s blessings joyfully and gratefully, or we can take them for granted. We can share God’s gifts with others or keep them to ourselves. But if we offer ourselves to God, as the work of the artisan is offered, then God can use us for God’s own purposes.

Respecting One’s Craft

God’s work in completing the process of liturgical design does not diminish the importance of the artisan’s effort. We must bring to any work we do for churches a sense of reverence and respect, but not to the point of timidity or immobility. Being self-conscious is as much difficulty as being insensitive to the work’s importance and potential. Fear of doing something that is unintentionally funny, absurd, or even scandalous—something that will be shown as a “bad example” in someone’s slide show at next year’s liturgy conference—must be overcome again and again. Otherwise one will do only what is “safe,” repeating something that succeeded in the past. That course of action results in work that has a deadly, sanitized look. Removing the risk means removing all the things that invigorate a work; it is the death of creativity. “Playing it safe” won’t displease or offend anyone, but neither will it move people to smile with joy, shed a tear, or pray spontaneously.

I have resolved this tension between safety and risk by making the best work I can. Then I show it to someone whose judgment and taste I respect, for comments and criticism. This dialogue helps me to grow and try out new ideas. Looking at other works, traditional and contemporary, also helps.

People who are interested and knowledgeable in liturgical design are difficult to find. When I do find them, I consider them gifts. Various people appear in my path when I need them, and for that I am grateful. Both their encouragement and their critical comments have helped me to continue working in the liturgical field when confidence wavered or when logic could provide no answers. One such resource person I met through a magazine article, and we developed a correspondence. I met another when friends brought someone into our shop. Others came from a design workshop and a visit to a seminary to look at a vestment collection.

I value my dialogue with these people who are vitally interested in a rather specialized field of design work for which good books and periodicals are hard to come by. These people are clergy and lay, women and men, of various ages and backgrounds. What is important is that we share a common vision: we want to create beautiful things to be used for a sacred purpose by the worshiping community, and we each have different abilities to contribute to that end.

Catalog versus Craft

Why order custom-made work when articles can simply be ordered from a catalog? While there is nothing inherently wrong with ready-made vestments or altar cloths, they can never replace objects crafted with the personal skill, inspiration, and creativity of an artisan. Never having the chance to commission original art would be a great loss to the community as well as to local artists and artisans. The presence of something unique and beautiful is a great gift; it calls forth peace and healing—even conversion—at deep, unspoken levels in both the artist and the viewer. Thomas Merton said, “Sacred art is theology in line and color, and it speaks to the whole man.… The material elements of the image become as it were the vehicle of the Holy Spirit, and furnish Him with an occasion to reach souls with His hidden, spiritual power” (Thomas Merton, Disputed Questions [New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1976], 156).

When parishioners make a vestment or an altar cloth, they often think that materials must be ordered from a church goods catalog; yet actually, they could purchase the same fabric locally. In a local store, they can examine the material, or ask for a courtesy discount, or have the owner order just what they need. But some church goods catalogs suggest that their fabric is special, beyond the ordinary; the fact that it costs more than local goods only seems to enhance its desirability. Catalog prices for mass-produced items are often so high that an experienced artisan can produce work at competitive prices. Catalog prices, after all, reflect the cost of employees, accountants, equipment, and 200-page annual color catalogs. Responding to the desire for crafts, some suppliers list handmade or handcrafted items, like carved crosses from Italy, that cost thousands of dollars. Imported crafts are not necessarily better than domestic crafts; artisans working in this country can produce equally authentic and beautiful objects, and at less cost.

Adapting the Ordinary

Why can’t an artisan’s ordinary production items be purchased for use in church? If you buy a handmade iced tea pitcher and goblets to hold and serve the consecrated wine, you are not making use of the artisan’s ability to design something special for liturgical use. The maker of a custom Communion set considers such important aspects of the design as the capacity of the vessels, their size in scale to the altar, the extra stability required, and ease in passing them from hand to hand. Such a design takes time and should be done sensitively. Artisans should pray for the grace to do simple and subtle liturgical design work. Obvious solutions, such as putting a cross on an existing iced tea pitcher or sewing the word Alleluia on a spring hanging to make an Easter banner, do not make good liturgical design.

The obvious does not invite us to go deeper, to reflect, to look, to wonder. Sensitive use of color and symbol in church design work is a natural means to lead us into supernatural realities with all their mystery. The obvious solution (“Alleluia!”) has a bullying quality that brings out our defenses or numbs us; subtle solutions lead us gently, gracefully, into worship. “Where there is revelation, explanation becomes superfluous” (Frederick Frank, The Zen of Seeing [New York: Random House, 1973], 28).

For an artisan, the completed work becomes a prayer to which the community can say “Amen.” Freedom, however brief or fleeting, can be found by losing oneself in such a work. Though questions linger, their importance fades. What matters to me at the creative moment is that both the artisan and work serve a sacred purpose and become incarnations in which God’s spirit can live.

Evaluating Visual Art for Worship

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Visual art is made for communication and expression, and thus must be evaluated for how it accomplishes these tasks in a liturgical context. The evaluation process must be sensitive to be theological and aesthetic considerations. In particular, arts for liturgical use are best presented and evaluated in the context of the Christian year or the particular Sunday for which it is created.

The visual arts present opportunities to look at long-standing prejudices and ideas about art in worship and to search for fresh ideas in a field shunned by many faiths for a long time. It is presumed, in this article, that what we are evaluating is temporary art, rather than architecture or more permanent additions, such as sculpture, stained glass, or furnishings.

The Broader Questions

Many of us are untrained in the visual arts. We are vaguely aware that art can decorate our walls, and that some people collect art, and that some institutions enshrine it for the rest of us to venerate. We can appreciate art that pleases us. We can even find a place for visual art in worship, especially during Christmas, when our secular life holds such a strong promotion of nostalgia. Creches and greens are then a part of the times and do not offend our sense of appropriateness for our worship spaces.

Is this how we evaluate the function of art in worship? Is it to entertain? Does it provide the traditional image to particular festivals? Do people have to like art for it to be acceptable in worship?

Many of us have tolerated another form of art—that which instructs or gives a message. We permit slogans or cliches to appear on our walls, brightly colored, in the form of banners. Occasionally we even abandon words, substituting instead a cultic vocabulary of esoteric symbols or crests from creeds of the past. Our favorite medium for this is felt and Elmer’s Glue, and we often “design” by vaguely copying examples from religious catalogs or poster books. We even totally ignore the space it will show in, disregarding color or size as relevant considerations. Such religious “propaganda,” such it is because its function is to persuade or educate us, attracts our attention for a moment or two, but seldom goes beyond this. It is quickly dismissed or overlooked beyond a first glance.

Should art used in worship be the Word made visual? Should it explain, justify or connect an illustration as illustrative of a theme or idea from Scripture or sermon? Is it less important than other parts of worship?

Another tradition of the visual arts has been that of the icon or religious image that serves as a meditative focus for prayer. Usually, these images are stylistically and iconographically predictable. Their function is to become transparent to our experience, almost magic in their ability to transform our humble words to prayers fit for the Holy to hear.

Is there religious art and secular art? Is subject matter the most important quality to consider in evaluating such art? Can religious subject matter ever become kitsch? Or sentimental?

There are dangers in attitudes like these that are used to evaluate visual art in worship. Many of us are uncomfortable with sentimental religious experiences, sensing with embarrassment their inability to address the complex and conflicting questions and priorities before us today. We see cloying sweetness and innocence leading toward indifference or hostility toward the world as it is. We also are jaded by fads and by slogans and are impatient with cliches. Our artists often sell out to our aesthetic limitations, choosing instead to approach us as yet another client for a commission, yet another advertising design challenge. They do not give us art, but a product they think will please us.

We hunger for truth, honesty, and freshness. We wither without our imaginations. We cry out for visions of glory. We want our sons and daughters to dream dreams, our old ones to see visions, and our men and women to prophesy. I believe it is here that we must begin to evaluate art that is used in our sanctuaries for use in worship.

Specific Ideas

What, then, is appropriate for worship? Obviously, such an evaluation begins with a clear understanding of what theme or season is highlighted on a particular Sunday. It is probably more appropriate to look backward at credal images on Reformation Sunday than on Pentecost. Thorns belong more to the austerity of Lent than the abundance of Epiphany. Many churches find art for worship flowing naturally when particular Scriptures guide not only the sermon and music but all other aspects in the liturgy. The use of a lectionary or similar long-range plan makes such creativity practical.

There are certain aesthetic considerations in visual art that have parallel sensitivities in the other arts. Visual art is evaluated by these criteria: composition, color, scale, harmony, counterpoint, and the environment in which the piece is hung. Usually, scale is the most difficult concept to grasp. Many of us simply make things too small! A grand scale, like one would use in stage-set design, conveys of itself a graciousness and majesty that automatically adds a sense of glory and importance to worship.

One of the reasons artists make art is for self-searching and self-expression. When working for a congregation, this cannot be the focus. Here we are making art for communal use and common expression. Here the work is not for self, but rather for communal identity. When our own experiences can be made broad enough or transparent enough in their meanings that the community can use them or claim them, they can be appropriated. But even here, it is not a personal testament as much as a corporate vision that works.

The strongest criteria of the quality of art appropriate for worship is its ability to evoke, to involve, to refresh, to provoke, or engage the worshiper on an emotive rather than a rational level. Such art allures us, calling forth response before calling for explanation. It is often very difficult to talk about it at all. Often images based on an emotional response to the Scripture or theme of worship for that day are the place to begin. Usually, these are semiabstract in form, engaging our imagination rather than instructing us.

There are not categories of spiritual feelings and nonspiritual feelings. We must be ready to accept the intensity of all the feelings evoked and integrate them with faith experiences.

Finally, for the work to have integrity, it best arises out of the people themselves. It is created for their own community at a particular time, for a particular occasion, on a specific site. This is perhaps the most difficult dimension of evaluation. Not every church is able to claim artists among their own, nor find artists willing to work within the assumptions and needs of the church. Making visual art is a talent and skill, like making sermons, or making music. Unfortunately, the church has done much to discourage the artist from participating in worship as an artist.

In summary, how is work evaluated? Does it work aesthetically? Especially the scale? Is it integrative, as the other parts of the worship service are? Is it communal in its nature rather than personal or esoteric? Does it evoke rather than instruct? Does it merely decorate? Does it have courage and integrity? Is it imaginative? Does it arise from the work of the people themselves?

When art arises from these parameters, it belongs naturally in worship. It adds a dimension that is unapproachable by any other means. But diminishing any of these parameters by compromise or carelessness seriously weakens this gift.

Yet it is our visual artist who can most clearly show us a vision that hints at the Kingdom of Shalom. It is God’s glory that is reflected whenever one works from courage, integrity, and imagination. It is God’s love made visible in yet another way when the abundance of such art is showered upon us with lavishness and sensuality: a gift that is bestowed with love made visible.