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Return of the Prodigal Son
Seeing a reproduction of Rembrandt's The Return of the Prodigal Son catapulted Henri Nouwen on a long spiritual adventure. Here he shares the deeply personal meditation that led him to discover the place within where God has chosen to dwell.
See more photos, specs, and reviewsA Brush With God: An Icon Workbook
For more than a thousand years, Eastern Christians have used their hands and hearts to create icons, proclaiming God's reality in a visible-and breathtakingly beautiful-way. This ancient art is enjoying a renewed interest in the West, as people of faith create icons and use them to meditate on mysteries for which there are no words.
A Brush With God is a guide to painting icons and using them in prayer. Written with warmth and energy, it describes the history of icons and examines why they've been a spiritual tool for so many centuries. Written from a uniquely Western perspective, the book guides artists-from novices to professionals-through the process of icon painting, using traditional techniques but employing contemporary materials. Included are eight full-color plates of the artist's icons.
See more photos, specs, and reviewsImagine: A Vision for Christians in the Arts
Imagine art that is risky, complex and subtle! Imagine music, movies, books and paintings of the highest quality! Imagine art that permeates society, challenging conventional thinking and standard morals to their core! Imagine that it is all created by Christians! This is the bold vision of Steve Turner, someone who has worked among artists--many Christian and many not--for three decades. He believes Christians should confront society and the church with the powerful impact art can convey. He believes art can faithfully chronicle the lives of ordinary people and equally express the transcendence of God. He believes that Christians should be involved in every level of the art world and in every media. Yet art and artists have not always been held in high esteem by conservative Christians. Art rarely seems to communicate clear propositional truth, rarely deals with certainties and absolutes. And the lifestyles of artists too frequently seem at odds with the gospel. So the arts have often been discouraged among Christians. Throughout this stimulating book, however, Turner builds a compelling case against such a perspective. He shows that if Jesus is Lord of all of life and creation, then art is not out of bounds for Christians. Rather it can and should be a way of expressing faith in creatively, beautifully, truthfully arranged words, sounds and sights. This stirring call is must reading for every Christian who has been drawn to the arts or been influenced by them. Features & Benefits
* a fresh and positive perspective on Christianity and the arts
* shows how art can faithfully represent both "real life" and divine truth
* challenges common Christian objections to the arts
* encourages Christians to be involved in every level of the art world and in every media
* written by a poet and journalist well-known in the popular music scene
See more photos, specs, and reviewsPraying in Color: Drawing a New Path to God
Maybe you hunger to know God better. Maybe you love color. Maybe you are a visual or kinesthetic learner, a distractable or impatient soul, or a word-weary pray-er. Perhaps you struggle with a short attention span, a restless body, or a tendency to live in your head.
This new prayer form can take as little or as much time as you have or want to commit, from 15 minutes to a weekend retreat."A new prayer form gives God an invitation and a new door to penetrate the locked cells of our hearts and minds," explains Sybil MacBeth. "For many of us, using only words to pray reduces God by the limits of our finite words."
For more information, including author events, examples and contact information to request Sybil MacBeth to do a workshop, visit www.prayingincolor.com.
Use Praying in Color to help with:
•lectio divina -- reading the bible for spiritual growth
•memorizing Scripture
•prayers for discernment
•creating a personal Advent or Lenten calendar
•praying for enemies
Praying in Color is ideal for:
•Intergenerational Education Classes
•Women's Meetings
•Praying Workshops
•Vacation Bible School and Summer Camp
•Staff Retreats on Prayer
•Summer Sunday School Classes
•Wednesday Night Church-wide Programs
•Senior Citizens Activity
•Youth Confirmation Retreats
•Men's Prayer Groups
•Prayer Therapy During Convalescence
•Kindergarten and Children's Prayer Training
•Homeschooling, grades K-12
•Prison Ministry
•Ministry to the hearing impaired
•Ministry to the disabled
"This is the most invigorating and enabling book about prayer that I have seen in years! Wry, funny, accessible, wise beyond all appearances, and deeply spiritual, MacBeth warms the soul as well as the heart. So will praying in color." - Phyllis Tickle, compiler, The Divine Hours
Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art
In Walking On Water, Madeleine L'Engle addresses the questions, What makes art Christian? What does it mean to be a Christian artist? What is the relationship between faith and art? Through L'Engle's beautiful and insightful essay, readers will find themselves called to what the author views as the prime tasks of an artist: to listen, to remain aware, and to respond to creation through one's own art.
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The Hours of Catherine of Cleves
When this magnificent volume first appeared in 1966, it was celebrated for its extraordinary beauty. Now, more than thirty years since its first publication, it is made available once again. Illustrating one of the great art treasures of the world, The Hours of Catherine of Cleves is a fifteenth-century illuminated manuscript containing a series of some of the most beautiful illustrations of the Bible ever made. Many of the great scenes from the Old Testament and many more from the New Testament are included, besides the Stations of the Cross and portraits of the saints.
The work of an unidentified Dutch master painter, the manuscript was made for Catherine of Cleves on the occasion of her marriage to the Duke of Guelders. All the 157 surviving miniatures are reproduced to actual size and in exquisite color with gold, together with three samples of pages containing the Latin prayers. Page after page reveals the elaborate program and rich illumination of the original. The progression from beginning to end shows an artist increasing in skill, relying in his earlier work on tradition and later emerging as an independent artist of bold, clear colors, dynamic brushwork, and lively imagination. He stands as one of the supreme painters of fifteenth-century Northern Europe.
Each page is accompanied by a descriptive and explanatory commentary by John Plummer. His introduction discusses the development of the Book of Hours as a liturgical form in general, and the history of the Cleves Hours specifically, and describes the place it holds in the history of Northern painting. 160 color illustrations with gold.
See more photos, specs, and reviewsTransfigurations
The most extensive collection of Grey's visionary artwork and life's journey in one volume.
• Includes a foreword by Albert Hoffmann and essays on Grey's work by renowned art critic Donald Kuspit, philosopher Ken Wilber, and Stephen Larsen, author of Joseph Campbell: A Fire in the Mind.
• 21,000 sold in hardcover since October 2001.
Every once in a great while an artist emerges who does more than simply reflect the social trends of the time. Such an artist is able to transcend established thinking and help us redefine ourselves and our world. Today, a growing number of art critics, philosophers, and spiritual seekers believe that they have found that vision in the art of Alex Grey.
Transfigurations, the follow-up to Grey's Sacred Mirrors (1991)--one of the most successful art books of the 1990s--includes all of Grey's major works completed in the following decade, including the masterful seven-paneled altarpiece Nature of Mind, called "the grand climax of Grey's art" by Donald Kuspit. His portrayals of human beings blend anatomical exactitude with visionary depictions of universal life energy. Alex Grey's striking artwork leads us on the soul's journey from material world encasement to recovery of the divinely illuminated core.
See more photos, specs, and reviewsWhat We Ache For: Creativity and the Unfolding of Your Soul
In her previous books, Oriah Mountain Dreamer has challenged readers to live with passion and honesty, to embrace the true, fallible, human self. What We Ache For is a moving and eloquent call to delve deeply into our creative selves, to do our creative work, and offer it to the world.
The creative process is essential to human nature. It is as essential as spirituality and sexuality, and in fact all three are deeply intertwined. What We Ache For is a practical book allowing readers to embrace the urgency and necessity of their creativity, whatever their medium -- writing, painting, sculpture, dance, music, or film. As Oriah says, "Doing creative work allows us to follow the thread of what we ache for into a deeper life, offering us a way to cultivate a life of making love to the world."
Following Oriah through this journey in such chapters as "The Seduction of the Artist," "Learning to See," and "Risk and Sacrifice," What We Ache For challenges and inspires readers to fully embrace their artistic selves as a way of forging a path of spiritual unfolding.
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