Friday, August 16, 2013

Promoting liturgical art. . .

A friend passed me the name of young liturgical artist, Jonathan Mayer, a member of WELS, living in Seward, NE, who has a studio called Scapegoat and a studio blog.  I highly commend it.

He has done a triptych model for a church in Georgia, stained glass for Bethany Lutheran College, and has a number of projects worth your attention.

I know him only via his blog and some of his art I have appreciated.  Liturgical artists tend to be starving artists and there is probably more money in the sofa size art advertized on TV and available at the local motel for today only than there is in congregations who are willing to spend some real money on "decoration."  So when I find a young person who seems to have a head on the shoulders as well as a gift for art, I am truly excited to see that employed in the service of the Church and to the glory of God.

I have only begun to read his thesis and it seems promising.  Here's a shout out to Jonathan!
at

3 comments:

  1. Janis WilliamsAugust 16, 2013 at 7:45 AM

    Just downloaded his thesis yesterday, and will begin reading it today.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousAugust 16, 2013 at 8:46 AM

    He offers several of his prints for sale through his website. We just hung one in our home yesterday, and it is beautiful.

    Supporting, promoting, and when possible purchasing the art of good Christian artists is one of the important ways we can confront the secular culture around us and confess our faith. We should be encouraging both individual Christians and our church institutions to be patrons of such artists.

    Some of the readers may be familiar with LCMS artist Ed Riojas, but if not they should look him up. He has done ecclesiastical art corresponding to the 1 year lectionary and also has works at churches in Michigan and the library at CTSFW.

    ReplyDelete
  3. jonathanpaulmayerSeptember 4, 2013 at 9:24 PM

    Pastor Peters,

    Thank you for the plug! Blogger lists referring links, so I followed one to your blog, and found this post. Thanks for the compliments and words of encouragement.

    Please also let me know what you thought of the thesis, if you have time. I'm eager to get some feedback and critique from Lutheran pastors/theologians.

    Thanks,
    Jonathan

    ReplyDelete