c4m artists news update (2)

The story of our charitable donation to the Haven House Children's Hospice features in the current edition of the Ilford Recorder and on the Neighbourhood Love webpage.

Peter Webb is currently exhibiting in the Spring exhibition of the National Society of Painters, Sculptors & Printmakers held in the Crypt of St Martin-in-the-Fields until 1st May.

The Illumined Way by Colin Burns features in From the Darkness ... light in contemporary art, a Brighton Festival Fringe exhibition (1 May – 23 May 2010) at Little St Peter's Church, Preston Park, Brighton.The curator of the exhibition is Nathaniel Hepburn, from Mascalls Gallery in Paddock Wood, West Kent. ‘From the Darkness’ is one of a series of exhibitions from Brighton to Canterbury including works by major international artists including Graham Sutherland, Stanley Spencer, Marc Chagall and Maggi Hambling.

The next Faith & Image event is The Spiritual Power of Drawing, an illustrated talk by Mark Lewis, exploring the drawings of the Renaissance period. There is no charge for this event, which will be held on Tuesday May 11th. 8.00pm, in the Gwinnell Room at St Mary's Woodford, but donations are welcome. Mark's talk will be followed on Friday, May 14th. at 10.30am by a visit to the British Museum to see the major exhibition: Fra Angelico to Leonardo: Italian Renaissance drawings. Meet on the steps of the main entrance of the British Museum, if you wish to attend.

Sarah Ollerenshaw currently features in the opening exhibition at The Moreton Gallery, which aims to promote the work of both established and emerging artists, showcasing talent particularly from the UK but also from around the world. Sarah is planning towards a solo show at St Peter’s Notting Hill and anticipates her work being included in Icon? The Art of Faith at Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery in the autumn. She has started Alder Fine Art with Emma Forrester to showcase their own work and to promote other quality, established and emerging artists. Alder Fine Art plan to be at the Cambridge Art Fair in June and Edinburgh Art Fair in November.

St John's Seven Kings is organising an Art & Music workshop on Saturday 29th May from 2.00 - 5.00pm. This workshop has been organised with local churches in preparation for this year's Our Community Festival and is open to all. The art workshop will be led by Mark Lewis and Peter Webb and will involve portrait and landscape drawing on the theme of local people and places. These will then be collaged into larger displays to be exhibited at St Paul's Goodmayes in the week of, and on the day of, the Our Community Festival. The music workshop will gather together and rehearse a singing group able to perform at the Our Community Festival. This workshop is being organised by Rev. Geoff Eze, curate at St John's Seven Kings. The art workshop is on a drop-in basis while, for the music workshop, we need participants to come at 2.00pm and remain for the whole session.

Valerie Dean will be having an exhibition of her paintings together with photographs by her husband Roger Dean in London during the month of June. The exhibition will be held at Pages of Hackney, 70 Lower Clapton Road, Hackney E5 0RN. There will be a private view on Saturday, 5 June from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. and they should be very happy to see you there. The exhibition will also be open in June during shop hours, which are Monday to Friday 11am - 7pm, Saturday 11am - 6pm and Sunday noon - 6pm. They look forward to seeing as many of us as possible at the private view. Valerie and Roger's work was recently seen together in a show of 16 Swale artists held at the Horsebridge Arts & Community Centre in Whitstable.

Current journalism from Jonathan Evens includes a obituary for the artist John Reilly in the Church Times, a review of the Resurrection exhibition at Bury St Edmonds to be published in the next edition of Art & Christianity, a response to an Artz Ville article on the Arts Centre Group website, and an interview with Catharine Pusey (then of the Employer's Forum on Belief) in the current edition of the Faith in Business Quarterly.

Harvey Bradley will be contributing work to the summer selling exhibition of work by members of Anglian Potters from Saturday 14 August to Wednesday 1 September in the Old Library, Emmanuel College, Cambridge. The exhibition will be open from 10am to 5pm (TBC). All are welcome, there is no admission charge. This will be an exhibition of work by over 50 members with the work on show covering the entire spectrum of ceramic art and pottery made in the region. Harvey is also involved with the Anglian Potters marquee at the Ickworth Park Wood Sale & Craft Fair, Ickworth Park Gardens on Saturday & Sunday 9 & 10th October.

Faith & Image: The Spiritual Power of Drawing

The latest Faith & Image event is The Spiritual Power of Drawing, an illustrated talk by Mark Lewis, exploring the drawings of the Renaissance period. There is no charge for this event, which will be held on Tuesday May 11th. 8.00pm, in the Gwinnell Room at St Mary's Woodford, but donations are welcome.

Mark Lewis has originated the Drawing First consultancy which aims to open up the world of freehand drawing to people of all ages for professional and personal development, stimulation or enjoyment. He trained and worked as an industrial designer specialising in product design, jewellery and silversmithing. He has had over 30 years experience of teaching drawing and design in schools, adult, further and higher education.

Mark has also provided practical training courses for art and design teachers and delivered community drawing events in London, including regular participation in the national Big Draw campaign. He was formerly a Principal Lecturer in the Sir John Cass Department of Media and Design at London Metropolitan University but has once again become a freelance artist and designer and shares his passion for drawing and creative thinking by offering tuition and bespoke workshops. He is currently lecturing part-time at Birmingham City University.

Mark's talk will be followed on Friday, May 14th. at 10.30am by a visit to the British Museum to see the major exhibition: Fra Angelico to Leonardo: Italian Renaissance drawings. Meet on the steps of the main entrance of the British Museum, if you wish to attend.

Haven House Children's Hospice donation

Jonathan Evens and Henry Shelton present the commission4mission donation to staff at Haven House Children's Hospice

commission4mission exists to encourage the commissioning and placing of contemporary Christian art in churches, as a means of fundraising for charities and as a mission opportunity for our churches. The charitable element of our work is made possible because on each commission obtained by c4m the artist involved agrees to waive a portion of their fee in order that a charitable donation can be made from the overall price of the artwork.

As a result of commissions gained through our first year of operation, c4m has able to donate, from its 2009/10 income, just over £2,700 to charity. This donation has been given to the Haven House Children's Hospice and today c4m's Chair and Secretary, Henry Shelton and Jonathan Evens, visited Haven House to present the donation.

Haven House Children’s Hospice is a charity that provides on-going holistic care for children and young people with life-limiting conditions. They also embrace the needs of the child’s family from the point of diagnosis through to post death care. Their commitment is to enable children to live life as fully as possible in a warm, fun and caring environment. They care for children and young people between the ages of 0 to 19 who have life-limiting conditions and who are unlikely to reach adulthood. They help families by providing a range of services that include day, short break and end of life care, together with therapeutic play in the community. Families can find the support they need when they need it most at no cost to themselves.

Following the cheque presentation, Henry and Jonathan were given a tour of Haven House and saw for themselves the tremendous work done with children and their families and the many recent improvements made to the facilities and services provided. Haven House is a special place for special children and c4m is proud that be able to play a small part in the ongoing support of its services.

Spiritual Life column

Jonathan Evens has written a 'Spiritual Life' column about commission4mission for the current edition of the Ilford Recorder:

"Last week the artist Henry Shelton’s new Stations of the Crown of Thorns for St Paul's Goodmayes were featured on the Faiths page of the Recorder. Henry Shelton's 'Stations' complement other existing artwork at St Pauls Goodmayes, including stained glass by Sir Edward Burne-Jones, William Morris, and Leonard Evetts plus a Madonna and Child by Jane Quail, to create a feast of visual art for worshipper and visitor alike.

The commission to paint these new ‘Stations’ was gained through commission4mission (c4m) which aims to encourage the commissioning and placing of contemporary Christian Art in churches, as a means of fundraising for charities and as a mission opportunity for the churches involved.

c4m has recently responded to a national consultation by Arts Council England on the arts saying that faith communities are part of the wider community of engagement with the arts and it is important that they are recognised in the matrix of how and why people value and enjoy the arts.

Members of faith communities may enjoy art which (although not exclusively) touches and nurtures their spiritual lives. Members of c4m (as both artists and audiences) talk about the value of art in their spiritual growth and understanding. Art has been an important medium through which communication about faith and belief has taken place over centuries, and as a result the church has enjoyed a long partnership with the arts, though this seems to have eroded in recent decades.

Churches can be significant as: spaces in which artworks are and can be displayed; venues for community art initiatives; places for accessing community members for consultation and/or participation in community arts initiatives; holders of significant arts collections; and as a continuing source of inspiration and encouragement for artists. The recent trend of placing significant art work in church venues (e.g. Antony Gormley, Flare II, St Paul's Cathedral), and the development of church-based arts spaces (e.g. Wallspace) and mainstream artists drawing on Christian themes (Mark Wallinger, Ecce Homo) has to be seen in the context of this.

At a time when the Archbishop of Canterbury has said that “the church needs more artists”, the church, Christian organisations and faith communities need to be seen as valid partners for the arts.

And, as the Bishop of Barking has said: “History can demonstrate that it is the Arts that have often provided the prophetic lead that society then follows. At a time in our national life when our society is in danger of losing its way and has been cut loose from its historic Christian values there is a role for the arts to be prophetic in re-establishing in contemporary ways the values that made our nation the great society that it is.”

At c4m we hope to increasingly play our part in that vision with Henry Shelton’s Stations of the Crown of Thorns being an exciting, current example of what the visual arts in Churches can contribute and reveal."

Other current journalism by Jonathan includes a obituary for the artist John Reilly in the Church Times, a review of the Resurrection exhibition at Bury St Edmonds to be published in the next edition of Art & Christianity, a response to an Artz Ville article on the Arts Centre Group website, and an interview with Catharine Pusey (then of the Employer's Forum on Belief) in the current edition of the Faith in Business Quarterly.

Submission to Arts Council England consultation

commission4mission aims to encourage the commissioning and placing of contemporary Christian Art in churches, as a means of fundraising for charities and as a mission opportunity for the churches involved. It is an emerging arts network based in East London and the Diocese of Chelmsford, and its patron is David Hawkins, The Bishop of Barking, who is himself a practising artist.

Our consultation response is a generalised response based on comments from our members but relates most closely to Q5. What do you think are the most important things to focus on in order to ensure more people value and enjoy the arts? and Q8 Do you agree with our thinking regarding the future role the Arts Council will play in partnership with others? Do you have alternative ideas?　

Supporting the links between faith and art

Faith communities are part of the wider community of engagement with the arts and it is important that they are recognised in the matrix of how and why people value and enjoy the arts.

Faith is an influential context for people's lives: it influences how people see themselves, their relationship with others and their environment, and how they create a sense of meaning and identity, which in turn influences how they behave.

Members of faith communities may enjoy art which (although not exclusively) touches and nurtures their spiritual lives. Members of c4m (as both artists and audiences) talk about the value of art in their spiritual growth and understanding. Art has been an important medium through which communication about faith and belief has taken place over centuries, and as a result the church has enjoyed a long partnership with the arts, though this seems to have eroded in recent decades.

Faith is not something that sits in isolation from art or any other area of people's lives: it is part of a complex unity. Increasing numbers of Britons report a sense of deepening 'spirituality', a seeking for something beyond the material life - 76% according to recent research (Hay/Hunt, Frequency of report of religious or spiritual experience in Britain for years 1987 and 2000, Blackwell Companion to Christian Spirituality, Blackwell, 2007, pp 417-441.) This is not an insignificant sector of the public, but a majority.

Thus it is important that the connection between art and faith in England is sustained by Arts Council England (ACE) - initiatives which recognise and nurture this (such as the Faith and the Arts website) are sustained and developed, that regional offices are encouraged to see faith organisations as valuable partners, and that funding is available for activities that enable artists and communities to connect faith and art.

Churches as creative spaces and Christianity as an influential theme

We wish to flag the significance of churches as: spaces in which artworks are and can be displayed; venues for community art initiatives; places for accessing community members for consultation and/or participation in community arts initiatives; holders of significant arts collections; and as a continuing source of inspiration and encouragement for artists. The recent trend of placing significant art work in church venues (e.g. Antony Gormley, Flare II, St Paul's Cathedral), and the development of church-based arts spaces (e.g. Wallspace) and mainstream artists drawing on Christian themes (Mark Wallinger, Ecce Homo) has to be seen in the context of this.

Christianity has been one of the great historic narratives and themes for art, and remains such, and this still needs to be acknowledged and encouraged.

As the Bishop of Barking notes: 'For centuries one of the principal subjects that the great masters have depicted have been biblical scenes. This was partly because the church was a significant patron of fine art but also the bible [like Greek mythology] provides epic and iconic themes which evoke the whole range of human emotion and which plumb the depths of divinity and depravity and of good and evil. If our art galleries were divested of all the paintings depicting biblical subjects our national collections would be severely depleted. Just because church attendance and Christianity in general is less fashionable than it was in previous centuries this is no reason to sideline works of art which depict Christian themes or are being created from a Christian motivation.'

The commissioning of visual art work for public spaces indicates there is still a demand for art on a Christian theme, or by Christian artists. This forms part of the hidden economy of the arts which needs recognition and support.

c4m supports and encourages the commissioning of contemporary Christian art work in public spaces. Recent commissions in which it has been involved in the past 12 months include: Queens Hospital Romford, St Paul’s Church Goodmayes, St Peter's Church Harold Wood and St Edmunds Church Tyseley.

Christian art projects and social engagement

Christian arts projects are also offering a point of engagement and nurture for people who are socially excluded or marginalised - the Crypt of St George's Leeds, involved a professional artist working with homeless people to produce a mural. Work by c4m members in East London is starting to reach out and engage with diverse communities in community-based arts activities in churches.

Developing an active partnership

At a time when the Archbishop of Canterbury has said that 'the church needs more artists', the church and Christian organisations need to be seen as valid partners for the arts.

We commend an active and sustained engagement with churches, cathedrals and Christian organisations as partners with ACE and arts organisations in the creation, delivery, and display of artworks and arts initiatives. The value of this partnership has previously been recognised on occasion (e.g. involvement of Church organisations in consultation on ACE rural arts policy) but lacks sustained energy and dialogue at a national and regional level.

These partnerships and dialogue should be encouraged across all regional offices. Regional offices may need confidence and encouragement to engage with and talk to churches and faith organisations - ACE should provide support and guidance on this.

Funding guidelines (e.g. Arts 4 All) should be reviewed to ensure they are not discouraging or disbenefiting organisations with a faith background which can demonstrate that their work has a wider community benefit - many can. Funding and art form advisors should be encouraged to support, and not dismiss, applications from faith organisations.

ACE should stimulate this partnership by documenting local and national partnerships between the arts and churches, what they achieve, how they evolve and what artists and audiences they engage with.

ACE should find ways of supporting commissioning of Christian art works e.g. by extending the 'Own Art' scheme to churches and other faith organisations to enable them to spread the cost of commissioning and purchasing works.

ACE should work in partnership with organisations such as c4m to develop the skills and capacity of faith/church organisations to commission art work - through supporting the development of guidance, case studies and access to professional advice.

From the Darkness and Colin Burns

From the Darkness ... light in contemporary art is a Brighton Festival Fringe exhibition (1 May – 23 May 2010) at Little St Peter's Church, Preston Park, Brighton.

The curator of the exhibition is Nathaniel Hepburn, from Mascalls Gallery in Paddock Wood, West Kent. ‘From the Darkness’ is one of a series of exhibitions from Brighton to Canterbury including works by major international artists including Graham Sutherland, Stanley Spencer, Marc Chagall and Maggi Hambling.

Works of all media which engage with light are to be exhibited in the beautiful setting of this 13th century church, including Illumined Way by Colin Burns.

Colin writes that journeying into the unknown, a sense of adventure and discovery, hinting that there may be something more beyond the physical world than we can see, are all themes that he explores in his work. He does this through the depiction of landscape, where there may be a path leading into the distance which symbolises the idea of journey or there may be light coming from an unseen source drawing the viewer in almost as if entering a hidden, unseen world.

West Ham exhibition: Additions

Our newest member, Sergiy Shkanov, has added three works to the ongoing commission4mission exhibition at All Saints West Ham. Tree of Life is an etching on paper from 1984, while Nice to see you and Trinity (see above) are photographs of original stained glass created by Sergiy in 2003.

Sergiy Shkanov

'Nice to see you', stained glass

'Beginning', oil & acrylic on canvas, 2008

Sergiy Shkanov is a professional artist working in the fields of stained glass, murals, mosaics, painting, graphic arts, and book illustration. He is a tutor of Fine Arts.

Sergiy has participated in group shows across Europe since 1987 and holds numerous personal exhibitions in the United Kingdom. He undertakes art commissions for private and corporative clients.

Sergiy says: “My concept in art is as old as the world itself – to introduce to our world something that will not destroy, but construct. Artists are like the emptiness of a flute, through which a sound goes and results in the creation of music. In our contemporary world there is too much violence and too little love. There should be something to oppose this. I choose art as a means of resistance.”

c4m artists news update

Jonathan Evens' 'Stations of the Cross' meditations are being used, for the second year running, by the Northwood and Northwood Hill Art Stns. This community art project involves a trail of artworks exploring some of the events in the final hours of Jesus' life. The artworks include paintings, photographic exhibits, drapes, metal sculpture and collages and, after display during Holy Week at various community locations, are now gathered together for display at Fairfield Church until 12th April (daily, 9.00 am - 12 noon). Each artwork will be accompanied by one of Jonathan's meditations and an explanation from the artist. The Northwood and Northwood Hills Art Stns are part of a passion for life. Admission is free.

Peter Webb will be exhibiting in the Spring exhibition of the National Society of Painters, Sculptors & Printmakers to be held in the Crypt of St Martin-in-the-Fields from 20th April - 1st May. The Private View will be on 20th April from 6.00pm – 8.00pm.

Sarah Ollerenshaw is planning towards a solo show in May at St Peter’s Notting Hill. “the gallery” is a new contemporary art space in the heart of Notting Hill housed in the newly refurbished St Peter`s church. The space is unique in that it is in the centre of a thriving community and is surrounded by existing architectural and artistic features. The ambition of “the gallery” is to support new and existing creative talent in all mediums from painting and sculpture to installations, film-making and music. The church family want to embrace the arts and to help the local community enjoy, learn and be inspired by events and shows which all will be welcome to attend. Sarah is also anticipating her work being included in Icon? The Art of Faith at Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery in the autumn.

Valerie Dean will be having an exhibition of her paintings together with photographs by her husband Roger Dean in London during the month of June. It will be at Pages of Hackney, 70 Lower Clapton Road, Hackney E5 0RN. There will be a private view on Saturday, 5 June from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. and they should be very happy to see you there. The exhibition will also be open in June during shop hours, which are Monday to Friday 11am - 7pm, Saturday 11am - 6pm and Sunday noon - 6pm. They look forward to seeing as many of us as possible at the private view. Valerie and Roger's work was recently seen together in a show of 16 Swale artists held at the Horsebridge Arts & Community Centre in Whitstable.

As a new resource for those using our webpage, a list of 'Faith & Art' links has been added. Scroll down to find this new and extensive list on the right hand side of the webpage.