The Revd Canon Andrew Vessey is an artist-priest who, while believing it important that Christian art connects with wider society as well as church members, thinks the particular duty of the artist who is a Christian is to develop images and symbols that stretch the meaning of our inherited biblical visual vocabulary.
His own major oil or gouache paintings grow from within particular landscapes in which he has come to see and feel the presence of saints and angels, to the point of becoming a setting of a particular biblical story in a contemporary setting. These studio works are supported by poems, written to explore the same theme both before or after the painting takes place. Other pictures will directly record in ink or pastel the changing light, impact of seasonal differences and the weather, especially around the woods and fields and along the estuaries of northern Suffolk.
Andrew trained at the Chelsea College of Fine Art and Bishop Otter College of Education. His ordained and parish ministry was in Suffolk, Worcestershire and Swansea. He has exhibited at Bury St Edmonds (1968/70), Bath (1975/76), Salisbury (1983), Worcester (2003), and Swansea (2008/11).
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