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BIO
Victoria Emily Jones graduated from UNC–Chapel Hill in 2010 with a BA in journalism and English literature and a minor in music, and she has done some postgraduate coursework in worship and the arts at Regent College in Vancouver. Now she works as an editorial freelancer and pursues independent research on Christianity and the arts, with a special interest in visual art that engages with biblical narratives, especially from the twentieth century onward and/or from non-Western cultures.
Victoria serves on the board of the Eliot Society, an Annapolis-based nonprofit that promotes spiritual formation through the arts, and as curator for The Daily Prayer Project, which publishes cross-cultural liturgies, music, and art for the Christian year. She is a member of Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA) and a contributor to the Visual Commentary on Scripture. From 2015 to 2022 she served as assistant editor of ArtWay, a Netherlands-based web publication that encourages Christian engagement with historical and contemporary art; she continues to write “visual meditations” for the site (see list below).
Based on the work she had done through her blog The Jesus Question (the precursor to Art & Theology), Victoria was selected in 2016 to participate with a small group of scholars and artists in the two-week Calvin College seminar “Bodies of Christ: Visualizing Jesus Then and Now,” led by Ed Blum, coauthor of The Color of Christ. Racialized representations of Christ remains one of her ongoing topics of inquiry.
PUBLICATIONS
- “How Asian Artists Picture Jesus’ Birth from 1240 to Today,” Christianity Today, December 18, 2023
- Commentary on Galatians 2:15–21 (Crucified with Christ), Visual Commentary on Scripture, June 21, 2023
- “Praying with the Eyes,” The Daily Prayer Project Easter 2021 prayerbook
- “Mosaics” and “Mount of Olives in Visual Art,” in Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2021)
- Commentary on 2 Kings 2:1–12 (Elijah’s Ascent), Visual Commentary on Scripture, January 13, 2021
- “Ears of the Earth,” Still Life, December 7, 2020
- “Jesus as Dancer: Jyoti Sahi’s ‘Lord of Creation,'” Sojourn Arts blog, October 19, 2020
- “The Seven Works of Mercy: How two Dutch artworks—one Renaissance, one contemporary—can help us recover an ethic of neighborly care,” Radix 41, no. 1 (Summer 2020), published online September 12, 2020
- “Fifty Years of Art and Theology: 1970 to Today,” chapter in Kunst D.V.:(Neo)calvinistische perspectieven op esthetica, kunstgeschiedenis en kunsttheologie [(Neo)Calvinistic perspectives on aesthetics, art history, and the theology of art] (Amsterdam: Buijten & Schipperheijn, 2020); revised for the English edition: The Artistic Sphere: The Arts in Neo-Calvinist Perspective (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2023)
- “Vincent van Gogh,” Artist Profile series episode 28, Makers & Mystics podcast, March 12, 2020
- “Remember, You Are Dust,” CIVA blog, February 25, 2020
- “The Best Christian Albums of the 2010s” (contributor), The Gospel Coalition, October 12, 2019
- “18 Paintings Christians Should See” (contributor), The Gospel Coalition, May 4, 2019
- Commentary on 1 Corinthians 15:35–58 (Resurrection of the Body), Visual Commentary on Scripture, January 15, 2019
- “Biblical Theology Set to Music: ‘Hebrews’ by Psallos,” The Gospel Coalition, December 13, 2018
- “Edward Hicks, The Peaceable Kingdom,” Art for Advent video series, ed. James Romaine, November 25, 2018
- “Shouldering the ‘Yoke of Love’: The Shared Passion of Simon and Jesus in Stone and Verse,” Literary Life, July 1, 2018
- 7 Art Spotlights, GiftofLent.org (Anglican Church in North America), February 14–March 25, 2018
- “God the Plowman,” Literary Life, July 2, 2017
- “Featured Artist: Nicholas Mynheer,” Transpositions (a publication of the Institute of Theology, Imagination and the Arts at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland), May 31, 2017
- “Journey to the Cross: Artists Visualize Christ’s Passion,” International Mission Board (Southern Baptist Convention), April 7, 2017
ArtWay.eu:
- “The Wheeling Playfulness of the Trinity” (miniatures from the Rothschild Canticles), June 4, 2023
- “Pregnant with God” (Blue Madonna by Michael Felix Gilfedder), November 27, 2022
- “Spring’s Extravaganza” (Resurrection by Alma W. Thomas), July 10, 2022
- “Golgotha, Auschwitz, and the Problem of Evil” (Reconciliation by Emma Elliott), March 20, 2022
- “Mary’s Fecund Yes” (Annunciation by Mats Rehnman), July 11, 2021
- “At the Whipping Post” (Largo do Pelourinho, Salvador by Djanira da Motta e Silva), November 1, 2020
- “Waking Up from Apathy” (The New Lazarus by Philip Evergood), August 30, 2020
- “Out of the Belly of the Beast” (The Jonah Marbles, 3rd century), May 3, 2020
- “Meditation in Blue” (The Alpha & The Omega by Betye Saar), November 10, 2019
- “Like a Wind” (Pentecost by Andrew Wyeth), June 9, 2019
- “Makoto Fujimura and the Culture Care Movement,” February 17, 2019
- “‘As warm water shatters at birth'” (Emergence by Bill Viola), September 2, 2018
- “Behold the Broken, the Bruised” (After Van Gogh by Rick Bartow), February 18, 2018
- “Our Sweet, Travailing Mother Christ” (The Birth of Ecclesia from a Bible moralisée), September 24, 2017
- “The Dark of Doubt Dispelled” (Day appears at last . . . and in the very disk of the sun shines face of Jesus Christ by Odilon Redon), March 26, 2017
- “Out of the Ashes” (Christ in Glory by Graham Sutherland), October 2, 2016
- “Hungry for Righteousness in Haiti” (The Tree of Life by Jacques-Richard Chery), May 22, 2016
- “Standing Together in Prayer” (Christ on the Mount of Olives from the Book of Kells), March 13, 2016
- “Resurrection with a Red Balloon” (Small Still Birth by Polly Morgan), February 7, 2016
- “Two Christ-like Saints” (Islip Screen by Nicholas Mynheer), December 6, 2015
- “Sewing Seeds of Hope in South Africa” (Keiskamma Altarpiece), October 4, 2015
- “And the Walls Came a-Tumblin’ Down” (Wailing Wall: Song for Quin by Steve Prince), August 9, 2015
- “The Crowning of Christ” (early Christian sarcophagus), April 5, 2015
- “The Yoruba Christ” (Annunciation, Flight to Egypt & Transfiguration by George Bandele), March 20, 2015
- “Jesus Christ, Our Sun-Face Savior” (The Face of Jesus by Don Froese), January 25, 2015
- “Kick at the Darkness till It Bleeds Daylight” (Jacob Wrestles the Angel by Arthur Sussman), January 13, 2013
TALKS
- “Picturing Jesus: A Case for Racially and Culturally Diverse Artistic Representations of Christ” (postgraduate seminar), Spurgeon’s College, London, May 19, 2021
- “Saying Yes: The Annunciation in Contemporary Art,” The Breath and the Clay creative arts conference, March 18, 2021
- “Seeing the Story: Visual Art for the Liturgical Year,” North Decatur Presbyterian Church, North Decatur, Georgia, September 15, 2019
- “The Crucifixion in Global Art,” Christian Union, Brown University, April 13, 2017
- “Art and the Church: Seeing the Sacred in Global Christian Art” (six-week Sunday School course), City of Hope Presbyterian Church, Columbia, Maryland, Spring 2017. Lesson titles:
INTERVIEWS / CONVERSATIONS
- “The Annunciation and Art,” Old Books with Grace (podcast), November 17, 2021
- Dean’s Forum, Saint John’s Cathedral, Denver, September 19, 2021
- “Searching for a Jesus Who Looks More Like Me” by Eric Copage, New York Times, April 10, 2020
- “Victoria Emily Jones on Gazing as a Spiritual Practice,” Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, December 14, 2016
Art & Theology 