Tag: The Breath and the Clay

Roundup: Upcoming conferences, “Rupture as Invitation,” and more

Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

UPCOMING CONFERENCES:

>> Calvin Symposium on Worship, February 7–9, 2024, Calvin University, Grand Rapids, MI: I’ve promoted this event in years past—see, e.g., here and here—and am excited to be attending again this year! I’ll be coleading a breakout session with Joel Littlepage and Ashley Williams about our work at the Daily Prayer Project, curating textual, visual, and musical resources from across time and place to encourage a life of prayer that reflects the church’s beautiful diversity. There are plenty of other sessions being offered as well; a few that stand out to me are “Blues: The Art of Lament” with Ruth Naomi Floyd (she’s also leading a Jazz Vespers service), “Music, Architecture, and the Arts: Early Christian Worship Practices” with Vince Bantu [previously], and “The First Nations Version New Testament and Its Impact on Worship” with Terry Wildman. This is in addition to what is probably my favorite part: the multiple worship services, led by liturgists, preachers, and musicians from different denominations and cultural backgrounds. I love my local church community, but I also love worshipping with folks from outside it—a reminder that the church is far broader than what I’m used to on a weekly basis.

>> “Poetry and Theology: 1800–Present,” February 22–24, 2024, Duke University, Durham, NC: Supported in part by Duke Initiatives in Theology and the Arts, next month Duke is hosting a poetry symposium that’s free and open to the public! The speakers are Lisa Russ Spaar, Judith Wolfe, Toby Martinez de las Rivas, Thomas Pfau, Kevin Hart, Anne M. Carpenter, Ian Cooper, Anthony Domestico, Luke Fischer, Dante Micheaux, Łukasz Tischner, and Bernadette Waterman Ward. Papers are on the poetry of Hopkins, Eliot, Rilke, Miłosz, and more.

>> “Return to Narnia: Creativity, Collaboration, and Community” (Square Halo Books), March 8–9, 2024, Lancaster, PA: Organized by book publisher, author, illustrator, printmaker, and gallerist Ned Bustard, this year’s Square Halo conference will feature author Matthew Dickerson as its keynote speaker and Sarah Sparks as its musical guest, along with various breakout session leaders, such as Brian Brown of the Anselm Society and Stephen Roach of the Makers & Mystics podcast. Tickets are $210 if purchased in advance or $220 at the door.

>> The Breath and the Clay, March 22–24, 2024, Awake Church, Winston-Salem, NC: Organized by Stephen Roach and friends, this annual creative arts gathering aims to foster community and connection around the pursuit of truth, beauty, and goodness, providing opportunities for immersive encounters and kindling for the imagination. There will be main-room sessions, workshops, a juried art exhibition (entry deadline: February 16), a poetry slam and songwriters’ round, a panel discussion on reconciling artists and the church, concerts, a dance performance, a short film screening, and more. Musical artists include Victory Boyd, John Mark McMillan, Young Oceans, and Lowland Hum, and among the keynote speakers are Rachel Marie Kang, Mary McCampbell, Junius Johnson, Vesper Stamper, and Justin McRoberts. I appreciate the bringing together of various artistic disciplines and the emphasis on practice. For tickets, there are both virtual ($99) and in-person ($299) options.

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NEW SONG: “MLK Blessing” by the Porter’s Gate: Written by Paul Zach and IAMSON (Orlando Palmer) and just released for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, this song is based on a benediction that MLK prayed, a variant of the ancient Jewish benediction known as the Birkat Kohahim or Aaronic blessing (Num. 6:24–26). It’s sung by Liz Vice and Paul Zach.

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PAST LECTURE: “Rupture as Invitation: Generosity and Contemporary Art” by Elissa Yukiko Weichbrodt: I’ve mentioned Elissa several times on the blog—I find her work so illuminating—and was grateful to have her in town last fall to deliver a lecture for the Eliot Society. “Contemporary art can often be unexpected or downright unsettling in its form and subject matter. But what if we reframed our discomfort as an invitation to enter rather than an unbridgeable divide? In this lecture from November 11, 2023, Dr. Elissa Yukiko Weichbrodt demonstrates how approaching contemporary art with humility, love, and courage can be a powerful means of growing in love for our neighbors.”

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UPCOMING EVENT: “Why Should Christians Care About Abstract Art?” with Elissa Yukiko Weichbrodt and Jonathan Anderson, February 22, 2024, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary–Charlotte, NC: Hosted by the Leighton Ford Initiative for Art, Theology, and Gospel Witness, this evening will consist of an opening of the exhibition Alfred Manessier: Composer in Colors (on display through April 30) and dessert reception, lectures by Elissa Yukiko Weichbrodt and Jonathan Anderson, and a Q&A. “For some people of faith, abstract art is difficult to engage because the meaning remains unclear, and the form can appear chaotic or uncompelling. For others, abstract art is an invitation to engage the whole person, contemplate spiritual realities, and encounter God in transformative ways. If abstract art can facilitate the latter, then Christians have a unique opportunity to learn and care about abstract art for theological, practical, missional, and relational reasons. This event is a unique opportunity to experience abstract art, learn about abstract art, and have formative interaction with one another on this topic.” The cost is just $10, and there is an online option.

Manessier, Alfred_Mount Calvary
Alfred Manessier (French, 1911–1993), La montée au Calvaire (Mount Calvary), from the Suite de Pâques (Easter Series), 1978. Chromolithograph on Arches paper, 22 × 29 9/10 in. (56 × 76 cm). Edition of 99.

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BOOK REVIEW: “Religion’s Understated Influence on Modern Art” by Daniel Larkin, on Spiritual Moderns: Twentieth-Century American Artists and Religion by Erika Doss: Challenging the presumed secularity of modern art, the new book Spiritual Moderns centers on four iconic American artists who were both modern and religious: Andy Warhol, Mark Tobey, Agnes Pelton, and Joseph Cornell.

+ ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION: Also responding to this publication: the Association of Scholars of Christianity in the History of Art (ASCHA) will be presenting a session at the College Art Association Annual Conference in Chicago on February 16 at 2:30 p.m. that will put four prominent scholars—Stephen S. Bush, Matthew J. Milliner, Robert Weinberg, and Gilbert Vicario—in dialogue with Doss to “explore the assumptions, motivations, and insights of [her] analysis, and consider a more open, inclusive, and diverse reading of American Modernism.”

Roundup: (Virtual) Arts conference, Psalm 129 jazz-hip-hop-folk fusion, and more

Victoria Emily Jones2 Comments

This year’s The Breath and the Clay creative arts gathering, on the theme of “Reenchantment,” is taking place March 17–21, with both in-person (in Winston-Salem, North Carolina) and virtual options. Registration for virtual attendees is pay-what-you-wish. Presenters include theologian Jeremy Begbie, poet Pádraig Ó Tuama, singer-songwriter Joy Ike, contemplative author Christine Valters Paintner, dancer Camille D.C. Sutton, and many more . . . including me! On the evening of March 18 I’ll be giving a twenty-minute talk titled “Saying Yes: The Annunciation in Contemporary Art,” which will be archived online afterward. (The global church celebrates the feast of the Annunciation the following week, on March 25.) (Update: Watch here.) Here’s the description:

The story of Jesus’s miraculous conception in the womb of Mary, a first-century Galilean peasant girl, told in Luke 1 has activated the imaginations of artists since the early Christian era. When an angelic messenger came and told Mary she had been chosen to bear God’s Son, she cycled through a range of emotions before ultimately accepting the call, stepping onto a path that, though scary, would be life-giving not only for her but also for her religious and ethnic community and for the whole world.

God invites us to participate in his work in the world and gives us the grace to do it. When his voice breaks through our safe, predictable routines, calling us to something big, do we respond with brave obedience? In this talk Victoria Emily Jones will share a handful of contemporary artworks that visualize that pivotal moment in salvation history when Mary said yes and set in motion the incarnation. These works show us the wild beauty of God’s plans and can help us tune our ears to the annunciations in our own lives.

(The title slide image is a detail of an Annunciation painting by Jyoti Sahi.)

I’m always impressed by the variety of artists, arts professionals, and art lovers that director Stephen Roach manages to bring together for The Breath and the Clay. Click here to learn more and to register.

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ONLINE LENT SERIES:

>> VCS Lent 2021: The Visual Commentary on Scripture is highlighting a different exhibition from its archives for each week of Lent, with new content including a video introduction to the week by Ben Quash and an audio reading of each of the three constituent commentaries.

The first week was on the theme of Covenant and covers Genesis 8:20–9:17. Stefania Gerevini curated three artworks from Italy that convey some aspect of the rainbow as divine promise: a thirteenth-century mosaic from the Basilica di San Marco in Venice, a colorful dome fresco (fifteenth century) from the Cappella Portinari in Milan, and a contemporary light installation by Dan Flavin at Santa Maria Annunciata in Chiesa Rossa, also in Milan.

Week 2, on Prophecy, explores the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53. Jonathan Koestlé-Cate comments on three modern artworks: Crucified Tree Form by Theyre Lee-Elliott, a crucifix by Germaine Richier (which sparked outrage when it was unveiled at Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce, Assy, in 1950), and an installation by postminimalist artist Anish Kapoor at the church of Saint Peter, Cologne.

>> “The Many Faces of Jesus”: I’ve been enjoying this Lenten series (on blog and podcast) by medievalist Dr. Grace Hamman, who makes medieval lit super accessible. “For Lent, Old Books With Grace will share and explore some medieval representations of Jesus in art and literature—the versions of Jesus that dominate the medieval church’s imagination. These medieval portrayals of Jesus may strike us as odd, threatening, charming, creative, stupid, or inspiring. In attending to these versions of Jesus, I hope for a few end goals: the first is that we may expand our Christian imagination. Perhaps a side of Jesus that has never occurred to you, or been sideswept by our contemporary culture, will suddenly illuminate an aspect of the Jesus of scripture. The second is that we may better identify the ways that we ourselves have culturally contained and portrayed Jesus, in positive and negative ways. Often the strangeness of the past helps us recognize the weird or damaging things we believe in order to make Jesus more palatable, understandable, or like us.”

Christ and his bride
Jean Bondol, “The bride (Ecclesia) and bridegroom (Christ),” from a Bible Historiale made in Paris, 1371–72. The Hague, MMW, 10 B 23, fol. 330v.

So far she has covered Jesus as judge, lover, and knight.

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RETUNED HYMNS:

>> “Up from My Youth (Psalm 129)” by Advent Birmingham, feat. CashBack and Terence June Gray: This is such a strange and compelling fusion! “An 1806 hymn by Isaac Watts meets hip-hop meets Johnny Cash meets folk meets New Orleans jazz meets industrial steel factory.”

Led by Zac Hicks, Advent Birmingham [previously] is a group of worship musicians from the Cathedral Church of the Advent in downtown Birmingham, Alabama. Hicks wrote this new tune for Isaac Watts’s metrical paraphrase of Psalm 129 and integrated a rap by guest artist Terence June Gray from Memphis. Singing lead (and playing drums) is Leif Bondarenko, the front man of the Johnny Cash tribute band CashBack. The video was filmed at Birmingham’s historic Sloss Furnaces. Available on iTunes, Amazon, and Spotify.

You can read the lyrics here, which include a slight revision of Watts’s verse 6.

>> “Thy Mercy, My God”: Words by John Stocker, 1776; music by Sandra McCracken, 2005; performed by Ellen Petersen Haygood (of The Petersens bluegrass band), 2018.

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POETRY READING: “Phase One” by Dilruba Ahmed, read, with commentary, by Pádraig Ó Tuama, Poetry Unbound: “What do you find hard to forgive in yourself? What might help? In this poem, the poet makes a list of all the things she holds against herself: opening fridge doors, fantasies, wilted seedlings, unkempt plants, lost bags, feeling awkward, treating someone poorly. Dilruba Ahmed repeats the line ‘I forgive you’ over and over, like a litany, in a hope to deepen what it means to be in the world, and be a person of love.”

Makers & Mystics (podcast recommendation)

Victoria Emily Jones1 Comment

Readers often ask me what podcasts I listen to, so today I want to share one of them with you, which comes out of my home state of North Carolina: Makers & Mystics.

Makers and Mystics logo

Hosted by Stephen Roach, Makers & Mystics is a biweekly podcast that aims to “develop a greater cultural understanding of why creativity abides at the core of our spirituality and why artists are called to be ‘architects of hope’ for our cities.” It is run by The Breath & the Clay, an organization based in Winston-Salem, which, in addition to producing regular online audio content, also hosts an annual conference and artist retreats. (Their 2019 conference already passed—you can purchase audio of all the presentations here—but two retreats are still being offered this year, in June and October; I just added them to my recent roundup, but you can also just go directly here for all the info.)

Now in its fifth season, Makers & Mystics features interviews with a broad swath of culture creators, many of whom are professional artists and Christians. Guests include an iconographer, an assemblage artist, an illusionist, a contemporary dancer, a classical pianist, an experimental opera singer, an antiquarian horologist, a filmmaker, an actress, a food writer and photographer, a spoken word artist, a children’s book illustrator and YA novelist, abstract painters, poets, a performance artist, a woven sculpture artist, several well-known singer-songwriters of faith (Liz Vice, Latifah Alattas, Audrey Assad, Josh Garrels, John Mark McMillan), and more, as well as pastors, theologians, and spiritual directors. These are people who pursue goodness, truth, and beauty in their work and in their lives. They are “makers”—people who make things, be they clocks or found-object sculptures or baskets or magic or “visual haiku”—and “mystics,” people who seek an intimate connection with God. Art, they recognize, can help strengthen that connection—not only to God but to self and to others and to the world at large.

Besides interviewing people from our own time, Roach and friends also highlight historical figures who have contributed to the practice or discourse of art, faith, and spirituality. These short (ten- to fifteen-minute) scripted episodes make up the Artist Profile Series. Spotlighted individuals include Hans Rookmaaker, Dorothy Sayers, Hildegard von Bingen, Wassily Kandinsky, and Sadhu Sundar Singh, among others.

The Breath and the Clay
The Breath & the Clay creative arts gathering is held in North Carolina every March.

I love to find out about the various creative endeavors that the people of God are engaged in, and Makers & Mystics is one of my primary avenues for doing that. I’m impressed by the wide variety of disciplines and styles that Roach has curated in his selection of interview subjects, and I appreciate the mix of fine and folk art (some people reject this distinction, but you know what I mean). Though there are recurring themes in some of the interviews—things like the importance of honesty and integrity, and how to live a life awake to wonder—I find each episode so unique. It’s fun to hear different people’s stories and creative processes.

If this is the first time you’re encountering Makers & Mystics, you might want to start with one of the foundational episodes, which do not follow an interview format:

The very first things we learn about God in Genesis, Roach says, is that he’s a creative being, and that he takes immense joy in the creative process. So when we’re told in Genesis 1:26 that humans are created in God’s image, Roach continues, our only concept of God up to this point is that he’s a creator who delights in creating. That’s why creativity is not ornamental but, rather, is in our blood; it’s our birthright as human beings.

“Lawgivers don’t shape culture,” says Ray Hughes. “Artists do. They’re the ones that tell us who we are. That’s why I say, songwriters: hey, you’re not writing next year’s most popular chorus; you’re writing the next generation’s language for accessing God.”

To sample some interview highlights from Makers & Mystics, check out the 2017 year-in-review episode. I’ve enjoyed all the episodes, but a few that have particularly stood out to me, in addition to the ones I list above, are “On Vocation and Calling” with Josh Garrels (+ part 2), one of my favorite music artists; “Evergreen” with Audrey Assad, where Audrey discusses overcoming religious trauma, dealing healthily with emotions, and her love of Celtic spirituality and music; and “Ring of Fire” with Moda Spira, which I linked to last fall, on the grief that accompanies divorce.

To explore the Makers & Mystics archives, hop on over to their website, http://www.makersandmystics.com/, and check them out on Patreon if you’re interested in giving financial support. You can also download episodes from iTunes, Spotify, or your favorite podcast-listening app.

Summer and fall conferences/retreats

Victoria Emily Jones3 Comments

Here is a list of upcoming arts conferences and retreats. I will be attending the CIVA conference next month as well as the DITA conference in September—if you’ll be at either, please let me know; I’d love to meet you!

All Things New (International Arts Festival)
Date: June 15, 2019
Location: Waterras Common Hall 3F, Tokyo, Japan
Cost: ￥2500 (about $22)
Presenters: Joshua Messick, Gerda Liebmann, Christopher Elmerick, Roger Lowther, and more
Organizer: Community Arts Tokyo (with additional sponsorship by Grace City Church Tokyo)
Description: “How can people in a city experience personal, social, and economic flourishing? What is the role of artists in making this world a better place? How can faith, work, and the arts come together for a holistic view of peace for the good of mankind? At this conference, we will hear from artists in the business world, the media world, and the plight of refugees from other countries. Their stories will give us a vision for how the arts point a way to new beginnings and bring goodness and hope into a broken world. Join us as we enter this world through speaker presentations, music performances, a short film, gallery exhibits, small group discussions, and more!” (Note: Presentations in Japanese will have simultaneous English translation over the wireless earphone system.)

Liebmann, Gerda_Salt of the Earth
At the “All Things New” festival next month, Thai artist Gerda Liebmann will be installing one of her “salt art” pieces.

The festival will include presentations/workshops/performances by

  • hammered dulcimer player Joshua Messick, who contributed to the soundtrack of the Japanese animated fantasy film Mary and the Witch’s Flower
  • visual artist Gerda Liebmann, on how art can foster relationship and connection
  • Christopher Elmerick, who founded and runs a cultural center in Berlin that promotes the free exchange of ideas through shared work- and performance spaces and more
  • Megumi Project, a group of women artisans who upcycle vintage kimonos into shawls, scarves, bags, journals, and other accessories
  • the Charis Chamber Players
  • organist Roger Lowther, on the physics of music

Roger Lowther is, with his wife Abi, the founder and director of Community Arts Tokyo, “a team of artists, professionals, and Japanese nationals assisting church planting through outreach, discipleship, worship, and disaster relief.” Their work is supported through Mission to the World, the international missions arm of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA).

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Are We There Yet?
Date: June 13–16, 2019
Location: Bethel University, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA
Cost: $350 for nonmembers; $300 for members
Presenters: Sedrick Huckaby, Letitia Huckaby, Hawona Sullivan Janzen, Chris Larson, Rico Gatson, Nate Young, Linnéa Spransy, Cara Megan Lewis, Rev. Babette Chatman, Jamie Bennett, Joanna Taft, Kelly Chatman, Joyce Lee, Caroline Kent, Lyz Wendland, Betsy Carpenter, Amanda Hamilton, Catherine Prescott, Vito Aiuto, and others
Organizer: Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA)
Description: “If you’re anything like us, working in an age of high anxiety and disruption has been trying. At the same time, the art world has never seen more diversity, wealth, interconnection, and popular appreciation. Some experience our current creative conditions as a ‘joyful noise,’ others a ‘resounding gong.’ This makes art difficult yet at the same time crucial. With our hope rooted in the Lord, we can rejoice in the unfinished state of our work. There is still so much to be made!

“Are We There Yet invites us to inhabit questions together: What are our shared pursuits? What practices and commitments can guide us in our work and collaboration? What would radical generosity do to the global art market? And how might we be participants in making ‘impossible things possible,’ as described by curator Hans Ulrich Obrist? With a commitment to hospitality, we will ask these questions and many more.”

Sedrick Huckaby
At Valley House Gallery in Dallas, Sedrick Huckaby stands in front of portraits he painted of his children, his wife Letitia, and himself. Sedrick and Letitia are two of the keynote speakers for CIVA’s 2019 Biennial Conference. Photo: Dane Walters/Kera News.

The conference will consist of plenary talks, panel discussions, and breakout sessions and will include a juried art show, late-night artist show & tells, optional day-ahead tours (art museums, city architecture, or sculpture garden) or workshops (printmaking or photography), a Liz Vice concert, and an ecumenical worship service.

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Visual Arts Retreat
Date: June 21–23, 2019
Location: Apple Hill Lodge, Moravian Falls, North Carolina, USA
Cost: $450 (includes lodging, food, and class materials)
Presenters: Allison Luce, Corey Frey, Ty Nathan Clark (via satellite), Stephen Roach, Thomas Torrey, Lauren Olinger
Organizer: The Breath & the Clay
Description: “Come get away for a weekend designed to inspire and deepen your understanding of visual art both as a spiritual practice and as an art form.”

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Vocation, Motherhood, and Artmaking
Date: July 25–28, 2019
Location: Laity Lodge, Leakey, Texas, USA
Cost: $495 (scholarships available)
Presenters: Andi Ashworth, W. David O. Taylor, Letitia Huckaby, Phaedra Taylor, Sandra McCracken, Ashley Cleveland
Organizer: Laity Lodge
Description: “This retreat is an invitation to explore the opportunities and challenges that are involved in the twin calling to motherhood and artmaking. It is open to mothers in all stations and circumstances of life, whether at the beginning of motherhood or in the fullest years of grandmothering, and to artists of all media, disciplines and contexts.” (Read more from David Taylor.)

Taylor, Phaedra_The Book of Games
Phaedra Taylor (American), The Book of Games: Oranges & Lemons, 2018. Encaustic on wood panel, 20 × 30 in.

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Kingdom Creatives Con
Date: August 3, 2019
Location: National Union Building, Washington, DC
Cost: $99
Presenters: Noah Elias, Othello Banaci, Rachel Petrillo, Anifa Mvuemba, John David Harris, Ryan Han, Andrew Hochradel
Organizer: Bemnet Yemesgen
Description: A conference “aimed at igniting inspiration, learning, and networking in the Christian creative community. . . . Attendees will enjoy workshops and talks by creatives from diverse backgrounds and industries. The conference is specifically tailored towards creatives who love Jesus Christ . . . graphic designers, illustrators, photographers, filmmakers, developers, animators, copywriters,” etc.

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New York City Arts Weekend
Date: August 9–10, 2019
Location: Various venues, New York, USA
Cost: $295 CAN
Presenters: Makoto Fujimura, Iwan Russell-Jones
Organizer: Regent College (host: Jeff Greenman)
Description: “Makoto Fujimura and Iwan Russell-Jones lead this exploration of Christian faith and the visual arts in New York City. Enjoy a fascinating tour of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and participate in shared meals, stimulating presentations, and challenging conversations. Develop a deeper understanding of how creativity finds its place in the new creation.”

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Creation and New Creation: Discerning the Future of Theology and the Arts
Date: September 5–8, 2019
Location: Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
Cost: $175 (student discounts available)
Presenters: Jeremy Begbie, Malcolm Guite, Christian Wiman, N. T. Wright, Natalie Carnes, Jennifer Craft, Carlos Colón, Steve Prince, Bruce Herman, Judith Wolfe, and others
Organizer: Duke Initiatives in Theology and the Arts (DITA)
Description: “At DITA10, we will celebrate past scholarship, reflect on today’s landscape, and imagine with tomorrow’s leaders.” The colloquium will include keynote lectures; workshops for church leaders and artists addressing the challenges of theology and the arts in the church and in our daily lives; panel discussions with artists and theologians; a concert by the New Caritas Orchestra; and a corporate worship service.

Herman, Bruce_Riven Tree
Bruce Herman (American, 1953–), Riven Tree, 2016. Oil on wood panels with gold, silver, and platinum leaf, 96 × 47 in. York Chapel, Duke Divinity School, Durham, North Carolina. [see “making of” video] [see in situ photo]

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The Future of the Catholic Literary Tradition (Catholic Imagination Conference)
Date: September 19–21, 2019
Location: Loyola University Chicago, USA
Cost: $150
Presenters: Tobias Wolff, Alice McDermott, Paul Schrader, Dana Gioia, Paul Mariani, Richard Rodriguez, Angela Alaimo O’Donnell, and others
Organizer: Hank Center for the Catholic Intellectual Heritage
Description: “This international biennial conference, sponsored by Loyola’s Hank Center, features over 60 writers, poets, filmmakers, playwrights, journalists, editors, publishers, students, and critics who will explore a variety of questions surrounding the Catholic imagination in literature and the arts. What is the future of the Catholic literary tradition? What is the state of discourses in faith and Christian humanism in a world increasingly described as ‘Post’—postmodern, post-human, post-Christian, post-religious? How is Catholic thought and practice (or the absence of it) represented in literature, poetry, and cinema? If, as David Tracy observes, religion’s ‘closest cousin is not rigid logic, but art,’ what might literary art be trying to communicate to its ‘cousin’—and to us all—as we travel along the first decades of the 21st century?”

The call for papers is still open, until June 15. Also check out some of the special events being offered, which will include a theatrical performance of Flannery O’Connor’s Everything That Rises Must Converge and an evening of poetry readings, live music, and a Chicago blues panel.

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Writer’s Retreat
Date: October 25–27, 2019
Location: Apple Hill Lodge, Moravian Falls, North Carolina, USA
Cost: $450 (includes lodging and food)
Presenters: TBA
Organizer: The Breath & the Clay
Description: “Come get away for a weekend designed to develop your writing both as a spiritual practice and as an art form.”

Apple Hill Lodge

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The Art of the Lost: Destruction, Reconstruction, and Change
Date: November 27–29, 2019
Location: Canterbury Cathedral, England
Cost: £175 for full conference (single-day tickets also available)
Presenters: Sandy Nairne, Simon Cane, James Clark, Ascensión Hernández Martínez, Emma J. Wells, and others
Organizer: Canterbury Cathedral
Description: “This conference will explore and appraise current and developing studies of how art changes, is reused or repurposed, disappears or is rediscovered. It will look at how and why art is defaced, destroyed or is lost within architectural settings, with a particular focus on art within the context of cathedrals, churches or other places of worship. It will consider changing ideologies, iconoclasm, war, fashion and symbolism. It will cover art from the 6th century to the modern day.”

Art of the Lost (Canterbury Cathedral)