Back to Bonita Springs: The Nativity

It's (almost) February, so it must be Florida! Time to return to friends at St. Mary's in Bonita Springs and our annual iconography workshop. This year we will spend the week praying and writing another icon of a significant story of Mary's life: The Nativity. This is the "draft" icon, written in anticipation of the class as a model based on a traditional icon. Tune in over the week as I post images from the class, and examples of the students' work.

The Angelus will be our prayer for the week...

The Angelus

The Angel of the Lord declared to Mary:
And she conceived of the Holy Spirit.
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
Behold the handmaid of the Lord: Be it done unto me according to Thy word.
Hail Mary . . .
And the Word was made Flesh: And dwelt among us.
Hail Mary . . .

Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God, that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

Let us pray:
Pour forth, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy grace into our hearts; that we, to whom the incarnation of Christ, Thy Son, was made known by the message of an angel, may by His Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of His Resurrection, through the same Christ Our Lord.
Amen.

The Venerable Bede

This icon of the Venerable Bede was a commission as a birthday gift for a colleague's partner. Some of the coolest icons I've done in the last years have been due to this friendship-- I am so grateful for the friendship and the adventures in iconography! Most of what we know about the early years of Christianity in British Isles we know because of the Venerable Bede. More information about his life and ministry may be found here.

The Rev. Florence Li Tim Oi

This icon of the Rev. Florence Li Tim Oi was commissioned by the graduating class of Yale Divinity's Berkley School of Theology as their present to the school. Writing this icon for them was a tremendous honor-- and a great and inspiring challenge. Florence herself was challenging, because we actually do know what she looked like-- so letting go of the temptation to try to paint a portrait (not going to happen!) and to let the icon be itself was a great bit of spiritual work. The hillside with the fog and the waves below were just plain fun. More about Florence, her life and ministry may be found here.

The Visitation, Iconographers

St. Mary's Episcopal Church Iconographers. Bonita Springs, FL. Feb. 2009
L-R: Sally Watts, Dianne Rowe, Jim Fox, Marcia Hardy, Sally Sites, Joan Warren, Babette Brenton, Pastor Gail Tomei. Absent: Helen Mallon, Bill Kingsley

The Visitation Day 5

What a remarkable week!

Thank you to my group of wonderful iconographers for your faithful engaging of this process. The pictures below were taken right after the icons were varnished, and so the reflection of the flash is rather bright and unfortunate. I hope that we'll have pictures from Sunday's blessing of the icons at St. Mary's.

The Visitation Day 4

Today we painted faces, using thin layers of paint to gradually add light to the icon. The movement of darkness into light is part of the powerful symbolism in icon writing.




The first highlight in "Second Flesh"




The second highlight in slightly shorter strokes, nearer the eyes and center of the face, in Second Flesh and a small amount of yellow light-warm white mix.




The third highlight in shorter strokes still, building cheek bones and facial structure.



And then the "enliveners" that place points of light at the brightest places on the face: above the eyebrows, eyelashes and the corners of the eyes, the cheekbones, down the center of the nose and nostrils, the filtrum (aka sniffle ridge) and chin.



Then the eyes are outlined and highlighted, and the face is outlined in the olive green Sankir (first flesh) plus a small amount of a dark brown paint called "Hair."

The Visitation Day 3

This is Helen, who takes very good care of us and makes sure we never go hungry!

Helen in the Kitchen, where she spends almost as much time as she does writing icons!


It was a good day of icon writing. Drapery and details were the work of the day, and reading the passage from Luke upon which this icon is based. Tomorrow, faces! And the story of the birth of John the Baptist...

And now some pictures of the day. I apologize for these not having names attached to each and that not all the icons are here (one was having its back painted...). These iconographers are working and praying hard, and it shows in their beautiful work... (as an aside, they wanted to be sure a picture of me was included...)