A time of sabbath for those in ministry

photo © ghost ranch

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Ghost Ranch has a long tradition of supporting those in ministry with rich respite and continuing education. In 2013, we will dedicate two special weeks to helping support those in all fields of ministry (ordained and lay).

Heaven of the Heart: Creating a Space for Sacred Imagination
What connects our spirituality, creativity, and living out our vocation? How might an intentional engagement with our creativity and our spirituality increase our ability to lead and live as people of faith? In this workshop you will push back the boundaries of familiar distractions and enter a Sabbath time in which to explore the intersection between creativity, spirituality and creative leadership. Using hands-on exercises, personal reflection and imagination, see how your creativity can form sacred community.

Join us at Ghost Ranch for our workshop Heaven of the Heart: Creating a Space for Sacred Imagination October 14–18, 2013. Ghost Ranch is situated on 21,000 acres located in northern New Mexico, stands proud as an ecumenical and interfaith education and retreat center of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). For more than half a century people have come for spiritual development, to discuss issues of peace and justice, to work together in creation care, to paint and write, to hike and ride horseback, to research rich and globally renowned archeological and fossil quarries, to see where Georgia O’Keeffe painted or simply to rest and renew their spirits. For more about our workshop or to register click on Heaven of the Heart. Hope to see you.

Summer 2013 at Ghost Ranch

photo © ghost ranch

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Join us at Ghost Ranch for our workshop Beyond Words: The Color of Prayer July 1–7, 2013. Ghost Ranch is situated on 21,000 acres located in northern New Mexico, stands proud as an ecumenical and interfaith education and retreat center of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). For more than half a century people have come for spiritual development, to discuss issues of peace and justice, to work together in creation care, to paint and write, to hike and ride horseback, to research rich and globally renowned archeological and fossil quarries, to see where Georgia O’Keeffe painted or simply to rest and renew their spirits. For more about our workshop or to register click on Beyond Words: The Color of Prayer. Hope to see you.

Beyond Words: The Color of Prayer. Too often we rely only on words, which have limits. Using art as prayer we are invited to explore the mystery and revelation of God from a place where there are no words. How might an intentional engagement with our imagination and our spirituality lead us to see the divine in (and connect with) one another? By gathering a group of all ages and engaging its collective wisdom, we will seek to inspire one another in prayer and art to make a visible sign of invisible grace.

Creativity for the healing of the nations.

Healing of the Nations © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR STUDIO:

We recently completed a body of work for the new Skainos Chapel in East Belfast, Northern Ireland. Thirteen in total, our prayer paintings are reflections on the writings of Genesis and the book of Revelation. This particular piece called Healing of the Nations is a reflection on Rev. 22:2, and the leaves of the trees are for the healing of the nations. Working in the studio on our painted prayers paralleled the US elections. With words and images of anger, power grabs and venomous attacks, people of power added their ingredients and stirred up an unhealthy pot of hatred and grinding away at our very souls.  Post election calls for revolution and revenge are a result of months of divisive language. We hope that we are not as divided and cynical as it seems. It was timely for us to be reflecting on healing.

Our reflections for healing are delicate and spiritual at best, perhaps like peace itself. Our process of painting together gives us a feeling that life is being generated when we turn towards one another. Drawing close to the vine gives us life, while separating isolates and stirs more despair and destruction. Creation is happening and is constantly evolving, as one-friend states it’s a verb.

Creativity and the act of creating opens a space where the possibility for a transcendent experience can take place. This is what creativity does. It is a circle, a circle of creativity and wholeness that opens a dialogue between the divine, the viewer and us. And many people know, from their experience either in giving birth to the creativity in them or to receiving it from others, that these become some of our most profound mystical experiences. When we are open to one another and connect our relationship to our creator, we will travel the rapids of creativity together on a raft over which we have no control. We’re being borne along by the power of the Holy Spirit, trusting in this process of renewal.

In the thirteenth century, St. Thomas Aquinas said, that the same spirit that hovered over the waters at the beginning of creation hovers over the mind of the artist at work. The work of creation, whether it happened six thousand years ago or 13.7 billion years ago is still going on today. Creation is continuous and we as humans, gifted with creativity, have a role in carrying this great work forward. We are also radically dangerous for this same reason as we carry within us this divine power of creativity.

When we imagine healing between us, and all nations, we see art as a visual language that helps transform divergence into dialogue. Art and creativity can empower us so that what was separate becomes whole, what was severed becomes healed, what was difference can become welcomed diversity. Perhaps moving us closer to the healing of nations.

Painting as Prayer

Holden Village Vesper Service. Photo © Lisa Thompson

FROM OUR TRAVELS:

Painting as Prayer by 
Chuck Hoffman + Peg Carlson–Hoffman
Holden Village Vesper Service
Holden Village Voice 
24 August 2012

How many of you consider yourself an artist? Generally if I ask a Kindergarten class, “How many of you are artists?” nearly every hand waves enthusiastically in the air. By third grade, half the class and by sixth grade, maybe just a handful.

What happens to us? How do we lose our sense of creativity? Do we begin to dismiss our need for inspired expression as we dissolve into the mainstream of cultural needs? Could we awaken our imaginations and see new possibilities in what appears to be fixed and framed ways of doing things? How could the arts enable us to risk new ways of existing with one another in our world?

The arts can help till the soil of our hearts. By opening the door to our imaginations, art can help reveal, heal and renew our spirits, our churches, our communities and our world. We need to risk coming together in our diversity, and re–imagine issues that divide us; the health of our planet and the ability to see our neighbor in the image of our creator, God.

The arts can provide a new lens to explore our faith and an understanding of our place in creation.

In one of our classes at Holden, a painting was created and placed on the altar with a belief that creativity is a gift from God and using that gift is an offering back to God. The process itself is a form of prayer, where time seems suspended and our thoughts connect with our feelings. Color, shape and form become our language.

The process involves having our group around the table.
• Each person has a single color of tempera paint, the paint we all used in our beginning days as young artists.
• We paint to music, but there is no talking during the process to get at the contemplative and prayerful nature of painting in this way.
• When the bell rings paint moves to the left and we move to the right. That way you have a new color to work with and you are now interacting with your neighbors painting.
• We move around the table working with one another’s ideas.
• We do this until we have covered the entire paper.

We created this together as a group. We each brought our individual expression to the table. Coming alongside our neighbors, we shaped a collective visual language. We forged ideas that allowed individual perspectives that are still evident in the painting. But the painting became a work that none of us could have created alone. In creating–we must become transparent. In this vulnerability new revelations about ourselves and those around us can be revealed.

The imagination is like a lantern that illuminates the inner landscape of our life and helps us to discover our hidden riches. The claiming and reclaiming who we are as persons created in God’s image, growing in the likeness of Christ to serve a hurting world, comes as we intentionally open ourselves to the movement of the Holy Spirit. By pushing back the boundaries of the familiar and being guided into areas of the unknown, we experience that which we did not know was in us – surprised by God! 

Prayerful beginnings

Twelve Tribes © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:

The artistic direction for our Skainos prayer paintings took into consideration the intimacy of the architectural form created for this sacred space. The size and treatment of the painting surface and color were created to give a sense of prayerful intimacy. Each piece of our art began with our own prayers penciled onto the raw canvas. Beneath our many layers of paint, the prayers began a dialogue with the Divine, blessing and invocation calling the viewer into a glimpse of the mystery of God’s intimacy, love and grace. We offer our paintings as a visual pathway to prayer and contemplation.

Skainos: Where life abounds

Living Waters © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:

We recently completed and delivered our series of painted prayers for the Skainos Project and the East Belfast Mission in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Our inspiration is grounded in the writings of Glenn Jordan of Skainos titled, The City of God in the Here and Now; the re–imagining of a sacred community in East Belfast that birthed Skainos. Its many mystical references to imagining, thin places, creativity, transformation, garden paradise and renewal conjured portals to the divine and of a space where we find walls soaked with stories.

The mystical references drew us to the creation story and garden paradise narratives of Genesis, seeing God as creativity. We were also inspired by John’s proclamation in his Book of Revelation of a new vision and imagining of the heavenly city breaking into this world. The thread that connects these stories is love. We have the living waters of Christ found in the Gospel of John and the love poems of Solomon. In John 7:37–38, Jesus refers to himself as the living waters of all creation. John writes, “On the final and climactic day of the Feast, Jesus took his stand. He cried out, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Rivers of living water will brim and spill out of the depths of anyone who believes in me this way, just as the Scripture says."  And in Song of Sol 4:15 “Thou art a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and flowing streams from Lebanon.”  We have worked with both of these texts for inspiration and the central element for the larger painting. Water is a vital component to East Belfast, (meaning river mouth) and creations element that allows life to abound both physically and spiritually.

The Song of Songs, are the sacred and sensual love poems of Solomon. We see these love songs as figurative in how they speak to the great mysteries of God’s shared intimacy with us, where we’re witness to love, and also to love’s response. Beauty and sanctity in human love becomes a reflection back of God’s Divine love for us. Embedded within Solomon’s words, we find the One who most intimately holds our hearts and binds us to one another.

Where the water flows

Watching the water flow © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR TRAVELS:

Two weeks in the mountains at Holden Village offered us a time for connection with new friends and a time for silence and contemplation. We facilitated our workshop, Heaven of the Heart: Creating a Space for Sacred Imagination and found time to hike into the mountains with sketchbooks and watercolors. This sacred space offered us an opportunity to create within this beautifully rugged creation. It changed our lens for seeing and hearts that opened us to wonder of God’s creation, both in the mountain lakes and the people we shared meals, art and conversation. What a blessing!

Transformation by water

On Lake Chelan to Holden Village © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR TRAVELS:

We have never been to Holden Village, deep in the Cascade Mountains of Washington. You can only get to the Village by mountainous trails or by boat, it’s that secluded from the world. While we have heard many stories over the years about its transformative nature, we have never experienced Holden first hand, until now. Our excursion began at Fields Point and arrived at the boat dock in Lucerne some two and half hours later. It became a spiritual journey as we shed our world that so desperately wanted to continue to claim us and transported us by the mystical realm of water. As our boat docked, we were greeted by a driver and a yellow bus to take us up the switch backs the remaining 14 miles into the Village. We arrived to strangers clapping a warm welcome to each of us. We gathered our bags and found our new home atop the road in a chalet that overlooked the Village and the mountains that surrounded us. We had arrived someplace amazingly special. 

Working from the Chaos

Whether at work in our studio or in our workshops,
we explore and allow the chaos to give rise to transformation.
Photo © Heidi Hoffman Photography

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Our work is the result of collaboration. We go beyond the conceptual sense, to include working together on the same canvas. We paint at the same time, forging ideas together that neither of us could create alone. We experience this as both visual and verbal communication. When we begin our conversation in paint, it is important to let each of our voices be heard, allowing expression of our unique perspectives. Chaos seems to be necessary to get to the deeper order that unifies our work. Because we know that ideas usually don’t move in a straight line, we make intentional space for a more organic and flowing nature to take hold. Sometimes it takes courage, faith and time to allow ourselves to be transformed by the process. We have found that our usual rushed and me focused behavior finally gives way to the quiet gift of being together. We bring this process into our workshops where we create paintings in large groups, much the same way we create our own work.

In life, and in conversation, things can get messy. The visual language of color and shape, helps us think about larger issues together. Perhaps it is because most of this conversation takes place on the visual right side of our brains, rather than the verbal side. When we look at our results, we see evidence of our individuality, as well as the presence of a third dimension–the spiritual. We are always surprised by what we have painted and discovered together and what we find in common. It is what we call Painting as Prayer.

Heaven of the Heart

Painting as Prayer at Ghost Ranch in the high desert of 
New Mexico © Genesis+Art Studio 

FROM OUR TRAVELS:

Ghost Ranch in Abiquiu, New Mexico offered us a thin place for art and the spirit. This space invited us into a time of art and prayer where we could share conversation, both visually and verbally, around our humanity and the divine. The sharing of our creativity, caring and open hearts helped us make our way through the week. The week helped me to be hopeful. I wonder about what becomes available to us when we meet each other as fully human and when we do, believe that we actually see the divine shining through our humanity. A hopeful future is possible, as this dynamic group illustrated for me. We can only get where we are going with each other and that seems possible by giving space to our precious human goodness. 

Painting as prayer in East Belfast

© Genesis+Art Studio photo by Heidi Hoffman

FROM OUR STUDIO:


We try to create a space for both the physical and spiritual aspects of our art making. We have a studio where we have a physical space in which to create or at least attempt to create. But perhaps a greater challenge is to create a spiritual space in which we can be truly present and mindful to one another and to the creative process. Peg and I work together on the same canvas at the same time, forging ideas together that neither of us would create alone. We experience this as both visual and verbal communication and believe that it takes courage, faith and time within this space to be transformed by the process. We believe we have to allow chaos early on in order to get to the deeper order that unifies. Our rushed and thoughtless behaviors give way to the quiet gift of being together.


We bring this process into the workshop setting as well, where we create paintings in large groups. As with our own work, these workshop settings involve prayer, silence and visual conversation. The visual language of color and shape facilitate thinking together and, as in all life, it can get messy. But out of the mess can come transformation. In life, as in conversation, ideas don’t move in a straight line. Idea development is organic and flowing in nature. When we begin our conversation it is important to let each of our voices be heard, allowing individuals to express unique perspectives. Arising from this conversation is a third element: the spiritual. At this stage, we begin to uncover the collective wisdom revealed from the depths of the painting. If we are willing to listen, be curious and respectful about the possibilities that come from these diverse voices, unification can rise from the chaos. We are always surprised by what we discover, what we hold in common through this process we call Painting as Prayer. 

Do we really need art?

© Genesis+Art Studio photo by Heidi Hoffman  

FROM OUR STUDIO:

It’s been a few weeks since returning from East Belfast and the completion of our mural project. I’m still excited by this work and the people it touched along the way. I believe art has the ability to connect us on a creative and spiritual level and in the process has the potential to transform us.

We began the project with the folks at East Belfast Mission. They worked with the East Belfast Partnership to secure a site for the mural, through Translink in Belfast. Those connections brought us in contact with the Ballymac Community, the site of the mural, who’s community members participated in painting the mural. That took place on the east side of the pond. Before the actual painting could take place, our studio began the design process back here in Kansas City. We mentored and guided four design students from the University of Kansas: Amanda, Jared, Lauren and Samantha. They invested five months working in our studio on the design and presentation of mural ideas, followed by two weeks the two week adventure in East Belfast. Daughter Heidi helped us both with the painting and with capturing the story in photography.

I’m proud of our group of designers and feel privileged to have had the opportunity to work with the folks in the Ballymac. We will be sharing more of our story in the weeks ahead. We hope to illustrate with word and image how works of the heart help to create and to transform communities.

Presbyterian Church of Ireland

photo © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR TRAVELS:

We recently facilitated our workshop Heaven of the Heart at the Ballygilbert Presbyterian Church in Bangor, Northern Ireland. Twenty four artists from all over Northern Ireland gathered for a day of creative, artistic and spiritual exploration. We concluded our time together by offering painted prayers on the World Canvas. The workshop was sponsored by the Presbyterian Church of Ireland and displayed our work at the General Assembly being held in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Transformation

Photo © East Belfast Partnership

FROM OUR STUDIO:

We have been busy in our studio the past several months designing a mural that will find its home in East Belfast, Northern Ireland. Amanda Kilwin, Jared Bergeron, Lauren Maibach and Samantha Fine, all recent graduates in design from the University of Kansas worked with us in our studio. We traveled to Northern Ireland for two weeks to complete the project by painting the mural with the Ballymac Community Group and the East Belfast Partnership. The mural is located in the subway at the Titanic Quarter Train Station in East Belfast. To see more go to With Growth Comes Transformation.

Join our workshop at Ghost Ranch

Photo © Ghost Ranch

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Join us at Ghost Ranch for our workshop Heaven of the Heart: Creating a Space for Sacred Imagination June 25–July 1. Ghost Ranch is situated on 21,000 acres located in northern New Mexico, stands proud as an ecumenical and interfaith education and retreat center of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). For more than half a century people have come for spiritual development, to discuss issues of peace and justice, to work together in creation care, to paint and write, to hike and ride horseback, to research rich and globally renowned archeological and fossil quarries, to see where Georgia O’Keeffe painted or simply to rest and renew their spirits. For more about our workshop or to register click on Heaven of the Heart. Hope to see you.

Heaven Of The Heart: Creating A Space For Sacred Imagination
What connects our spirituality, creativity and living out our vocation? How might an intentional engagement with our creativity and our spirituality increase our ability to live as people of faith? In this workshop you will push back the boundaries of familiar distractions and enter a Sabbath time in which to explore the intersection between creativity and spirituality. Using hands-on exercises, personal reflection and imagination see how your creativity can form sacred community.

Art of prayer

© Chuck Hoffman / Genesis + Art Studio

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:

Rain waters the earth, making it bring forth and sprout…. The whole creation is groaning in travail… A sower went out to sow. We are reminded that prayer is not a lifestyle option, or a mechanical technique, but something natural to all creatures, like breathing out and breathing in, like metabolizing our food, like the process of growth which we achieve without knowing how we do it. In moments of crisis, when we feel ourselves on the edge of existence, we reach out to our creator. We do not engineer our growth – in the body or the spirit – but allow God to make us fertile.

Crossing the Frontier

Crossing the Frontier © 2012 Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:

We have been experiencing genuine and dramatic changes. These tectonic life-shifts have put us on a journey across unfamiliar thresholds to deal with many emotions and new experiences. At times these changes have dragged us into view of the very things we'd tried hard to avoid. We offer our art as an expression of our spiritual practice that explores the healing potential of shape, color and form. By exploring universal themes of life and death, nature and earth, conflict and the redemptive power of love, Crossing the Frontier is a trek into the heart of wisdom and transformation. Without seeing ourselves as we are, we can never see ourselves as we are meant to be.

Finding the meaning

The Prodigal Son Journal © 2010 Chuck Hofman / Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:
The Prodigal Son Journal 48 x 108 Charcoal, gauche, mixed media  2010
Created for The Jerry Evenrud Prodigal Son Collection 
Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota 

Journal reflections from 9 September, 2009. As I began this year long journey with the Prodigal Son I hope to walk in his shoes of loneliness, despair and joy upon his turning back. I will draw from my own life experiences, my feelings and senses, as a father, brother and son. There are markers in my life where creating distance from God through my actions or inaction has left me in despair and darkness. Grace in the light of Christ erases my darkness and awakens me to a new beginning. It reminds me of the story about the person who chased the setting sun for fear of darkness, wisdom turned them around to run through the dark in hope, to greet the rising sun. 

The Prodigal Father

The Prodigal Father © 2012 Genesis+Art Studio

The Prodigal Father 

30 x 108 Acrylic 

The Jerry Evenrud Prodigal Son Collection 

Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota


FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:
As I turned the story of the Prodigal Son over and over in my head, I began to look at this parable through the eyes of all the family members. I tried to see the perspective as a father, an oldest child and a wayward son, fusing these thoughts with feelings from my own life experiences. I also looked at the definition of prodigal; wasteful on a lavish scale, being one of the meanings for the word. The title of the story tends to direct my focus on the wasteful younger son. But I was drawn to see a parable of a prodigal father; after all, the father knowingly wastes a portion of his wealth giving it to his son. The father must have recognized that his son lacked a sense of direction and was destined to a path that would lead him far from himself and the wisdom he shared. Or perhaps it was the father’s prodigal love that didn’t refuse the request for the early inheritance. The father could have kept his wayward son at home by denying his demand, but releases him into the storms of the world waiting on the road until he sees him again. By our world standards the father seemingly has wasted his time and his resources. The father, who lets the son depart, does not let go of the relationship between them. He waits with his pain and loss, constantly lifting his gaze on the distant landscape until he catches sight of his returning son. It tells me of a heart that was with his son throughout his journey and remained steadfast in his love. Keeping his son in his heart, the father is able to open his arms, exposing his heart and lavishing him with abundant love. Something extraordinarily unexpected happens at the intersection of their embrace.
 

Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom

Rocks of Giants Causeway Photo © Chuck Hoffman / Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:

We have been in our studio working on a painting around the theme of gratitude. It required me to reflect on the virtue of gratitude as a spiritual practice, which brought me to the teaching of John O'Donohue. I have been reflecting on his wisdom and writings for many years and find a newness to his words each time. I discovered this once again as I explored the nature of gratitude.


You have traveled too fast over false ground;
Now your soul has come to take you back.

Take refuge in your senses, open up
To all the small miracles you rushed through.

Become inclined to watch the way of rain
When it falls slow and free.

Imitate the habit of twilight,
Taking time to open the well of color
That fostered the brightness of day.

Draw alongside the silence of stone
Until its calmness can claim you.

― John O'Donohue

Keeping us mindful of God’s abiding presence

Photo © St. Paul's Monastery

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Our work has been selected to be part of the exhibition Seeing God: A Juried Exhibit of Sacred Art. The exhibition will be up during February at the Benedictine Retreat Center on the campus of St. Paul’s Monastery, St. Paul, Minnesota. We are honored to be part of this art show as the Benedictine community works to sustain and expand the spiritual imagination and deepen a sense of awe. From their call for artists, “Over the centuries, Benedictines have encouraged women and men who use color, form, sound, and word to express the beauty one experiences in the encounter with God’s own creativity. Their "sacred art" contributes to keeping us mindful of God’s abiding presence. This exhibit features contemporary artists who work in that spirit.”

Seeing God: A Juried Exhibit of Sacred Art
1–29 February, 2012  9–5:00pm daily
Benedictine Retreat Center, St. Paul’s Monastery
2675 Benet Road, St. Paul
651.777.8181

The spirit of artistic creation

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Join us at Ghost Ranch for our workshop Heaven of the Heart: Creating a Space for Sacred Imagination June 25–July 1. Ghost Ranch is situated on 21,000 acres located in northern New Mexico, stands proud as an ecumenical and interfaith education and retreat center of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). For more than half a century people have come for spiritual development, to discuss issues of peace and justice, to work together in creation care, to paint and write, to hike and ride horseback,
to research rich and globally renowned archeological and fossil quarries, to see where Georgia O’Keeffe painted or simply to rest and renew their spirits. For more about our workshop or to register click on Heaven of the Heart. Hope to see you.

Summer in the Washington Cascades

   FROM OUR STUDIO: 

Consider joining us this summer at Holden Village in Chelan, Washington. Holden Village is in an isolated mountain retreat center in the Washington Cascades. Holden is a place to come and celebrate Life, Community, and Renewal. We will be on the teaching staff facilitating our art workshops from August 11–25. For more information check out this short film that captures a few days of village life or go to their web site by clicking Holden Village. Hope to see you.