Acton University - Four Days of Classes on the Free Economy

Explore the intellectual basis of the free economy; discover why this cannot be separated from a culture of beauty and Catholic social teaching if we want a society that promotes the flourishing of the human person. Once again, I am going to encourage everybody to think about attending 'Acton University' . This is a residential course that takes place in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The dates are June 17-20.

The Acton Institute is an organisation devoted to the promotion of a free and virtuous society. Each person attending must sign up for a an integrated series of lectures so that each builds on the last. It is cleverly worked out so that the first lecture you choose restricts your choice for the second and so on.  It can be repeated year after year, so that each time you go you deepen your knowledge and understanding of the Free Economy. The Free Economy was defined by John Paul II  'an economic system which recognizes the fundamental and positive role of business, the market, private property and the resulting responsibility for the means of production, as well as free human creativity in the economic sector'. This is the form of capitalism that he affirmed as being consistent with the Catholic social teaching and the Catholic understanding of freedom. He went as far as saying that this is the economic system also that is the 'the model which ought to be proposed to the countries of the Third World which are searching for the path to true economic and civil progress'. (both quotes are from Centesimus Annus, 42)

Acton itself is ecumenical, but it is carefully designed so that as a Catholic I can choose courses that focus on Catholic social teaching or are consistent with it. As well as obvious courses such as a basic introduction to economics, they insist that everybody attends a class, for exampe, on Christian anthropology (brilliantly taught by Sam Gregg) and offer elective topics such as the theology of Benedict XVI, public policy, globalization, and the environment. What impressed me is that far from being the detached libertarians unconcerned with morality that some had portrayed them as, they were all profoundly interested in the poor and the foundations of a good and moral society. Furthermore, and again this goes against the way they were characterised, they were extremely interested in promoting a culture of beauty and seeing how this was connected to a free economy.

As this blog is about beauty and culture - I want to recommend to readers particular two lecturers who are at Acton again and address directly the connection between the economy and the culture: Michael Matheson Miller and Dr Jonathan Witt who are on the Acton permanent staff. As is true of all lectures at Acton U, their talks are accessible and entertaining, and each offered great insights into what forms culture.  I would recommend the classes of both lecturers very strongly. Dr Witt's focus on culture, in the lecture I saw last year, was on literary forms  and how it these reflects the worldview of the author. He has co-written an interesting book about science and culture called A Meaningful World. Many who criticise free market economics assume that those who advocate capitalism and the free economy are indifferent to cultural questions. This is certainly not true of those at Acton, the message that I took from my experience is that not only are they interested, but also that they see the existence of a culture of beauty is an essential aspect of a truly prosperous society.

Another highlight for me last year was the lecturer by Andreas Widmer who is director of the Entrepeneurship programs at the Business and Economics dept of Catholic University of America. His insights into how creativity and virtue meet in business are fascinating.

I want also to mention something that touched me personally when I attended last year. My wife is Venezuelan and through her I have become aware of how freedom has steadily become more and more restricted there; and how this has lead to a stifling of prosperity and a degrading of the culture. Since I came to realise this, it has been surprising to me how little of this people are aware of this in the West. It was gratifying to hear Fr Robert Sirico, the founder of Acton talk of Venezuela in his inaugural address and subsequently to meet a group of young people from Venezuela who wish to work towards greater freedom in this beautiful country. http://youtu.be/2Vc3mymrpSY

Greenwich Village, New York City

Here are some photos of Greenwich Village in Manhatten. I took the photos when I went to NYC to give a talk before Christmas. What is interesting is how all the buildings shown incorporate traditional proportion. Usually this is reflected in different sized windows as you go up the building, with the smallest at the top. Proportion reflects the natural harmony of music in which combinations of threes predominate. So, even if there are far more floors than three, the architects have grouped together the floors into three sections, with a large ground floor, then a string of floors that are the same size, but smaller than the first, and then the top floor or floors smallest. Using decorative features, the architect connects each section visually. This usually means that in multistorey buildings, the middle section is the largest. Then when one views the building from a distance, these three sections (each subdivided) obey the rules of traditional proportion. Much of NYC, even the great skyscrapers built before the second world war, follows this traditional proportion and it is one of the reasons that I love to visit. I also like the fact that these are lived in and worked in buildings. If I was going to point an architect to how a city can be elegant and have all the ordinary activities of city life going on, I would be as inclined to point people here, rather than to the centre of any European city that has become a preserved museum of gift shops and cafes only.

While I was here I was staying at the Dominican church, St Joseph's (below, where I was very well looked after by the friars!). Here is the exterior of their church with its Palladian facade. This part of NYC shows how using proportion allows for a tremendous variety in design. They all sit happily together because they participate in the same standard - which is the beauty of the cosmos, and which ultimately points to the same invisible standard, the beauty of heaven. So we can say, perhaps, that Jerusalem was builded here, amongst these city houses and offices.

A Practical Guide to Praying in Home - A New Book Coming in April

Making the family the powerhouse for cultural change by making the liturgy the central pillar of prayer. 

This is one of the projects I have been working on over the past year. I have co-written a book called The Little Oratory - A Beginners Guide to Family Prayer , which will be published in April by Sophia Press. It is a both a simple how-to book about prayer in the home and in the family; and it is a why-to as well - want you understand why as well as what!

I have written it with Leila Lawler, whose entertaining and brilliant blog Like Mother, Like Daughter (likemotherlikedaughter.org) I have long admired. She offers both practicality and piety in right measure and all her experience and insights of managing a home as a mother and, more recently grandmother, have added great wisdom.

We explain, for example, how to make an icon corner and supply many color plates of the appropriate images so that you can detach and frame them beautifully for your home. We also explain why this is encouraged - referring all the time to the Catechism and the documents of the Church. And we help you to pray with it as a family when you are busy also with everything else going on in the home. The prayer we offer gives a strong emphasis to the Liturgy of the Hours and we explain why the Church recommends this worship so strongly.

I have painted the color plates for example St Michael the Archangel and the Veronica Cloth (see below) and additionally a dozen or so line drawings of the Transfiguration (below)and the Presentation. The line drawings can be removed as well, or photocopied and used to teach your children to draw through coloring in and copying - this will help to inculturate them. As well as the paintings and line drawings of sacred art by myself, there are wonderful illustrations by Deirdre Foley. She has done a wonderful job and through her work she has helped us to show you what we mean, as well as tell you!

It is written with the hope that through the spread of a liturgical piety in the home, the family will become once again the driving force for cultural renewal. Keeping a faithful prayer life with your family isn’t easy. From herding distracted children to managing the seemingly endless litany of prayers and devotions, our spiritual life all too often feels frantic and burdensome. But this isn’t the way it should be. Our prayer life, our family life, and our work life should — and can! — be in harmony. When they are, our family is a powerhouse of grace, and Our Lord transforms our home into a little Eden —a little bit of heaven on earth. We hope that this book will help to bring peace to your home by integrating your family into the calm, truly joyful way of Mother Church. Her feasts and seasons, prayers and devotions are gifts that draw us closer to God and unfold before us His marvelous plan of salvation.

We want to encourage prayer that engages the whole person, so as well as visual prayer we want to encourage vocal prayer, and ideally this means chant. We even give simple tips on how to start to sing prayers when you are unused to doing so or think you are tone deaf. We work on the motto that if you can bear to listen to yourself in the shower, then you are good enough to sing your praises!

We include such things as. . .

• How to use sacred art to strengthen your prayer life.
• How to extend Catholic beliefs and devotions into every room of the house.
• Why the Liturgy of the Hours is important and how it can make your family holy.
• How to pray the Rosary with children—and keep the rowdiest of them calm and reverent.
• The active role children can —and should—play in the prayer life of the family
•  What to do when only one parent takes the spiritual life seriously.
• How to overcome the feeling that you’re too busy to pray.
• Practical ways to extend the liturgical life into your workplace.

I'll keep you posted when the book is released. You can pre-order on Amazon here ( fyi Sophia Press are projecting an April publication not a February publication as Amazon states).

Creativity in Science through Beauty

Liturgical science? Here is a Way of Beauty replay of an article first published in April 2010. I included this example as part of my class in architecture and traditional proportion recently, to illustrate the fact that modern science does not invalidate the traditional approach to number, rather it reinforces it......

In the Canticle of Daniel, chanted on Lauds Sunday Week 1and all feast days in the Divine Office, all of creation is called to give praise to God. The frosts hail and snow, wind and rain and all the other inanimate aspects of creation listed in this canticle do not give praise to God literally, but through their beauty they direct our praise to God. The cosmos is made for us. Through it, we perceive the Creator. In this sense the whole of Creation is ordered liturgically, in that it directs us to God and we give Him thanks, praise and glory. That thanks and praise of man is expressed most perfectly in the liturgy.

Well it seems that we could modify this canticle in accordance with the discoveries of particle physics, perhaps adding the line: ‘Oh you multiplets of hadronic particles, give praise to the Lord. To Him be highest glory and praise forever.’

In excellent his book, Modern Physics and Ancient Faith, describing the consistency between the Faith and the discoveries of science, Stephen M Barr describes the scientific investigation of a grouping of sub-atomic particles which he refers to as a ‘multiplet’ of ‘hadronic particles’. He describes how when different properties, called ‘flavours’ of ‘SU(3) symmetry’, of nine of these particles were plotted mathematically, then they produced a patterned arrangement that looked like a triangle with the tip missing.

‘Without knowing anything about SU(3) symmetry, one could guess just from the shape of the multiplet diagram that there should be a tenth kind of particle with properties that allow it to be placed down at the bottom to complete the triangle pattern. This is not just a matter of aesthetics, the SU(3) symmetries require it. It can be shown from the SU(3) that the multiplets can only come in certain sizes….On the basis of SU(3) symmetry Murray Gell-Man predicted in 1962 that there must exist a particle with the right properties to fill out this decuplet. Shortly thereafter, the new particle, called the Ωˉ was indeed discovered.’

This result would have been of no surprise to anyone who had undergone an education in beauty based upon the quadrivium, - the ‘four ways’ - the higher part of the education of the seven liberal arts of education in the middle-ages[1]. The shape that Murray Gell-Man’s work completed was the triangular arrangement of 10 points known as the tectractys. As described in my previous articles for the New Liturgical Movement, this is the triangular arrangement of the number 10 in a series of 1:2:3:4. 1, 2, 3 and 4 are the first four numbers that symbolize the creation of the cosmos in three dimensions generated from the unity of God; and notes produced by plucking strings of these relative lengths we can construct the three fundamental harmonies of the musical scale. The importance of this in the Christian tradition is indicated by the fact that Raphael’s School of Athens fresco, which is in the Vatican, portrays Pythagoras the Greek philosopher whose ideas were the basis of these ideas of harmony and order. He is portrayed looking at a chalkboard with  a diagram of the tectractys and X, the Latin number 10. (Above it on the chalkboard is the diagram which is a geometric construction of the musical harmonies.

The idea that the tectractys might be governing the arrangements of properties of these sub-atomic particles does not prove that it is a correct theorem (although I do find it intriguing!). Nor, even, is knowledge of the tectractys necessary to see the missing dot in this case. As Barr points out, it is obvious once you look at the incomplete graph. But it is obvious only once one works on the assumption that nature is ordered symmetrically. Once Gellman did this, his intuition gave him the missing point. This intuitive leap is the first step in any creative process. We come up first with an idea of what we think it might be, and then test it with reason.

I do not have a deep knowledge of particle physics, but I doubt that the traditional quadrivium contains the full range of symmetries that one is likely to see and would need to use as a research particle physicist. Nevertheless, I would maintain that the traditional education in the quadrivium would enable the research scientist to be more creative in his work. A traditional education in beauty, which is what this is, trains the mind to work in conformity to the divine order, to which, in turn, the natural order conforms. Such a mind is open to inspiration from the Creator, and is more likely to make the necessary intuitive leap when placed with an array of data. The mind that habitually looks to the divine symmetry is more likely to see the natural symmetry.

Physicist A. Zee put it this: ‘Symmetries have played an increasingly central role in our understanding of the physical world. From rotational symmetry physicists went on to formulate ever more abstruse symmetries…fundamental physicists are sustained by the faith that the ultimate design is suffused with symmetries.Contemporary physics would not have been possible without symmetries to guide us…Learning from Einstein, physicists impose symmetry and see that a unified conception of the physical world may be possible. They hear symmetries whispered in their ears. As physics moves further away from everyday experience and closer to the mind of the Ultimate Designer, our minds are trained away from their familiar moorings…The point to appreciate is that contemporary theories, such as grand unification or superstring, have such rich and intricate mathematical structures that physicists must martial the full force of symmetry to construct them. They cannot be dreamed up out of the blue, nor can they be constructed by laboriously fitting one experimental fact after another. These theories are dictated by Symmetry.’[2]

And what has this to do with the liturgy? I quote from my article on the quadrivium, The Way of Beauty, which appeared on the New Liturgical Movement website in September:

‘The traditional quadrivium is essentially the study of pattern, harmony, symmetry and order in nature and mathematics, viewed as a reflection of the Divine Order. When we perceive something that reflects this order, we call it beautiful. For the Christian this is the source, along with Tradition, that provides the model upon which the rhythms and cycles of the liturgy are based. Christian culture, like classical culture before it, was also patterned after this cosmic order; this order which provides the unifying principle that runs through every traditional discipline.  Literature, art, music, architecture, philosophy –all of creation and potentially all human activity- are bound together by this common harmony and receive their fullest meaning in the liturgy…When we apprehend beauty we do so intuitively. So an education that improves our ability to apprehend beauty develops also our intuition. All creativity is at source an intuitive process. This means that professionals in any field including business and science would benefit from an education in beauty because it would develop their creativity. Furthermore, the creativity that an education in beauty stimulates will generate not just more ideas, but better ideas. Better because they are more in harmony with the natural order. The recognition of beauty moves us to love what we see. So such an education would tend to develop also, therefore, our capacity to love and leave us more inclined to the serve God and our fellow man. The end result for the individual who follows this path is joy.’

When the person is habitually ordering his life liturgically, he will tap into this creative force, for he will be inspired by the Creator. Meanwhile all those multiplets of hadronic particles in the cosmos will be giving praise to the Lord.

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[1] For more details of the quadrivium read the following articles written by me for the New Liturgical Movement website: Cosmic Liturgy and the Mind of God; On Number; Harmony and Proportion; The Way of Beauty at Thomas More College of Liberal Arts

[2] A Zee: Fearful Symmetry, the Search for Beauty in Modern Physics (New York, Macmillan, 1986)  p281. Quoted by Stephen M Barr in A Student Guide to Natural Science (Delaware, ISI Books, 1986) p71.

How an Artist Can Conquer the World When Armed With the Arrows of Beauty

James Gillick Inspires Students at Thomas More College. Aspiring artists are 10 a penny. Successful artists are rare; successful Catholic artists who succeed in secular markets and can articulate clearly the basis of their success are rarer still. So when you get a chance to talk to one who does well enough that he can afford to pay four apprentices a year to work in his studio he is worth listening to; especially when he is an eloquent speaker and understands the basis of his success.

On 22st January, Englishman James Gillick, one of the UK's most successful artists and a Catholic came to Thomas More College of Liberal Arts and spoke about his faith and his approach to business and working in a secular world. Speaking to a packed Helm Room, his talk was impassioned and inspiring. When he finished students gathered around asking for advice to help them as they step out in the next phase of their lives.

He began by passing on good wishes from his most recent apprentice - former TMC student Jacqueline del Curto to her friends in the audience. Then he began his talk. He is the son of Victoria Gillick, whom Britons of my generation (I am 51) will remember as the Catholic who in the 1980s took the British government all the way to the highest court, the Law Lords, to try to overturn a law which allowed doctors to prescribe he contraceptive pill to girls under 16 without informing their parents (ultimately the government won). He spoke of this and what a profound effect it had on him as a boy watching the treatment of his mother and her resolve in the face of it - hostility from the government, from feminists, from from the newspapers and television and the resulting abandonment of friends; and how this gave him a sense of a mission as a Catholic that could be translated even into the work of an artist.

In regard to his own work he spoke first of the apparent hopelessness of the situation facing Catholics today. We have an aggressively anti-Catholic, materialist society in the which leading figures are the very wealthy devoted to getting more. These are the people that he must win over in order to sell his paintings. He told us of the process whereby he carefully worked out what sorts of paintings would appeal to these people. He chose subjects that suggested stability and solidity - qualities that those who work in the unpredictable world of finance wish to communicate to others, and convince themselves they possess. Consistent with this, in my opinion, his still lives particularly, through subjects such as game birds, and his portraits evoke a sense of traditional landed gentry of the Britain of Downton Abbey and before. He described also he carefully calculated how he could paint so that his work was consistent also with the Faith. This is an assumed faith rather than something explicit, so anyone who looks at his work will see that what he has done is look first to the liturgical forms. He has picked the baroque and based his style, whether religious or mundane art, on this. I think that this is exactly the right approach: it arises from a vision of a popular contemporary culture that will subtly develop the liturgical instincts of those who do not go to church, preparing their hearts for the mysteries that are manifested in Sacred Liturgy, and stimulating a desire for it - even if initially they are not aware that this is what they seek.

For James Gillick beauty as the main weapon we have in the secular world. Armed with it we cannot fail, he thinks. As he spoke it seemed to me that what he was describing is a process giving love until they submit. I was reminded of the quotation of our Pope Emeritus who wrote: 'True knowledge is being struck by the arrow of beauty that wounds man: being touched by reality, “by the personal presence of Christ himself,” as Nicholas Cabasilas puts it. Being overcome by the beauty of Christ is a more real, more profound knowledge than mere rational deduction. Of course we must not underestimate the importance of theological reflection, of exact and careful theological thought; it is still absolutely necessary. But to despise, on that account, the impact produced by the heart’s encounter with beauty, or to reject it as a true form of knowledge, would impoverish us and dry up both faith and theology. We must rediscover this form of knowledge—it is an urgent demand of the present hour. …'  It struck me that the 'arrows of beauty' are a set of a true Cupid's darts whose effect is not disordered desire but rather a properly ordered love of God.

Gillick explained that our only chance of success is for us to be united in our worship and prayer to the source of that beauty and hope, Christ.

When asked why there seemed to be such a market for ugliness, he commented that while fashion can stimulate demand in the short term for the trivial and titilating, people do respond to beauty when presented with it and that response is generally stronger and more long term. The reason that so little beauty is bought, he suggested, is that so little of it is available for sale - very few artists today are capable of producing current forms that participate in the the divine beauty and have anything of the sort of lasting value that artists of the past used to be able to create.

He spoke of his inspiration in looking at British history and the parallels he sees with today's situation. The Normans, who invaded in the 11th century, set themselves up as a brutal, self-serving class who dominated and subjugated the population of Britain. However, they were changed by the rise of the gothic culture of beauty which attracted them and transformed them and British society into a culture of beauty that was so resplendent that Britain was referred to as Our Lady's Dowry. If we engage beautifully with the secular culture, whether as artist, or musician or writer, or just Christian who lives life well and gracefully, with charity then we have nothing to fear and we can change the world. However, we do need to have a clear sense of purpose to guide us and a foundation in the Church. If we have that then today's Normans can be transformed just as those of yesteryear were.

I have known Jim for about 15 years and what always strikes me when he talks about art is he contrast between the description of the mission that he believes he is on, and the means by which he strives to achieve it as an artist and a father. When he talks of his work is very practical and straightforward - certainly not the precious, angst ridden bohemian of the popular artist image. He talks of his belief that artists need talent and dedication so that they can work hard and produce many paintings that are good enough to sell for a high price. Only then will he be able to support his family. When he discusses his role in changing the culture and his family, he is seemingly humbled and awestruck that he can even contemplate aiming to fulfil such a high calling. But as he points out, we are called to achieve amazing things by humble work - it is Christ who can give it the seemingly miraculous result.

From top: speaking from the podium, my introduction of him to the students; and then below talking to students afterwards. Below that two of his paintings - his portrait of Margaret Thatcher, painted to commemorate her being Chancellor of Buckingham University (Britain's only non-government funded university); and point-to-point horses.

St Winefride's Well, Holywell, North Wales

Here are some pictures of the ancient pilgrimage site in Britain. I first showed these a couple of years ago, but present them again following the last piece about painting the icon of St Winefride. This is the site of retreat centre run by the community of Bridgetine nuns. It dates back to the miraculous healing of St Winefride at the waters of the spring at this site in the 6th century. It is at the town of Holywell (appropriately named) in North Wales. I grew up just about 10 miles from here, over the border in England. I was aware of the place and the reason it had been named, vaguely, when growing up, but had no idea that it was and active pilgrimage site until long after I converted. I used to go and listen to Vespers at a convent in nearby Chester and a nun told me that there were many cures and conversions as a result of St Winefrides well. (The same nun told, me incidentally, that an Irish mystic has been told in a vision that Freddie Mercury, the late singer from the rock group Queen, is in purgatory. I would certainly like to believe that it's true!) People could drink the water or immerse themselves in the pool. Around the same time a group of Bridgetine nuns moved there to set up a new retreat centre. I had about this because they had previously been members of the community at the Maryvale Institute in Birmingham. So I decided to make a visit.

As you can see it is a well preserved medieval structure (dating from the 15th century). I drank the waters and prayed at the site. As someone who struggles to get into a heated swimming pool, I decided not to go for full immersion. It has been visited by English Kings and during the Reformation became a focus for recusant activity. You read about it on Wikipedia.

Looking at the photograph above you can see the changing tents, on the right, the hand pump for water to drink, on the left. The flowing spring, which you will see in photos below is in an octagonal starred well. It is situated in the turretted stone building at the far end and it overflows into the dipping pool which you can see.

Below we have a medieval sculpture of a man carrying someone else who is infirm and inscription of someone cured.

Creating a New Icon - St Winifride

How to create something new without stepping outside tradition. Those who have ever attended an icon painting class will know that the method of teaching is to copy an existing icon and that deviation from the prototype is usually flatly forbidden. This is an important part of the training - provided that the student is given an understanding of what it is he is copying and why the artist who painted the prototype made the decision regarding style and content that he did. This experience can lead some to conclude erroneously that there is no room for any creativity or originality in icons. In fact while originality from the artist is never sought as an end in itself, sometimes it is necessary - when for example there is no existing image of a particular saint.  The icon top left is St Winifred (also spelt Winefride), a Welsh saint from the 6th century. This was painted by Aidan Hart the English icon painter. I haven't spoken to him about this, but I am not aware of any other icon of St Windfride and so I conclude that he has created this.

Aidan had created a number of these icons of ancient British saints and I have heard him describe the general methods he uses. He researches the saints so that he can work out what visual features characterise the saint and then includes these in the icon. So here for example, she is wearing the old habit of a religious and has the staff of authority of an abbess. Then, he looks at his library of existing icons and as far as possible makes a composite picture from these to create the new icon. Only if he cannot do this does he introduce something completely new. I do not know for certain what his inspiration is for St Winefride, but it struck me that it might be this icon of St Theodosia (below) which comes from Mt Sinai and was painted in the 13th century. I know that he has based his style on the golden age of icon painting that this belongs to. It is a Greek style in which has a relatively high level of naturalism (for icons) and so modern Western people tend to relate to it easily. It almost looks as though Aidan has copied it from a mirror! It might be that the similarities are incidental, and Aidan did not base the original on this, but nevertheless, if I were faced with the problem of creating something new, this is where I would have gone to create St Winefride.

I recently decided that I would like to paint an image of St Winefride too. I grew up near the pilgrimage site in Wales and for personal reasons had prayed to St Winefride. I promised her that I would paint a icon of her and donate it to the community of nuns who run the residential retreat centre at the tow of Holywell in North Wales where it is situated. I added to the image the palm branch of a martyr and the well to depict the source of the healing waters which still flow today. I have also added the Romanesque or gothic style border, which characterises the Western sacred tradition of the Roman Rite and which I always like to include in my work. As always, I think Aidan does a better job, but I am happy nevertheless that this image will help the prayers of future pilgrims to Holywell.

Building the Liturgical City from the Comfort of Your Armchair

Here's a book for anyone who wants to participate in the re-establishment of a culture of beauty. In the quadrivium of the liberal arts - the 'four ways' of arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy - students learn not only the language of mathematics in which number is a sign of a truth (much as a word is a 'sign' that reveals a truth another way), but learn to relate those mathematical signs to each other in a pattern of relationships that reflects beauty of God. This order is common to the abstract worlds of mathematics and geometry, the cosmos, the beauty of musical harmony and the moral order and it governs also the rhythms and patterns of our worship in the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours as we progress through sacred time; ultimately all point to the Word, the Logos, in whom, as Pope Benedict XVI put it, 'the archetypes of the world's order are contained'.[1]

When understood in this way, the study of these disciplines provides the student with a set of principles by which all human work can be governed so that it is intimately linked to the liturgy. Furthermore through its beauty all human work can potentially give 'praise to the Lord', just as the cosmos doe,s as described in the Canticle of Daniel, for example.

Architecture is the field which comes to mind first when thinking about how to make use of the traditional harmony and proportion, but as I have indicated, we can incorporate this order into any aspect of time and space and then potentially any human creation or activity can participate in this divine order and bear witness to Him through its beauty. When human culture once again reflects the divine beauty, in ways that are not in-your-face statements of the creed, but are built upon the foundation of an assumed faith, then we will have something very powerful that will draw people into the Church. This is the via puchritudinis and it is the beauty that will 'save the world', to use the famous phrase of Dostoevsky. It is preparing the hearts of men to receive the Word and respond with love when presented with it in more direct ways; and it is most powerfully and directly presented to them in beautiful sacred liturgy. This is why cultural reform and liturgical reform are so closely tied together and why there is an article about furniture design on a blog about liturgy.

This little book By Hand and Eye, was sent to me by one of the authors when he read an articles in my blog about proportion and harmony in architecture. Walker and Tolpin are working carpenters who have done their research on the design and proportions of fine furniture of the 18th century such as we might see for example, in the work of Chippendale and Adam. They demonstrate first how the visual features of furniture are closely linked to the architecture of the buildings they are made to sit it. For example you can link the look of the columns of the building to the design of the legs of chairs and tables. Second, and of most interest to me, is their work in the examination of the proportions of the furniture. Their research, based upon examinations of original drawings and measurements indicates that the simple Pythagorean harmonious proportions, based upon ratios of whole numbers such as 1:2, 2:3 and 3:4 govern the design of furniture. This matches my conclusion relating to the proportions of architecture and like me, they do not see the Golden Section, which many assume to be fundamental to systems of proportion. Their presentation is a good balance of the theory - going right back to Plato and Pythagoras and the practicalities, with several case studies of how you might build a piece of furniture using these principles.

It is their personal knowledge of how carpenters actually make furniture which contributes to their conclusions. The designers of the past did not generate drawings from CAD software but, just like the gothic mason designing a cathedral, multiples of a single, arbitrarily assigned first dimension. So, in furniture, they maintain, all dimensions were constructed relative to a single unit governed by a pair of dividers. The furniture maker very likely never knew during the process what the dimension of his work were in any absolute measure of, for example, inches or feet.

I should say that I am not against CAD in principle, but designers should be aware that such software is as likely to make one design badly as well!

Below: first two pieces by Adam and then Chippendale

English Catholic Artist James Gillick Speaking at Thomas More College on January 21st

James Gillick one of the UK's most successful artists, will be speaking at Thomas More College in the library building at the campus in Merrimack, NH this coming Tuesday at 7pm. Jim, who is a good friend of mine and a devout Catholic, paints both mundane and sacred subjects. He is devoted to the re-establishment of a culture of beauty, not only through his own work, but by teaching. He offers up to four working apprenticeships a year. This is an intensive course in which apprentices are expected to work very hard. He teaches not only technique, but also the business skills of being an artist such as marketing and book-keeping. His talk is open to the public and will be of interest to any who are interested in the arts, but will be of particular value to those who really want to make it as and artist. James is not precious about what he does - he has a refreshing, down-to-earth practicality about his work and the way he discusses it. He is based in Lincolnshire in England and sells through the top galleries in London.

He is largely self taught (although he has the advantage of coming from a family of working artists) and his Catholicism informs his work - he consciously paints in the baroque style . I am particularly fond of his still lives.

When we look at any scene, we do not take it all in, in a single glance. Rather the eye, which has an angle of focus of only about 15 degrees roves around the scene, gathering information that is stored in the memory. We tend naturally to spend more time on those aspects of what is in front of us that we are most interested in and so we have most information about those areas.  Those areas that are of less interest we pass over quickly. At any moment, the image on the retina of the eye has a central region that is in sharp focus, and has the greater colour. Peripheral vision is, in contrast, blurred and depleted of colour (the cells in that part of the retina can only transmit tonal information). The reason that we are not conscious of this is that the picture we see in our mind’s eye is supplemented by information given to it by the brain and which is supplied by the memory. If the memory does not have information about this particular scene, then the brain will supplement the picture, so to speak, with what it feels ought to be there based upon what has been seen in elsewhere. This is usually pretty reliable, but not always. (Illusionists manipulate this, for example, by tricking the mind to supply a picture of something that isn’t there.)

The naturalistic painting of the baroque period (the 17^th century), developed a balance of focus and colour that mimicked this natural way of looking at things. The assumption behind it was that mankind is hardwired to appreciate the hand of the Creator in his creation and if the artist works in harmony with the way we see, then the well painted artwork will similarly, through its beauty, point us to the ultimate source of inspiration of the artist. Those areas that are of primary interest in the composition are rendered in sharper focus and contain more detailed information. Similarly, most of the painting, which the artist intends for us to see in peripheral vision is depleted of colour and rendered in monochrome (usually sepia). When this is handled skillfully the artist controls the passage of the eye over the canvas using the interplay of sharp contrast in tone and sharp edges, and supplies greatest detail and colour in those areas that are naturally of greatest interest. They are also the areas that contain most colour.

The academic method of drawing and painting, which was the basis of the baroque style, is gaining ground again, but this baroque balance of focus and tone is not always understood, and even more rarely properly applied. (I am likely to be making this point many times in this blog.) However, James Gillick (who interestingly did not learn his craft one of today’s ateliers of Florence or the US) is certainly someone who is pointing the way to something good for the future: his muted palette and sharp contrast of light and dark is sensitive to the methods of the Old Masters. You can see more of his work at www.gillick-artist.com .

Upcoming talk at St Mary Magdalene Church, Berkeley CA; Monday Jan 13th

For any interested and within striking distance, I am visiting California this month and will speak at the invitation of the Dominicans who run the parish. The poster, which says it all is below. The painting, by the way, is St Francis at prayer by the Spanish baroque artist Zurburan.

St Ambrose - the Second Commission for Our Lady of the Mountains, Jasper, Georgia

Here is the second completed icon commissioned by Fr Charles Byrd of Our Lady of the Mountains. This is based upon a mosaic in Rome of St Ambrose that was completed in a period very close to when he lived. The beehive is associated with St Ambrose because of his honeyed words - he was an eloquent speaker and the scroll contains the opening words and music to the Te Deum, the liturgical hymn sung in the Office of Readings in the modern Office at every Feast and Sunday which is often attributed to him. St Ambrose wrote many hymns for the liturgy and to the degree that his name became associated with the form. In his Rule, St Benedict refers to the singing of 'Ambrosian' hymns at each office. This will be close to the other recently completed icon of St Gregory and so is intended to speak to it visually. For this reason I included very similar background and decoration.

Below I am in my studio working on its counterpart, St Gregory the Great, and with both in my studio.

Sacred Art Class at TMC

A chance to learn sacred art whatever your level, and to subsidise TMC students so that they can attend for free. I will teach this and it is offered free to Thomas More College students (who have to pay just the standard weekly charge for room and board in the dorm. Even though I am Artist in Residence at the college it is difficult for the students to get intensive tuition. To learn art properly needs blocks of time and this is difficult to organise in the packed timetable during term time. Therefore, I have decided to offer an additional class of four solid days, which will allow them to make some real progress and set them up to work in their own time afterwards. This class is also open to people from outside the college. This is a great chance to learn sacred art and so meet the students of the college as well. We will charge you for this (at what is still a reasonable price for art tuition) as we hope to recoup some of the costs of putting on this class for the students. Please spread the word to those who might be interested in attending or even donating so that this can become a regular feature in the TMC calendar. The cheap hotel rates mentioned in the poster are offered to all those who are connected with this class by the way.

Recently Completed Work - St Gregory the Great

A model lesson in commissioning work I have been busy painting over the last couple of months undertaking a couple of commissions for Fr Charles Byrd of Our Lady of the Mountains Catholic Church in Jasper, Georgia. The first completed is shown here, St Gregory the Great and I will show the other, St Ambrose. This was a great experience from start to finish. First of all, Fr Charles had a clear idea of what he wanted and this was very helpful to me. He had researched what St Gregory would have looked like and did not want a repeat of other icons he had seen because he felt that they would not have been historically accurate. We based this image on a description by a contemporary, John the Deacon and based the vestments upon contemporary icons of other popes. This is why he is not wearing an ornate papal tiara and has long grey hair. For all this, I did not feel at all stifled. He was happy to hear suggestions from me as to how we might fulfill the commission in accord with what he wanted and I feel that the end result is very much a joint effort. I wanted this to have a Western feel and so asked to be able to include the geometric patterning in the border and background. Also I made sure, as always, that we fulfilled the criteria of St Theodore the Studite so that it should be an image worthy of veneration: that it bears the name of the saint; and that it has the characteristics of the person, this refers both to physical traits (such as the grey hair) and those symbols that are associated with him - in this case the dove of the Holy Spirit. In his Letter to Artists, John Paul II asked for a renewed dialogue between the Church and artists in service of the common good, so that we might move towards reestablishing a culture of beauty. This dialogue can be of the form of grand events, in which the Pope, as Benedict did, gathers together prominent artists to make and address which is then published. This sort of event is the starting point for it puts the need in peoples minds. But a continuation of this, and perhaps the more important and productive part, is the dialogue that takes place at the grassroots. When enlightened patrons and artists who are Catholic and aware of our traditions work together to create art that fulfills its purpose. Whether this has produced a worth result here is for others to say, I hope so. I think the point is that if we are going to have art that serves the Church, it is unlikely that any one person will know all that is necessary and be able to produce the art in any particular case; we need cooperation between enlightened artists, religious who understand Church requirements and the liturgy, and patrons (the people supplying the money are very important and must contribute too).

They plan on installing this and St Ambrose into the Church in the new year and I hope to see photographs of the ceremony afterwards.

Nativity Scenes in the Snow - New Hampshire Farmers Bearing Witness

We have had a lot of snow and cold weather recently and I have been feeling cooped up. When we had a relatively warm day (above freezing!) I decided to take advantage and go for a walk in the New Hampshire countryside. I went with my colleague at TMC Ryan Topping and three of his young boys. We headed for one my secret locations in New Hampshire, walking on plowed and sanded dirt roads, so it was firm underfoot. It was just perfect  - everywhere looked beautiful and peaceful in the snow, but it was warm enough to outside without discomfort. I did not expect to see these delightful displays: the large nativity scenes the farmers had created for the advent and Christmas seasons. One was clearly visible from the road and it was clear that the intention was for passers by to see it. The second was set back in the farm, several hundred yards from the road. As we walked past the farmhouse, the farmer came out and introduced himself. He thought we might be associated with the family that had moved into the neighboring farm. He noticed that one of the children who was with us (one of the boys of my colleague at Thomas More, Ryan Topping) was playing with a rosary and told us that he had a pavilion with a statue of Our Lord and Our Lady and we should go and look at it. His grandfather had come down from Quebec in the 1920s and this had been the family farm ever since, he said. They have had to adapt to the times in order to stay economically viable and so as well as continuing with the traditional practice of tapping maple trees and creating the syrup in a sugar shack, they have given the farm over to animals that probably wouldn't have been seen here 100 years ago. They given the pasture over to elk and sell venison to top restaurants and organic markets around the country. The sight of these large, antlered deer seemed all the more appropriate in this Christmas season. It was easy to believe that we were seeing reindeer! I thought that the elk was the North American equivalent of the reindeer but discovered when I got home that that would the caribou. Anyway, its still close enough for me.

Thank you to those who made these displays for helping so much to make a great day out.

Photos below show first the nativity scene on the roadside; and the pavilion set back in the fields with the Sacred Heart of Jesus the central figure.

... and then look back towards the farmhouse:

How to Pray With Visual Imagery

It is now more than three and a half years since I started this blog so first of all I would like to thank so many of you for your interest and your comments. I am currently involved in several book projects which will be published in the early part of next year - more information to come. In order to give myself time to write these, I thought I would reduce my postings to one fresh piece per week. However, it also occurred to me that many of you who read this, will not have seen much of what I posted in the first two years. In my mind, these are foundational to my thinking and shed light on much of what I write now, so I thought they would be worth repeating. So for these two reasons I thought I would replay some of these foundational posts. So for the next couple of months, I will alternate old and new. The first replay was first published in April, 2010: When I first started painting icons I was, of course, interested in knowing as well how they related to prayer. I was referred by others (though not my icon painting teacher) to books that were intended as instruction manuals in visual prayer. I read a couple and perhaps I chose badly, but I struggled with them. One the one hand, they seemed to be suggesting some sort of meditative process in which one spent long quiet periods staring at an icon and experiencing it, so to speak, allowing thoughts and feelings to occur to me. Being by nature an Englishman of the stiff-upper-lip temperament (and happy to be so) I was suspicious of this. I had finally found a traditional method of teaching art that didn’t rely on splashing my emotions on paper, and here I was being told that in the end, the art I was learning to produce was in fact intended to speak to us through a heightened language of emotion. Furthermore, the language used to articulate the methods always seemed to employ what struck me as pseudo-mystical expressions and which,  I suspected, were being used to hide the fact that they weren’t really saying very much.

So I started to ask my teacher about this and to observe Eastern Christians praying with icons. What struck me was that prayer for them seemed to be pretty much what prayer was for me. They said prayers that contained the sentiments that they wished to express to God. The difference between what they did and what I did at that time was that they turned and looked at an icon as they prayed. Also, when at home, often happily and without embarrassment they sang their prayers using very simple, easily learnt chant. Before meals, for example, the family would stand up, face an icon of Christ on the wall and sing a prayer of gratitude or even just the Our Father.

As I learnt more about icons through learning to paint them, I realized that every aspect of the style of an icon is worked out to engage us in a dynamic that assists prayer – through its form and content the icon will do the work of directing our thoughts to heaven. In short I don’t need to ‘do’ anything. The icon does the work for me.

The iconographic form is not the only one to do this. The Western Catholic tradition is very rich and has also the Baroque and gothic art forms that are carefully worked out to engage the observer in a dynamic of prayer, although in different ways. If the icon draws our thoughts to heaven, the baroque form is designed in contrast to have an impact at a distance in order to make God present on earth. The gothic figurative art is the art of pilgrimage, or of transition from earth to heaven, and stylistically it sits between the iconographic and baroque. It is the ‘gradual psalm’ of artistic form. Just like the spires of its architecture, it spans the gap between heaven and earth so that we have a sense both of where we going to and where we are coming from. I will discuss how the form of each tradition achieves in the next articles I write.

So the advice I was given was to ditch the books about praying with icons, and learn first to pray. Then as I pray always aim to have visual imagery that I allow to engage my sight and which assists. St Augustine said that those who sing their prayers pray twice. I would add that those who look at visual imagery as well pray three times (and if we use incense four times, and consider posture five). This process of engaging different aspects of the person in addition to the intellect is a move towards the ideal of praying with the whole person. This is what praying from the heart means. The heart is the vector sum of our thoughts and actions. It is our human centre of gravity when both body and soul are considered. It is the single point that, when everything is taken into account, defines what I am doing. It is the heart of us, in the sense of representing the core. This is why it is a symbol of the person. It is a symbol of love also because each of us is made by God to love him and our fellow man. It symbolizes what we ought to be rather than, necessarily, what we are. The modern world has distorted the symbolism of the heart into one of desire and ‘heartfelt’ emotion, precisely because these are the qualities that so many today associate with the essence of humanity.

The liturgy is ultimate form of prayer. By praying with the Church, the mystical body of Christ, we are participating in ‘Christ's own prayer addressed to the Father in the Holy Spirit. In the liturgy, all Christian prayer finds its source and goal.’[1] Therefore, the most important practice of praying with visual imagery is in the context of the liturgy. For example, when we pray to the Father then we look at Christ, for those who have seen Him have seen the Father. The three Catholic figurative traditions in art already mentioned were developed specifically to assist this process.

Just as the liturgy is the ‘source and goal’ of prayer, so liturgical art is, I would argue, the source and goal of all Catholic art. The forms that are united to the liturgy are the basis of Catholic culture. All truly Catholic art will participate in these forms and so even if a landscape in the sitting room, will point us to the liturgical. We cannot become a culture of beauty until we habitually engage in the full human experience of the liturgy. In the context of visual art, this practice will be the source of grace from which artists will be able to produce art that will be the basis of the culture of beauty; the source of grace and from which patrons will know what art to commission; and in turn by which all of us will be able to fulfill our vocation, whatever it may be, by travelling on the via pulchritudinis, the Way of Beauty, recently described by Pope Benedict XVI.

Of course, each individual (depending upon his purse) usually has a limited influence on what art we see in our churches. However, as lay people, we can pray the Liturgy of the Hours and control imagery that we use. The tradition of the prayer corner, in which paintings are placed on a small table or shelf at home as a focus of prayer, is a good one to adopt.  We ‘orientate’  our prayer towards this, letting the imagery engage our sight as we do so. We can also sing, use incense and stand, bow, sit or kneel as appropriate while praying. A book I found useful in this regard, which describes traditional practices is called Earthen Vessels (The Practice of Personal Prayer According to the Patristic Tradition) by Gabriel Bunge, OSB

Does this mean that meditation of visual imagery is not appropriate? No it does not. But as with all prayer that is not liturgical, it is should be understood by its relation to the liturgy. So just as lectio divina, for example, is good in that it is ordered to the liturgy because through it our participation in the liturgy is deepened and intensified. So, perhaps, should meditation upon visual imagery should be understood in relation to the use of imagery in the liturgical context. Also, I would say that it is useful, just as with lectio, to avoid the confusion between the Western and Eastern non-Christian ideas of meditation and contemplation are. I was recommended a book recently that helped me greatly in this regard. It is called Praying Scripture for a Change – An Introduction to Lectio Divina by Dr Tim Gray.

---

[1] CCC, 1073

A Pretty 19th Century Church in Vermont

I recently spent some time on holiday in a state adjoining New Hampshire, Vermont. We were staying close to at town called Killington (when the deep snow arrives it is a ski resort). Nearby, as we drove home, we saw a hamlet which consisted of an early 19th century stone church and connected buildings. We pulled over and took some quick photographs. Called the Episcopalian Church of Our Saviour,  it is in a Romanesque style but is of its time too (think of Pope Francis and Evangelii Gaudium). Once again, I think it shows what we could do today if we wished to, by respect the past and build on past traditions and 'building on them'.  The pitched roof is perfect for the snowy Vermont winters.

I will let the photographs speak for themselves:

Evangelii Gaudium - Pope Francis talks of the Way of Beauty

This is the first short article in which I offer some reaction to the apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium of Pope Francis. In this he referred directly to Pope Benedict's phrase, the 'via pulchritudinis' as a vital component in evangelisation and of the importance of the arts.

'167. Every form of catechesis would do well to attend to the “way of beauty” (via pulchritudinis). Proclaiming Christ means showing that to believe in and to follow him is not only something right and true, but also something beautiful, capable of filling life with new splendour and profound joy, even in the midst of difficulties. Every expression of true beauty can thus be acknowledged as a path leading to an encounter with the Lord Jesus. This has nothing to do with fostering an aesthetic relativism which would downplay the inseparable bond between truth, goodness and beauty, but rather a renewed esteem for beauty as a means of touching the human heart and enabling the truth and goodness of the Risen Christ to radiate within it. If, as Saint Augustine says, we love only that which is beautiful, the incarnate Son, as the revelation of infinite beauty, is supremely lovable and draws us to himself with bonds of love. So a formation in the via pulchritudinis ought to be part of our effort to pass on the faith. Each particular Church should encourage the use of the arts in evangelization, building on the treasures of the past but also drawing upon the wide variety of contemporary expressions so as to transmit the faith in a new “language of parables”. We must be bold enough to discover new signs and new symbols, new flesh to embody and communicate the word, and different forms of beauty which are valued in different cultural settings, including those unconventional modes of beauty which may mean little to the evangelizers, yet prove particularly attractive for others.'

So he stresses the objectivity of beauty and how that which is genuinely beautiful points to God. In regard to art in particular he stresses the importance of creating new forms but that this should be done by 'building on the treasures of the past'. This means, as I read it, doing what Christian artists have always done: looking at the forms of the cultures of those with whom they wish to communicate with, in a discerning way; deciding what is consistent with the principle of objective beauty (and here we look to traditions to guide us) and then applying them in the context of those Catholic traditions (and, incidentally, exactly what happened after the Council of Trent as part of the Catholic Counter-Reformation).

This is very different from what those who reject tradition might wish to do - simply incorporating modern forms without any regard to those of the past and assuming that by making the content Christian we have something that is good. To my mind the Holy Father is absolutely right and it is consistent, for example, with what Pius XII said in Mediator Dei in regard to figurative art; and in general to the writing of Popes Paul VI, John Paul II and Benedict XVI on such matters.

Given that this constitutes a small part of the whole document, one might think that he does not give it great importance. However, his reiteration of the writing past recent Popes, suggests that one should read this document not as an isolated statement that replaces previous ideas, but in the context of a much larger corpus - as one that re-emphasises, builds on and adds to, albeit incrementally, what came before.

Also, given that the document is an apostolic exhortation following a synod, one wonders how much we should look at this as a personal statement of the Pope, and how much it is in fact an account of contributions made by others. I am not expert enough to answer that question. Except to say that much of it reads to me like the section on art does - the restatement of things said before without any attempt to give new insights: it is simply giving the message, 'this is still important'.

How the Ancient Sarum Rite Formed the Art and Architecture of a Tiny Country Church in Devon, England

Here are some photos of a tiny church in Devon. The tour of the church was given to myself and the rest of the class on the Maryvale's Art Beauty and Inspiration course that was taking place at Buckfast Abbey in Devon. As part of this, we asked Michael Vian Clark, who taught chant to the monks at the abbey, and who is a keen local historian to talk to us about one of the local churches. He is now based in Rome where has has recently begun his studies as a seminarian (for the Diocese of Plymouth). Michael is a keen student of the Sarum Rite and chanted for us in the church (teaching us to accompany him with an organum drone) as he explained how this was the music that would have resonated throughout this church prior to the reformation.

Michael has written a description for NLM readers, which I give below. There are some aspects of this that particularly strike me. When Fr Lang of the London Oratory spoke about church architecture this summer at Sacra Liturgia 2013 in Rome, he stressed the importance of thresholds that clearly separate the temple, the place of worship from the outside world. The porch or the cloister, in grander churches, become especially important in this respect in churches that are designed for the Sarum Rite. This rite has many processions that emphasise the earthly pilgrimage from the City of Man to the City of God. This point of pilgrimage by which even in this life we can by degrees be transformed and participate in the divine nature through participation in the sacred liturgy, is a feature of gothic art, which stylistically spans the divide between the shadowy fallen world of the baroque; and the heavenly state of eschatological man as revealed by the icon. As Jean Corbon describes in his book the Wellspring of Worship, by being part of the mystical body of Christ, his Church, we can participate in the transfigured Light.

A book has recently been published that looks at the design of Salisbury Cathedral in the 13th Century, here, relating to the regular processions that took place. We see similar influences even in this little country church and its humble porch. As Michael puts it:: 'The porch had particular significance in the Ritual of the Use of Sarum, which involved more regular processions outside of the Church building than other expressions of the Roman Rite. Indeed there were exceptional processions on Feasts such as Candlemas, Palm Sunday, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, Corpus Christi and Rogation Days which included a station outside at the 'Palm Cross' - a stone structure in the churchyard with ascending steps. Here at Ashton the base of the Palm Cross is still visible, directly opposite the porch with its image niche above the main portal. The porch was the place where the Rite of Baptism, Holy Matrimony and the Churching of Women actually began - the books describe the location ante ostium Ecclesiae. The threshold of the Church was therefore more than mere weatherproofing. It had its own liturgical function.'

These painting probably survived because the church is so remote and there would have been strong local sentiment to keep them. There is a pale fresco on the wall which was revealed when a painting that had previously hung on that section of the wall for centuries was removed.

What we see here is an indication of just how colourful and ornate even a small country church would have been during the period when this gothic church, in the English perpendicular style, though very simplified, was built. There is an ornate rude screen. The floor, which immediately caught my eye because of its geometric patterned form is probably a Victorian renovation, Michael told me.

Here are some thoughts that Michael has put down for us in connection with this church:

''The Church of St John the Baptist is dramatically situated on a rocky outcrop overlooking the Teign Valley in Devon, England. It was, and still is, quite remote: accessible only by high-sided lanes. It is part of a family of churches in this valley that share similar architectural features: one may reasonably speculate the hand of the same masons, carpenters and glass painters.

'Like so many Devonian churches, the details (that is to say the window tracery, screenwork and fragments of painted glass) are generally of the late fourteenth to early fifteenth century, but at Ashton, as elsewhere, this disguises much more ancient fabric into which such details were inserted as part of a widespread programme of enhancement and beautification of liturgical spaces right up to the Reformation. The most striking addition to the typical dual-cell structure of a post-Conquest church is the North aisle, separate by slender and elegant Beer stone arcades that may derive inspiration from the late thirteenth century design of Exeter Cathedral. This aisle was built to house a secondary altar, the sanctuary of which later became the 'family pew' of the Chudleigh family, giving a strong clue as to its original benefactors.

'Later, a porch was also added - a feature that had particular significance in the Ritual of the Use of Sarum, [as mentioned]. The glory of Ashton is no doubt the beautifully preserved Rood Screen and Parclose Screen that respectively separate Nave from Chancel and the two altars one from the other. Rood Screens were a particularly favoured devotional expression in England as a consequence of the division of legal responsibility for the Church fabric itself: Chancels were the responsibility of the Living whereas Naves were the responsibility of the Parish.

'The Rood Screen marked the boundary and parishes are known to have been anxious to ensure their screen and Rood were as impressive as possible (and more impressive than their neighbours.) Typically a Screen has three components: a Dado with images of the Saints; Tracery work that permits a view of the High Altar and above this a Loft which gave access to the Rood itself (composed of a large image of the Crucified Lord flanked either side by His Mother and the Beloved Disciple) which was the dominating feature of the people's part of the Church.

'At Ashton the Screen was sensitively restored by Harry Hems of Exeter in the early twentieth century and the Rood itself has been restored, albeit in unpainted wood. The image sequence is a mixture of the local and universal and sometimes grouped in logical sequence - e.g. Doctors, Evangelists, Martyrs, Holy Helpers; sometimes not. An interesting feature is that of local saint, Sativola or Sidwell who features with the scythe of her martyrdom both on the screen and in glass at Ashton, demonstrating the strength of her cult in the former diocese of Exeter. The connections with mainstream (and very Roman) Catholicism are also clear: here are depicted Popes, Cardinals, Bishops and international saints, such as Zita of Lucca and Anthony of Egypt as well as saints such as Ursula and, possibly Thomas of Canterbury and Boniface that connected Britain with Continental Europe.

'Admittedly the quality of the artistry is not especially high - note that the faces of the saints are essentially the same, however this Screen has even more to reveal. Perhaps the most interesting feature is the sequence of catechetical paintings on the reverse of the Screen in the Chudleigh chapel (which survive) and the Sanctuary (which are faint outlines only) which seem to have been added later. The panels of the Annunciation and Visitation are conventional enough, but texts for the Transfiguration (a later Feast for the Universal Church) demonstrate a dynamic concern to keep up to date liturgically, even in this remote corner of Devon. Other features of note include a rather faded but nonetheless striking figure of the Lord showing his wounds, after the manner of the Mass of St Gregory. Unlike the extant Sculpture of the same theme in Exeter Cathedral, here this does not form a reredos, but is instead a devotional painting. Fragments of glass, including figure painting of exceptionally high quality survives in the North aisle, notably the figure of St Sidwell mentioned above and St Gabriel holding a scroll bearing the text of the Annunciation. In summary, this is a remarkable Church not only for the survival of the liturgical apparatus of the Use of Sarum, but also for the quality of the workmanship on display. A Church worth a detour of many miles to see.''

 

In this view down the ailse, the second altar Michael refers to is just barely visible to the left, we seen the section inside that portion of the screen later on.

This is the area at the front of the church that contains the second altar.

 The fresco below was revealed when a more recent wall hanging was removed.

Audio of Talk Given In New York City: the Formation of the Catholic Artist

A training in skills, humility and beauty, which would be useful to all For any who are interested, here is a recording of a talk I gave in New York City recently. It is about the formation of the Catholic artist. The link is here. As I describe in the talk, this training aims not only to impart the technical skills necessary, but also forms the person in humility so that his instincts are to follow inspiration (should God choose to inspire him); and gives a formation in beauty that develops the artists intuitive sense of right relationship and harmony. It is a liturgical centered training so those aspects that form the person are not trained so much as given; in that they are the fruits of full and active participation in the liturgy. As such this training, therefore, is useful too (with minimal adaption) anybody, regardless of his personal vocation.

I should say that I was very impressed with my hosts, the Catholic Artists' Society in their emphasis on the importance of the spiritual life of the artist and its integration with his art. After the talk, Compline was sung in the chapel and all were encouraged to stay and pray. Before it the Hour began, we were given the text and simple musical score and the leader explained to those who might not have any experience what we were about to do, stressed the value of the Liturgy of the Hours and explained to us how to sing. It worked very well. I loved the way that they encouraged people to take the handouts home and think about making this part of the prayer life of the domestic church.

The link for the audio is here. (www.catholicartistssociety.org/david-claytons-lecture-forming-the-artist/)

The next event in this series is on December 14th and is a lecture by Alice Ramos of St Johns University.

An Ordinary Street in the London Suburb of Hanwell

After the last view of Nashua, NH mainstreet here are some views of Hanwell in west London. They were taken over the summer when I was on my way to Heathrow airport. When I teach the class on harmony and proportion in architect at Thomas More College, we do study the traditional principles as manifested in the great buildings of the past, but I am as anxious to establish in the idea also that this is not just something for cathedrals and grand civic buildings. Even the buildings that we use in everyday life - affordable mass housing, the shops, offices, businesses and factories  can conform to these simple principles and create a beautiful and livable environment. I believe that cities are where most of us are meant to live - the future is not, and nor ought to be, one of a new high-tech agrarianism. However, I do not believe that modern cities need be the inhuman places that we tend to think is inevitable. This is where the consideration of the beauty of ordinary things and places becomes so important.

I stopped at a roadside cafe for an English breakfast on my to catch my plane home and it was a sunny morning. What was interesting to note was that the basic structures of the all the buildings conformed to traditional harmonious proportions. I am guessing they were built around the turn of the last century. As you look at each one you can see the triple layered proportion with each storey a different size in the traditional manner. These were never grand buildings, just ordinary high street buildings built for every day use. Even though the modern businesses that occupy them have made no attempt to accentuate or conform to the harmonious proportions in their modifications, what remains still makes Hanwell High Street nice enough for the Big Bites Cafe to put tables outside so that patrons could enjoy the sunshine. I would always maintain that if they knew it, they would attract even more business if only they would take this into account. The beautification of the high street is one of the main ways that towns seek to preserve the town centres and fight against the out-of-town malls to maintain a community feel. This is known, but rarely is this aspect of how it might be done understood.

For the curious I have included a photo of the menu, I chose the Tradition English complete with B. Pudding, ie Black Pudding...ah how I miss England.