Artist of the Month: Floyd Skloot
The writer's perennial struggle is to find words to match the emotional content of the subject at hand: is the language too cold and detached or too sentimental and florid? Somehow this struggle is never evident in the prose and poetry of Floyd Skloot, where the consonance between word and feeling always seem right, no matter how wrenching and sad the subject matter. And Skloot does have difficult matters to write about, including the virus that attacked his brain and permanently debilitated him. Yet even in this painful territory Skloot's balance of honest reportage and his search for the "objective correlatives" of his experience in art, nature, and religion is unerring. The reader comes away from a Skloot poem, essay, or novel moved, learning something about the author, but also about the world we share with the author. Stoic would be the wrong word for this, because it carries connotative baggage of stiff upper lips and grim determination and that's not the tenor of his language. Serenity won't do either. Perhaps there isn't a word for it, but whatever the inner cost of writing for Floyd Skloot, his work exudes the peace of someone able to see himself sub specie aeternitatis.

To go to Floyd Skloot's Artist of the Month, page, click here.

Arcade Fire: Funeral
Hailing from Montreal, Arcade Fire is a listening experience that's as hard to forget as it is to classify. Though various aspects of the band lend themselves to a wide variety of comparisons-David Bowie, Roger Waters, Bjork, Talking Heads, Neil Young, "chamber pop"-Arcade Fire manages in the end to elude specific categories. Whatever a listener might call them, since the recent release of their first full-length album, Funeral (2004), critics and fans alike have been giving Arcade Fire rave reviews. Made up of members from both Canada and America, the band has its origins in the meeting of singers and multi-instrumentalists, Win Butler and Régine Chassagne in Montreal. Now a married couple, Win recalls hearing Régine sing jazz at an art opening by commenting, "I knew I had to make music with her." Soon added to the pair were Win's brother, William, Richard Parry, Howard Bilerman, and Tim Kingsbury. After doing a great deal of research about smaller labels, the band settled with Merge Records in North Carolina. Though much of the music on Funeral is rambunctious and fun, both the lyrics and the album's softer songs indicate the album's underlying romantic solemnity. Subjects that are given serious consideration include love, death, and faith. Social analysis is also addressed on songs such as Neighborhood #3 (Power Out): "And the power's out in the heart of man, take it from your heart put in your hand.." Much of this seriousness, in fact, stems from life events that happened to band members while recording the new album. Within a year's time, Chassagne's grandmother, the Butler brothers' grandfather, and Parry's aunt all died. The band dedicates the aptly titled album to those who have gone before them. Like most elegies, the work here is serious. As one critic put it, "Arcade Fire sounds like an urgent snow-padded bike ride to a 24-hour pharmacy for penicillin that will save your lover's life." A complex and challenging album, the work rewards those who are willing to listen to it a number of times before settling on a reaction. The same can be said of the band.

For more information: www.arcadefire.com.

Transplant, Transport, Transubstantiation by Marjorie Maddox
Winner of the Yellowglen Prize, Transplant, Transport, Transubstantiation is Marjorie Maddox's latest collection. Director of Creative Writing and Professor of English at Lock Haven University, Maddox also published one of the poems in this book in Image. Of course, the title of this volume says it all. The poems in this collection all related to the wood-root "trans," which can mean movement, change, across, transfer, metamorphosis, and more. Maddox might have added "translation" to her title, since the essence of poetry involves taking the world and translating it into words. Her father's death is also a central theme of the book. Before he died, he was the recipient of a heart transplant. In the opening poem, "Treacherous Driving," Maddox writes of the heart donor who died in a car crash. "The first night of the blizzard, / that stranger inched into Ohio. / Halfway through he skidded into our snow-spackled lives. / His heart is buried / in my father / who is buried." The themes of love, death, sacrifice, and suffering are ultimately comprehended in the Eucharist, that reenactment of Christ's passion, in which bread and wine are transubstantiated into Christ's body and blood. In her poem, "Eucharist," first published in Image #12, Maddox refuses to romanticize the taking of Communion. "This is the swallowing / of what spewed out: spears / stuck long in the side, / thorns thick in the skin. / No trickle. / A Hallelujah / torrent down the throat."

To learn more about this book, click here.

James Janknegt: The Parables of Jesus
The art of James Janknegt is currently displayed in an online exhibit through the Episcopal Church and Visual Arts website. Working mainly with oil on canvas, the artist illuminates the realities of the world we tend to place a veil over. This collection of paintings contains colorful, quirky renditions of Jesus' parables, often set in a rural Texas context (which is where Janknegt maintains Brilliant Corners ArtFarm). These works evoke a raw truth, incorporating contemporary material icons such as the McDonalds logo, and present the original parables translated in light of today's society-Jesus' parable of the Good Shepherd is titled as The Parable of the Good Chicken Farmer. Jesus wrote parables in order for the masses to hear-not just listen, to see-not just look. Janknegt believes his role as an artist is "to help us see, not just look; see what the shadows of this world are disclosing about the Government of the Promised Son." Indeed, he does so combining the precision of brushstrokes with the universality of the parables.

Visit the Episcopal Church and Visual Arts website:
http://www.ecva.org/wordimage/essay.htm#top

Go to Janknegt's own website: www.bcartfarm.com.

A Song to Sing, A Life to Live: Reflections on Music as Spiritual Practice
Don Saliers and Emily Saliers
"A Song to Sing, A Life to Live is for anyone who once took piano lessons and wishes now they hadn't quit. It is for those who sing with their communities of faith but who are confused by secular music, and it is for those outside faith communities who wonder whether there is anything true in the songs of organized faith traditions." Father and daughter Don and Emily Saliers team up in this latest addition to the Practices of Faith series (from publisher Jossey-Bass) to explore the ways in which music-both sacred and secular-heals our brokenness and alienation and reveals God's grace. Emily-one half of the alternative folk-rock duo the Indigo Girls-composes "the music of Saturday night," while her father Don-theology professor, church musician, cantor and composer-creates "the music of Sunday morning." Don and Emily approach life and faith very differently, but it is their common belief in the unifying power of music that draws the reader into their stories. A Song to Sing, A Life to Live explores music across many genres and settings and invites us to a broader, deeper vision of the power and role of music in human life. "Saturday night morphs into Sunday morning as I sit down with my father and we talk about how those two days and two ways are not really so separate. We speak of how music can deepen human life beyond measure and bring us closer to the truth of what it means to be human and to the transcendent power of love beyond our understanding. Music, we keep saying, is some kind of mysterious mediator between us and the God we seek."

For more information: http://www.practicingourfaith.org/bookstore.html

Gallery Watch

Light and Aenigma

The Barrington Center for the Arts presents two shows: Light, exhibiting Ground Zero photographs, and Aenigma, featuring altarpiece constructions. Krystyna Sanderson's Light captures the images of the people and times following the September 11, 2001 destruction of the World Trade Center. In harmony with Sanderson, Robert Eustace's Aenigma evokes "a mysticism of memory and a yearning for the transcendent"-similar sentiments of Americans deeply affected by the September 11 tragedy. These two installations will be on display through February 18, at Gordon College's Barrington Center, Wenham, MA. The Gallery's hours are 9 a.m. until 7 p.m. Monday through Friday. It is also open from noon to 4 p.m. on Saturdays.

For more information, please visit http://www.gordon.edu/2shows.htm.

If you have information other ImageUpdate readers might find interesting, share it here! Do you have a question that you hope a member of the ImageUpdate community might have the answer to? Ask it here. Have your messages posted by sending an email to gwolfe@spu.edu.

(For a complete catalogue of continuing events and announcements supplied by Image Update readers, check out "What's New Elsewhere.")

Reminder: MFA & Milton Center Fellowship Deadlines
Deadlines for The Milton Center postgraduate fellowship and Seattle Pacific University's MFA program are rapidly approaching! The Milton Center fellowship brings emerging writers of Christian commitment to Seattle for an academic year to complete their first book-length manuscript in fiction, poetry, or creative nonfiction. Fellows are assigned to writing mentors, who in the past have included such poets and novelists as Scott Cairns, Diane Glancy, and Brenda Hillman. Fellows will also enjoy the perks of interacting with the editorial staff at Image and the English faculty at SPU, participating in a weekly writers' workshop involving some of the best writers in the Seattle area, and teaching some English courses at the university. A year in Seattle with a $15,000 stipend for living expenses and-sweetest of all-the space and time to write from within a supportive community make the Milton Center an appealing sanctuary for the creation of literature that seeks to redeem and transform the time. Requirements include an M.A. in English literature or a humanities field, with some experience in teaching writing. The application deadline for the 2005-06 Milton Center Fellowship is March 15, 2005. The application form may be downloaded on the web page listed below.

Our host institution, Seattle Pacific University, has launched a new, low-residency Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing and Image will be playing a central role in the program. Ours will be the only university-sponsored MFA in Creative Writing (fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction) that incorporates the Christian faith into the curriculum-a first in Christian higher education. Faculty for the 2005-2006 academic year are Paul Mariani for poetry, Robert Clark for fiction, and Leslie Leyland Fields for creative non-fiction. The residencies for the 2005-06 academic year will take place July 28 - August 7, 2005, and March 16 - March 26, 2006. The MFA application deadline to begin the program during the August residency is March 1, 2005.

For more information on the Milton Center fellowship, go to:
http://www.imagejournal.org/milton/fellowship.asp.

For more information on the MFA program at SPU, go to:
http://www.spu.edu/mfa.

Announcing Image's Glen Workshop 2005
"This Great Unknowing: Drawing Near to Mystery"
July 31 - August 7, 2005

The Glen Workshop is an illuminating conference on the arts and religion, where participants practice and strengthen their craft and vision in community. This weeklong event combines the best elements of a workshop, an arts festival, and a symposium. By exploring this year's theme, "This Great Unknowing: Drawing Near to Mystery," participants will share a common ground for discussion during the week. Morning workshops are small enough to allow the faculty to give close attention to each participant-to beginners as well as those advanced in their craft. This year's faculty includes illustrator Barry Moser, playwright Arlene Hutton, poets B.H. Fairchild and Andrew Hudgins, mixed-media artist Barry Krammes, Navajo painter Elmer Yazzie, and many others. Afternoons and evenings at the Glen feature faculty readings, lectures, and presentations. Each evening concludes with an ecumenical worship service that incorporates the arts. This year's musicians-in-residence, Karin Bergquist and Linford Detweiler of Over the Rhine, will be giving a concert as well as playing during worship throughout the week. Free time offers participants opportunities for writing, conversation, hiking, and exploring the stunning scenery and cultural treasures in and around Santa Fe. Surrounded by the stark, dramatic beauty of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the Glen is hosted at St. John's campus and is within easy reach of the rich cultural, artistic, and spiritual traditions of northern New Mexico. Please note that class sizes are limited: don't wait too long to register!

A brochure will be printed and mailed in early February. If you are on the Image subscriber list, you'll automatically receive a brochure. If you'd like to have one mailed to you, send us an e-mail by clicking here.

In the meantime, to begin your exploration of the Glen Workshop, click here.

And for a personal perspective on the Glen experience, read Roz Dimon's brief reflection here.

Scholarship for the Glen Workshop, 2005: WC&C Scholarship
Do you need a scholarship to make your attendance to the 2005 Glen Workshop possible? In addition to the scholarships offered by Image, Writers' Conferences & Centers is conducting its annual competition to provide scholarships for emerging writers who wish to attend a writers' conference. Two winners will receive $500 that you can put towards your Glen Workshop registration. Please inquire and send writing manuscripts directly to the WC&C Scholarship Competition, Association of Writers & Writing Programs, MS1E3, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA 22030 postmarked before or on March 1, 2005. Winners will be notified by May 15th.

For information about guidelines, please visit:
http://www.awpwriter.org/contests/wccscholarship.htm

Image Forum: Let Your Voice Be Heard!
As a quarterly journal, Image doesn't have a "Letters to the Editor" section that you see in periodicals that appear more frequently. We've always regretted that, because through our pages—and programs like the Glen Workshop and the Image Conference—we've been striving to build community, to stimulate a larger conversation in artistic and religious circles, both in this country and around the world. Recently, thanks to some hard work on our webmaster's part, we launched the Image Forum, a full-featured online message board system that's already buzzing with conversation. Write a virtual Letter to the Editor. Start a thread in any of several different forums devoted to particular art forms. Share your work with others. Let us know how to make the Forum better. Let your voice be heard!

http://forum.imagejournal.org

Subscribe (and a whole lot more) Online
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