Soul-Food-For-The-Eyes

 

I really like going to art fairs and this month my friend talked me into heading to Louisville for just such an occasion. So the four of us with lattes in hand headed into the neighborhood streets lined with stalls. Karen, the expert shopper, had a map and kept notes on where we may need to return. Jenny had her mental Christmas list scrolling through her mind. Sarah, an artist herself, kept her eyes open to inspiration and ideas and solutions.  And me?  As my mouth sipped and swallowed the latte, my eyes drank in all the colors, textures, shapes.

I wouldn’t say that art was a huge part of my childhood.  Oh sure, I really dug the spirographs and fashion-plates my sister and I made. Also, we were talked into making a couple of latchhook rugs,  cranked out numerous potholders from the plastic-loom-kit, baked our fair share of shrinky-dinks, and carried home at least one God’s-eye from camp each summer.  And I still remember that lovely art project in elementary school when we painted dogwood trees with puffy pink and white paint with those even puffier paintbrushes.

But I never excelled in any of my art classes.  And I didn’t seek out art. And did I even appreciate it?

But the spring of my junior year in college, I had the opportunity of going to Italy for a month-long class. And in Florence, I was blown away by the many masterpieces:  impressed by the sheer size of some of them--Botticelli’s Venus stared back at me almost eye-to-eye;  mesmerized by the incredibly vibrant and crisp blue falling on the Madonna’s shoulders;  captivated by Michelangelo’s Unfinished Slaves--great masses of rock revealing stone-people bursting out of their stone-prisons.

Life, however, can’t be spent in museums.  And  I never have enough money to fill my home with art. So I attend art fairs to feast, and to fill up on soul-food-for-the-eyes for awhile.  And I treasure what I have. That one print. The photograph there. A blue vase.

I think of the art that people have created for me.  The rough orange clay cat with glued-on ears made by my little nephew that sits on my desk and makes me smile.  My favorite coffee mug painted with quotes and swirls from my good friend. The thick sweeps of oil on my father’s paintings hanging on my walls. The delicate scalloped edges of the note cards my mother gently embosses and glitters.  

I’m so thankful for the creative people living around me. The artists who devote time and labor to bringing us art. To friends and family who create gifts of art for me. But I’m not just thankful for the art itself, but for the reminder--the process of creativity, the presence of artistry, and the products of beauty all remind me of The Great Artist, The Creator. He creates simply because that is who He is.  And He creates with a wild abandon and exuberance and extravagance. And His works of art are all around us -- autumn leaves, newborn babies and the new hearts beating in his followers' chests. Create in me, Lord. Create around me, Lord. Create through me, Lord.