“And what is faith?…”
On the art of Colin McCahon
This is the fourth of seven pieces meant to introduce our readers to participants in our ordination preparation course at The Seminary of the Christian Community in North America. Each one will contemplate a work – or works – of art that speak to their path and Christ’s working in the world in some way. We havce heard from Victoria Capon, Jeana Lee and Mimi Coleman. Today we introduce you to Lesley Waite.
. . . . and what is faith? Faith gives substance to our hopes and makes us certain of realities that we do not see . . . .
Hebrews 11:1
I was born in Dunedin, New Zealand, a city established in the late 1840s by Scottish immigrants. They brought Presbyterianism and with gold found in Central Otago from 1861, built the first university in New Zealand that opened in 1869. I grew up with and developed a strong relationship to words and books, art and nature – then, as an adult found Colin McCahon, who brought all these together in his paintings.
Colin McCahon from the cover of a documentary on the artist (Wikipedia)
The following painting was my introduction to McCahon. It harks back to his first ‘I AM’ based on God’s words to Moses in Exodus. This, ‘Gate III’ is one of his largest paintings (3.05m x 10.67m) and presents McCahon’s attitude towards the spiritual destruction he felt was threatened by the loss of those spiritual ideals that bind a society together. New Zealand almost prides itself on being secular; the country does not announce a particular national religion, but includes all. And yet, in such inclusivity, I feel a sense of the spiritual is scattered and lost among the many within the land.
“Gate III” by Colin McCahon
There is a thin blue line at the edge of the ‘M’ where the light overcomes the darkness, that morning-light colour, explained by Goethe in his theory of colour, while the words themselves express a spiritual struggle . . . . and an eventual resolution to peace, into “a pure land”.
in this dark
night of Western
civilization
O earth earth earth How is the hammer of the
whole earth cut
asunder and broken.
All ye who kindle a fire and gird
Yourselves about with firebrands:
Walk ye in the flames of your fire and among
the brands which ye have kindled.
The earth shall stagger like a drunken man
Then the moon shall be confounded and the sun ashamed.
teach us to order God be gracious to us and bless us.
our days rightly, God make his face shine upon us.
that we may enter that his ways may be known on earth
the gate And his saving power
of Among all the nations.
wisdom. The Lord bless you.
The Lord, your true goal,
your holy mountain
as there is a constant
flow of light we are
born
into a pure land -
as there is a constant
flow of light
we are born into
a pure land.
The way in which McCahon places emphasis on certain words, through their placement and through the thickness of the paint, and whether he has used black or white for the words; the landscape shapes and ‘sky’ colours, all tell his story. The ‘I’ suggests the breaking asunder of the earth; the ochre ‘sky’ above the horizon of mountains and the darkness overwhelming it at the beginning, contrasts sharply to the light/love portrayed at the end of the story, when one has entered through the ‘gate’.
Such despair at the beginning, and such hope through faith towards the final words resonated with my own feelings of our land. Thought by many in the world to be a paradise, an Eden, but where, before people ever arrived about 2,000 years ago, having no land animals; a land of trees and birds, with fish in the waters – no ‘Day Six of the Creation’! Yet the earth shakes and breaks, spewing forth sulphurous burning gases and lava; and our youth suicide rate is very high as well as physical abuse in families. Where the light is strong, there also is a dark shadow. We need to break through darkness to the light.
Colin McCahon was born in 1919 (d. 1987) in a small South Island, NZ, port-town, where his parents’ and grandparents’ commitment to a Wesleyan/Presbyterian faith and Irish roots had a strong impact on his spiritual search. As he had known since childhood that he would be a painter, he brought his personal exploration of the nature of religious belief into his work. The relationship of light to dark, used in colour and later in black and white, expresses this search and the challenges his own personal beliefs took him to in an increasingly secular age. Early paintings present McCahon’s feeling of God within the land, with few embellishments; here is experienced . . . the ground of existence of the heavens and of the earth . . .
“Otago Peninsula”, 1946
This peninsula projects into the north-east towards the morning light, from my hometown of Dunedin. The sandy area to the right shelters…(to read the whole piece, please click here)
The author, Lesley Waite, with her daughters
Lesley Waite now live in Wellington, New Zealand, mother of two daughters who each have two children. One daughter and family live in Warwickshire, England, the other with her family in New South Wales, Australia. Travels have become pilgrimages; outer journeys often coincide with inner journeying towards the meaning and expression of faith. In preparation towards possible service at the altar, travel has become ‘digital’ as a zoom.room is dialed up; faith and hope now face challenges in a new guise!
This is the ‘Arts Wednesday Blog’ of the Seminary of The Christian Community in North America. To learn more about what we are doing at the Seminary of The Christian Community, visit our Patreon site for more content: The Light in Every Thing.
