The Potential for Beauty

By Amy Cruz

Seeing beauty and the potential for beauty is a skill any great artist possesses.  In my own work, I paint not only on canvas, but also on cardboard and $1.99 window shutters from Goodwill.  Most of my paintings are simple images, but several contain lines, shapes, colors.  Art doesn't have to be complicated, just interesting to look at-- let's call it gaze-worthy.  Gaze-worthy art doesn't have to be beautiful. It just has to capture the viewer for more than five seconds.  However, most people buy or create art that they consider beautiful in some way.  

Different art appeals to different people, just like some prefer the mountains over the beach.  Mountain lovers are drawn to artwork that reminds them of the mountains, even if it's just color similarities, and they are not entirely sure why they like a particular painting over another.  From the looks of my artwork, I don't think I could live anywhere without trees.  Some people are captivated by photo-realistic paintings while others enjoy impressionistic or abstract paintings.  I appreciate the craftsmanship that goes into photo-realistic painting, but I would rather gaze for hours at a painting with many loose brush strokes.

As an art teacher, one of my biggest goals is to teach my students to see beauty and the potential for beauty in everything from the small and common to the large and magnificent.  Seeing beauty in the sky is not hard if you just pause to look at it from time to time.  Seeing the beauty in the lines of a chair is slightly more difficult.  Seeing the potential for beauty in something empty, like a blank canvas, is much harder.  You must imagine beauty before it can be created.  As Michelangelo once said, "I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free."  I think God wants us to enjoy the insignificant and the impressive, love the landscape of each moment and look forward to what's next, love people where they are, envision where they are going, and see the potential for beauty in the places they are lacking; approach all of life as art in the making.

Recently, we finished a yarn installation at my school.  I imagined the potential for beauty with yarn in the courtyard where the installation was to be constructed. I was inspired by the work of such artists as Sebastein Preschoux and Chiharu Shiota. It took twenty-five hours, two hundred students, twenty rolls of yarn, two teachers, collaboration, communication, creativity, problem-solving skills and sharing the vision with others to make it happen.  Everyone did a great job.  Every day people walk by and pause to take in the sight of the yarn that transformed the space:  warm-colored strands reaching down to benches that make a spiral in the bottom of the courtyard, and cool-colored strands forming a spiderweb between the second and third story windows.  It is definitely gaze-worthy.

God loves creating beautiful things, gaze-worthy things.  From my travels I know his ideas of beauty are far-reaching and unexpected.  He sees the potential beauty in any void or place of lack. Yosemite National Park is one of my favorite of his works.  I wonder how the landscape looked before he formed the valleys, waterfalls, mountains, and meadows?  
You are gaze-worthy, by the way.  Did you know that?  Be encouraged to see the beauty and potential for beauty in places, things and especially people.  Be encouraged.

Amy Cruz is a gifted artist, teacher, hip hop dancer, and choreographer.  She is a teaching fellow at Reynolds High School in Winston-Salem, and lives with her husband Michael and her cat Winston.  She loves painting, weaving, and interior design and does much of her painting during worship at church.  To view more of her art, check out her facebook page at www.facebook.com/pages/Amy-Cruz-Gallery/137761569568289.  You can reach Amy at ae.cruz22@yahoo.com.

Deep Breakthrough

By Jean Smith

Deep Breakthrough, 24" x 36" oil

I am an oil painter with a preference for portraits and figures, but about two years ago, while everyone sang songs to God in church, I started expressing my worship with paint.  I painted this piece Sunday, March 12, 2012, for the grand opening of Center City Church's new building in downtown Greensboro, NC.

I had asked God for an idea, an image, wisdom, encouragement, and favor before I painted this.  When I got ready to lay down the first stroke, I still wasn't sure what direction to go.  I started with a big white swipe with my pallet knife.  It unfolded, and I participated.  All that makes me, me, is here.  Things that I know.  Things that I feel.  Skills that I have.  A willingness to take risks.  Faith.  a heart for the things of God and his people.

The concept of a breakthrough from a deep place began to emerge.  I thought of breaking the strongholds, such as lies we believe or the repercussions of a damaged childhood, that keep us from living the full and vibrant life we were meant to live.  Of kicking out that ceiling that isolates and smothers us.  Of taking what we know and acting on it instead of believing in our own excuses.  There are dynamics here.  Intercession.  Not settling for the norm.

How it gets from the soul to the canvas is still very much a mystery to me.  Often I don't have anything to say about what I just painted until I sit down and look at it from afar.  Then I see something in it or know who it's for.  It amazes me.  God often speaks to me through the feedback I get to confirm what it says.  I get to know and experience the faithfulness that God has for me and his dear ones.  I paint prophetically even though I don't understand how it works.  

I just know it does.

When Jean was seven years old, her grandmother taught her how to sew.  That launched her into a lifelong pursuit of craftsmanship and creative problem solving for the fun of making her own stuff.  She tried everything from sewing, quilting, and macrame', to Indian beading and beyond. In 2004, Jean delved into oil painting.

Currently, Jean belongs to The Cosmic Cow Society, Art With Purpose, and The Portrait Society of America.  Her day job is carrying mail for the US Postal Service.  She accepts portrait commissions.  To see samples of her work, please visit her website and sign up for her blog at www.JeanSmithArtist.com.  Jean lives in Winston-Salem, NC.