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Final exhibit in Sacred Art Series opens Nov. 17

bj
November 13, 2000

NORTHFIELD, Minn. ? A new exhibit that uses paintings and essays to explore world religions opens at St. Olaf College?s Steensland Art Museum Friday, Nov. 17, and runs through Wednesday, Dec. 20.

The Mark McGinnis exhibit, called "Designs of Faith," is among the last in the six-month Sacred Arts Series throughout Minnesota. McGinnis uses a series of essays and paintings to look at Christianity, Islam, Baha?i, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, the dreaming religion of Aboriginal Australia, Hopi, Ifa Divination of the Yoruba of West Africa and Inuit Spiritualism.

McGinnis will discuss his work in a slide lecture in Flaten Auditorium Friday, Nov. 17, at 4 p.m. The opening reception will be from 5-7 p.m. that day.

McGinnis undertook the project in 1992, hoping to find meaning and direction for his own life while improving his art. Like many artists in the early 1990s, he was fed up with the post-industrial role that economics played in influencing society and the West?s domination by consumerism. His intent, he said, was "to study alternative ways of designing our relationships from many cultural sources."

To learn about world religions McGinnis turned to basic religious texts as well as scholarly and critical writings, and then created one essay for each religion. Each essay explains the foundational history of the faith and a description of its moral and ethical teachings.

McGinnis used his research to create his paintings, striving to capture the essence of each faith by using its time-honored symbolism and visual conventions as seen through the eyes of a contemporary western painter. He completed the exhibit in 1998.

The pieces in his project are arranged into spiritual and geographic sections: "western" religions (though all were born in the Middle East); the Indian faiths; Chinese religions; and tribal religions of Australia, the United States, the Arctic and West Africa.

McGinnis? effort inspired a number of revelations. In Judaism he found remarkable "adaptability and determination to survive." In his native Christianity he again felt "connected to the faith of my youth." In Islam he discovered a great deal of strife with other religions, and found Mohammed to be "one of the most remarkable people I studied."

His studies revealed commonalties among many religions, including Hinduism, Judaism and the tribal faiths. And he found differences, the greatest between Christianity and the tribal spirituality.

The Sacred Arts Series was produced by the Basilica of Saint Mary in conjunction with its Millennium 2000 celebration of 2000 years of Christianity. The 15-month celebration embraces the liturgical calendar from Advent 1999 (November) through Epiphany 2001 (January), and includes worship, lectures, festivals, meditations, art exhibitions and other events.

The series concludes in February 2001 with a symposium that will explore the relationship between art and religion in America, public life.

Those who want more information about the Sacred Arts Series or other Millennium 2000 events may call (612) 333-1381 or visit the web site at www.mary.org.

Steensland Art Museum is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday; 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Thursday; and 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For more information about the museum, please call (507) 646-3556.

St. Olaf College prepares students to become responsible citizens of the world, fostering development of mind, body and spirit. A four-year, coeducational liberal arts college of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), St. Olaf has a student enrollment of 2,950 and a full-time faculty of approximately 256. It is one of Money Guide?s top 100 "elite values in college education today," and it leads the nation?s colleges in number of students who study abroad.

Contact Michael Cooper at 507-786-3315 or cooperm@stolaf.edu.