WORSHIP THROUGH ART
Below is a lesson plan that I wrote for introducing the arts into a weekly worship service.
Every generation there are men and women who reshape the way we view the world. They have the courage to take something old and make it new again. In the mid 1900’s an artist talent, in Europe, was based on how accurately he or she could re-depict the world. Precision, detail, and realism, where highly valued. However, with the invention of photography and the development of a highly elite market, everything began to change. A few french painters started to think about how to express the world in new ways, as an impression.
When one puts a painting created by a realist and an impressionist side by side the realist will be clear, crisp, and the impressionist will appear blurry. This blurriness was not because the artist needed a new pair of glasses, but to leave room for our imaginations to fill in the rest. Impressionist began to study how colors responded to each other and how lines can represent movement. This new lose impressionistic style of painting developed by artist such as Monet, Renoir, and Van Gough, did not just change the landscape of the art world, but the landscape of the music world as well.
In 1885 one of these impressionistic painters named Claude Monet set up his easel on the coast of France and began painting the sea. He captured several archways including “The Manneporte,” eery orange and blue sunsets, and rows of fishing boats waiting to be taken out to sea by their owners. Monet’s painting of the Escrete coastline and water lilies inspired a classical composer named Claude Debussy. Debussy compositions changed after being exposed to Monets paintings. The same movement of the waves that Monet captured in his free flowing lines and curves Debussy captures in his rhythms and unresolved harmonies. Claude Debussy is now know as the father of impressionism in music.
The story of Claude Monet and Claude Debussy is a beautiful example of how the visual arts and the musical arts inspire and complement one another. We can have this same relationship between musician and artist in our congregations.
We can learn how to inspire and sper one another on when it comes to worship. Their are many different ways to set up a safe environment were this can start to happen. The first and most important is exposure. How can one be inspired by something if they have not seen it, or heard it for themselves. Claude Debussy would not have begun playing with the idea of incorporating the ideas of impressionism into his music if he had not been exposed to the work of Claude Monet and others. Every Sunday morning we have the opportunity to inspire our congregations to express their worship to the God of the Universe in new ways, new lines, colors, harmonies, and instrumental overtures, we do this through the songs we choose, the words we read, and the images we display.
Exposure as a parable:
There were two farmers, who had large farms with lots of workers. One farmer gave his workers corn seeds to plant. The workers planted the corn and when it came to harvest they had corn to live on through the winter. The other farmer gave his workers corn, lettuce, carrot, broccoli, tomato, onion, beans, spinach, turnips, and potatoes seeds to plant. The workers planted the corn, lettuce, carrot, broccoli, tomato, onion, beans, spinach, turnips, and potatoes. They harvested each vegetable during its season. They enjoyed sweet salads all summer long and lived on corn, carrots, canned tomatoes, onions, dried beans, turnips and potatoes through the winter.
Often times we think that we only like corn because all we have ever been exposed to is corn. As leaders it is time for us to diversify our seeds when it comes to worship and see what grows.
Week 1: (I do- Building interest and meaning)
Tell the story of how the work of Monet inspired Debussy as part of the worship. Follow up this story with a story from your congregation on how a visual artist has inspired one of the people on your worship team, or how a piece of music has inspired one of the visual artist in your congregation. After the story, project Claude Monet’s, “the Manneporte,” a shoreline arch, or a slide show of several of Monets paintings from Escrete, and while playing Claude Debussys, “La Mer”(French for The Sea). “La Mer” is written in three parts. If you have time constraints, I would recommend playing only the second stanza.
Week 2: (We do- sheltered practice)
Give everyone in the congregation the supplies needed to respond to music through drawing. (Two pieces of paper, colored pencils, and a hard surface to work on.) Choose a song that connects well to the current sermon series or season of the church calendar. The first time the worship band or choir sings through the song instruct the congregation to just listen and brainstorm ideas on a piece of paper.
The second time the worship team sings the song through, invite each person to take one of his or her sketches and expand on it on the second piece of paper while the music is playing. Have a gallery board in your auditorium where people can hang these pictures to share with oneanother. Make sure there is a write up on the board explaining to everyone how the work was created and what song they were inspired by. If you choose a song with words hang the words next to the board for people to refer to.
Week 3: (Exposure)
Encourage people to go to the art station and meditate on others artistic expressions as you sing together, or scan some of the images in and play them as a slide show while the worship team plays or choir sings the song again this Sunday.
Week 4: (You do-Individuals continue to use and grow from engaging with this practice on their own.)
Post instructions on how to use the art station and Monets “the Manneporte,” for people to participate with again if they choose. Invite the congregation to use the art station. Do not assume they will know that they are allowed to get up out of their pue or chair and visit it during worship. Show you value the images that are created in this space by leaving everyones work up on the gallery board and rearranging them before the next service to make space for new work.
Helpful Hints for an Art Station:
Hang a rules of the studio poster.
Make sure to post when exhibits will be taken down to make room for new exhibits on the gallery board, and where the box is located for people to collect their work after the exhibit is taken down.
Protect you hardwood floors or nice carpet by laying down a large cheep carpet rug, or piece of linoleum, down under the table and easels to collect any spills, drips, dust, or bits of clay.
"Music is the expression of the movement of the waters, the play of curves described by changing breezes. He who feels what he sees will find no more beautiful example of development in all that book which, alas, musicians read but too little--the book of Nature." (Claude-Achille Debussy (Living Masters of Music)) (Claude-Achille Debussy, inspired by Claude Monet’s Water Lillies: The Clouds, 1903)
Below is a lesson plan that I wrote for introducing the arts into a weekly worship service.
Every generation there are men and women who reshape the way we view the world. They have the courage to take something old and make it new again. In the mid 1900’s an artist talent, in Europe, was based on how accurately he or she could re-depict the world. Precision, detail, and realism, where highly valued. However, with the invention of photography and the development of a highly elite market, everything began to change. A few french painters started to think about how to express the world in new ways, as an impression.
When one puts a painting created by a realist and an impressionist side by side the realist will be clear, crisp, and the impressionist will appear blurry. This blurriness was not because the artist needed a new pair of glasses, but to leave room for our imaginations to fill in the rest. Impressionist began to study how colors responded to each other and how lines can represent movement. This new lose impressionistic style of painting developed by artist such as Monet, Renoir, and Van Gough, did not just change the landscape of the art world, but the landscape of the music world as well.
In 1885 one of these impressionistic painters named Claude Monet set up his easel on the coast of France and began painting the sea. He captured several archways including “The Manneporte,” eery orange and blue sunsets, and rows of fishing boats waiting to be taken out to sea by their owners. Monet’s painting of the Escrete coastline and water lilies inspired a classical composer named Claude Debussy. Debussy compositions changed after being exposed to Monets paintings. The same movement of the waves that Monet captured in his free flowing lines and curves Debussy captures in his rhythms and unresolved harmonies. Claude Debussy is now know as the father of impressionism in music.
The story of Claude Monet and Claude Debussy is a beautiful example of how the visual arts and the musical arts inspire and complement one another. We can have this same relationship between musician and artist in our congregations.
We can learn how to inspire and sper one another on when it comes to worship. Their are many different ways to set up a safe environment were this can start to happen. The first and most important is exposure. How can one be inspired by something if they have not seen it, or heard it for themselves. Claude Debussy would not have begun playing with the idea of incorporating the ideas of impressionism into his music if he had not been exposed to the work of Claude Monet and others. Every Sunday morning we have the opportunity to inspire our congregations to express their worship to the God of the Universe in new ways, new lines, colors, harmonies, and instrumental overtures, we do this through the songs we choose, the words we read, and the images we display.
Exposure as a parable:
There were two farmers, who had large farms with lots of workers. One farmer gave his workers corn seeds to plant. The workers planted the corn and when it came to harvest they had corn to live on through the winter. The other farmer gave his workers corn, lettuce, carrot, broccoli, tomato, onion, beans, spinach, turnips, and potatoes seeds to plant. The workers planted the corn, lettuce, carrot, broccoli, tomato, onion, beans, spinach, turnips, and potatoes. They harvested each vegetable during its season. They enjoyed sweet salads all summer long and lived on corn, carrots, canned tomatoes, onions, dried beans, turnips and potatoes through the winter.
Often times we think that we only like corn because all we have ever been exposed to is corn. As leaders it is time for us to diversify our seeds when it comes to worship and see what grows.
Week 1: (I do- Building interest and meaning)
Tell the story of how the work of Monet inspired Debussy as part of the worship. Follow up this story with a story from your congregation on how a visual artist has inspired one of the people on your worship team, or how a piece of music has inspired one of the visual artist in your congregation. After the story, project Claude Monet’s, “the Manneporte,” a shoreline arch, or a slide show of several of Monets paintings from Escrete, and while playing Claude Debussys, “La Mer”(French for The Sea). “La Mer” is written in three parts. If you have time constraints, I would recommend playing only the second stanza.
Week 2: (We do- sheltered practice)
Give everyone in the congregation the supplies needed to respond to music through drawing. (Two pieces of paper, colored pencils, and a hard surface to work on.) Choose a song that connects well to the current sermon series or season of the church calendar. The first time the worship band or choir sings through the song instruct the congregation to just listen and brainstorm ideas on a piece of paper.
The second time the worship team sings the song through, invite each person to take one of his or her sketches and expand on it on the second piece of paper while the music is playing. Have a gallery board in your auditorium where people can hang these pictures to share with oneanother. Make sure there is a write up on the board explaining to everyone how the work was created and what song they were inspired by. If you choose a song with words hang the words next to the board for people to refer to.
Week 3: (Exposure)
Encourage people to go to the art station and meditate on others artistic expressions as you sing together, or scan some of the images in and play them as a slide show while the worship team plays or choir sings the song again this Sunday.
Week 4: (You do-Individuals continue to use and grow from engaging with this practice on their own.)
Post instructions on how to use the art station and Monets “the Manneporte,” for people to participate with again if they choose. Invite the congregation to use the art station. Do not assume they will know that they are allowed to get up out of their pue or chair and visit it during worship. Show you value the images that are created in this space by leaving everyones work up on the gallery board and rearranging them before the next service to make space for new work.
Helpful Hints for an Art Station:
Hang a rules of the studio poster.
Make sure to post when exhibits will be taken down to make room for new exhibits on the gallery board, and where the box is located for people to collect their work after the exhibit is taken down.
Protect you hardwood floors or nice carpet by laying down a large cheep carpet rug, or piece of linoleum, down under the table and easels to collect any spills, drips, dust, or bits of clay.
"Music is the expression of the movement of the waters, the play of curves described by changing breezes. He who feels what he sees will find no more beautiful example of development in all that book which, alas, musicians read but too little--the book of Nature." (Claude-Achille Debussy (Living Masters of Music)) (Claude-Achille Debussy, inspired by Claude Monet’s Water Lillies: The Clouds, 1903)
Labels: Intro to worship through art
posted by Kathryn M. | 11:52 AM
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