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Tyler Museum of Art Invites Congregations to Learn About Upcoming Saint John's Bible Exhibition

Tyler, TX—The Tyler Museum of Art will host a series of meetings to inform the public and area faith-based organizations about the upcoming exhibition, “Illuminating the Word: The Saint John’s Bible”, scheduled for June 9 through September 3 at the TMA.

“We anticipate that many congregations from throughout the region and surrounding states will be interested in attending this extraordinary exhibition as a group,” said Kimberley Tomio, TMA director. “These meetings are to give them more details about the art and how to make special arrangements for their groups.”

“Illuminating the Word: The Saint John’s Bible” is an exhibition organized by The Minneapolis Institute of Arts and Saint John’s University, now on a national tour supported by Target Stores. It features most of the completed works to date of The Saint John’s Bible, the most significant hand-written and hand-illuminated (illustrated) Bible commissioned since the invention of the printing press, some 500 years ago. The Saint John’s Bible has been described as “a masterwork…an unprecedented undertaking in contemporary book arts and a major cultural and interfaith endeavor.”

Featured at the area meetings will be Tim Ternes and Carol Marrin, members of the “Illuminating the Word” exhibition staff from Minneapolis, who will present a short video on The Saint John’s Bible project. All area faith-based organizations are invited to send representatives to any of these free meetings to learn about the exhibition, group rates and reservations. Group travel planners are also invited.

Public presentations are planned for February 23 at the La Quinta Inn in Longview at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., and at the Tyler Museum of Art February 25 and February 26 at 2 p.m. Other presentations are planned for February 21 at the Ruthe Jackson Center in Grand Prairie, TX from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. and with church leaders in Shreveport, LA on February 24. For details and directions to the meetings call the Tyler Museum of Art at 903-595-1001. Reservations are requested but not required.

Local individuals and corporations sponsoring the Tyler exhibition to date include Vernon and Amy Faulconer, The Rogers Foundation, Su Holder, the Rowland Foundation, the Fair Foundation, and the Byars Foundation. Corporate Member Sponsors are Dermatology Associates, Southside Bank and Tyler Cancer Center. The TMA is currently seeking additional local and regional sponsors for the exhibition and its companion events including the members opening reception, senior citizens day, educational lectures and calligraphy workshops.

“Illuminating the Word: The Saint John’s Bible” will be a ticketed exhibition, with free admission to TMA members. Admission fees are $10 for adults; $8 for seniors and college students with ID; $5 for children 13-17; $2 for children 3-12. Special group rates are available for churches, clubs and organizations, or tour groups with advance reservations.

Commissioned by Saint John’s Abbey and Saint John’s University in Collegeville, MN, The Saint John’s Bible is a contemporary work created in the tradition of handwritten medieval manuscripts. The artistic director of the project, Donald Jackson, is one of the world’s foremost calligraphers and scribe to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth’s Crown Office at the House of Lords. During the past five years, Jackson has worked in rural Wales, with scribes and artists to write and illuminate The Saint John’s Bible entirely by hand, using quills and paints hand-ground from precious minerals and stones such as lapis lazuli, vermilion, malachite, silver, copper, and 24-karat gold.

The “Illuminating the Word” exhibition features pages from the first three completed volumes of The Saint John’s Bible: the Pentateuch (the first five books of Jewish and Christian scripture), Gospels and Acts, and Psalms. Among the pages on view will be The Seven Days of Creation, Genesis, The Garden of Eden, Jacob’s Ladder, The Ten Commandments, The Parable of the Loaves and Fishes, The Sermon on the Mount, The Parable of the Sower and the Seed, The Birth of Christ, Dinner at the Pharisee’s House, The Woman Accused of Adultery, The Raising of Lazarus, The Death of Moses, The Crucifixion, the frontispieces for the four Gospels, and images of flora and fauna indigenous to Minnesota. Original artist sketches will be on view, and a work-table from the scriptorium where the artists work, displaying materials such as quills, hand-ground pigments, gold leaf, calfskin vellum, and ancient inks from China. The exhibition also includes examples of sacred texts from non-Christian religions and artwork from the special collections of Saint John’s University.

“We are very fortunate to be one of the first museums selected to show this incredible manuscript,” Ms. Tomio said. “In this region and throughout the world today, there is a great deal of interest in religious artwork. We feel this Bible will be recognized for centuries as a major contribution in that field. It is a showcase for both the finest calligraphy and contemporary illuminations of a sacred text.”

Theologians from Saint John’s Abbey and University and the College of Saint Benedict, together with consultants from other faiths, have worked with Jackson, providing theological briefs that direct the interpretation of scripture (using the New Revised Standard Version) in the illustrations. Based on these briefs, Jackson and his team of scribes and artists have created illuminations reflecting a multicultural world and humanity’s enormous strides in science, technology, and space travel. Because the project is an interfaith undertaking, Jackson has incorporated imagery from Eastern and Western religious traditions, as well as influences from Native American cultures. For example, an illumination in Gospels and Acts depicts the Earth as seen from space, a contemporary interpretation of the planet’s place in the universe. Illuminations throughout Psalms show artistic renderings of digital voice prints of Saint John’s monks chanting the Psalms—intersected with digital voice prints of calls to prayer in Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, Sufi, and Native American religious traditions.

“Illuminated manuscripts have always marked the time and place in which they were created, and The Saint John’s Bible will reflect our world at the beginning of the twenty-first century for future generations,” said Brother Dietrich Reinhart, OSB, president of Saint John’s University. “Today, through partnerships with museums and educational outreach, we hope to touch people of all cultures and creeds with the spirit and beauty of this book.”

The Saint John’s Bible, consisting of 1150 pages in seven volumes, will be completed in 2007, at a cost of about $4 million. Then it will be housed permanently at the Hill Museum and Manuscript Library, Saint John’s Abbey and University in Collegeville, Minnesota, where it will be used in worship and be available to scholars and the public. “ Illuminating the Word: The Saint John’s Bible” will tour to libraries and museums worldwide. After leaving Tyler in September, the exhibition will be displayed in the Library of Congress, the Naples (Florida) Art Museum, the Phoenix Art Museum and the Mobile Museum of Art. The Prophets volume will be displayed at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, with additional venues currently being scheduled.

Three exhibition-related books will be available at the TMA Gift Shop for purchase: Illuminating the Word: The Making of The Saint John’s Bible, Gospels and Acts, and The Psalms. For more information on the exhibition, to become a TMA member, or an exhibition sponsor call the Tyler Museum of Art at 903-595-1001.

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