Saturday Sharing (My Finds Are Yours)

Today's edition of Saturday Sharing will keep you busy with art, poetry, and a visualization of nature. Enjoy!

✭ If you have not yet visited the beautiful ArtWay, which debuted on Pentacost Sunday (May 23), go there now. The concept behind ArtWay is, as its vision statement explains, to "open up the world of the visual arts to the interested lay man and woman . . . to hand people a key to this world that is rich and fascinating yet sometimes hard to enter", and to do so by providing content that is "formed by the spiritual dimension of a work, whether Christian, Buddhist, post-modern or other. . . ArtWay intends to bring Christian art and reflection about art to all who are, or should be, interested. . . ." 

On ArtWay's site, you will find visual meditations, book reviews, articles about church and art, word and image Bible studies, information about artists (by name, country, and period), lists of exhibitions and events, a Christian calendar, quotes, numerous art- and faith-related resources, and more. 

ArtWay, whose operations are based in the Netherlands, appears in both a Dutch and an English version, and they are not the same. For those able to read in both languages, it is easy to toggle between the two versions. 

ArtWay's staff includes editor-in-chief Marleen Hengelaar-Rookmaaker, who holds a degree in musicology and has written about popular music and the visual arts, and associate editor Laurel Gasque, author of Art and the Christian Mind: The Life and Work of H.R. Rookmaaker (Crossway Books, 2005), and a lecturer in theology and the arts at Regent College in Vancouver, Canada. 

✭ Few of us have ever bothered to save ticket stubs. One artist, Mia Liu, has, and she's creating from them intricate paper sculptures that will delight and astonish. For images of her work, go here, here, here, and here. Some great close-up shots are here. Liu, born in Taiwan, exhibits around the world.

✭ Do you enjoy hearing poets talk? At Likestarlings, poets are paired together so they can "talk in poems", and photographers are paired with photographers so they can "talk in pictures". The result: wholly new work. Read currently available poems here. The section on images "is still in its infancy."

✭ A new illuminated book is out: Songs of Imagination and Digitisation, produced by if:book with support from the Arts Council England. This is no ordinary book. As its description reads, it "contains sound and moving images, involves walks and talks, even an imaginary brain made of copper plates, plus opportunities to enter your own thoughts and ideas" about poet William Blake. Read and listen and watch the book here. It's quite an experience in book-making. Kudos to the creative and innovative if:book team.

Also see Blake's Netbook.

✭ One of my favorite sites is Speaking of Faith's Observed blog. In May, Krista Tippett wrote an essay for Observed titled "What It Means for Me to Be Human", an introduction to her in-depth look at the "inner world of people with autism and whose who love them."

Included in Tippett's piece is a link to the beautifully written "Five Weeks", in which the late scientist Stephen Jay Gould writes about his son with autism. (The essay is from Gould's Questioning the Millennium, published in 1999.) 

I also recommend Edward Bryne's gorgeous collection of poems Tidal Air. (You may purchase the book directly from the poet; go here. Byrne's Website is here.) In addition, see his beautiful poem "Autism: Hyperlexia", published in the Spring 2010 issue of  Bellevue Literary Review.

✭ Whether or not you're a math whiz, you will appreciate the unquestionable beauty of this visualization of numbers as present in nature, Nature by Numbers (also see "The Theory Behind This Movie"), by Cristobal Vila, founder of the graphic and animation studio Eterea.

Also worth viewing are Vila's Fallingwater, a marvelous animation of Frank Lloyd Wright's arguably most famous architectural gem, and his illustrations for I Love Japan. Take time to explore all of the galleries of Vila's work by starting here (some exquisite works on paper, such as "Four Nudes" and "Chica que mira" or the watercolor "Garajonay 2", are to be found in Gallery 4). The list of links on Vila's site is fabulous.

Nature by Numbers from Cristóbal Vila on Vimeo.