| By
John M. De Marco
ORLANDO — An art therapist’s depictions of
female characters from Scripture played a prominent role in Asbury
Theological Seminary-Orlando’s recent Women in Ministry emphasis.
Reesa Boyce, a member of Memorial United
Methodist Church in Lake Placid, produced 20 separate collages of
biblical women, ranging from Eve to Miriam to the Samaritan Woman, all
with contemporary faces chosen from magazines. The exhibit, titled “The
Women of the Bible,” was displayed at the seminary Feb. 12 to March
12.
Boyce said the 10 Old Testament and 10 New
Testament depictions can be examined from three separate levels:
artistic design, the biblical stories themselves and women’s issues
in general. The collages are symbolic, with the Hebrew word for “life”
appearing in many of them.
“The overall theme is choosing life and not
death through our behaviors,” Boyce said. “The word for life is
placed in such a way to remind us that ‘woman’ is the timeless
link to life before and after. She [Eve] stands as the mother of
humankind, drawing us into her beginnings and pushing us in the
direction to make the right choice. Eve has taken the rap for a lot of
us over the years. The truth is that we are all responsible. Eve
models the choices we all can make. And Adam is in a position to model
the kind of sacrifice necessary for life to happen.”
Text detailing the stories behind the artwork is
positioned next to the portraits.
Boyce’s work has been displayed in a number of
locations around Lake Placid, including South Florida Community
College. She said she has received encouraging feedback from people
and has been pleased with the affirmation her work has received from
the seminary, as well.
“Art is a very interactive technique,” she
said. “I put my projections onto the work, and that’s what you
see. The viewer comes with their own life experiences and awareness
and understanding and projects that on the images there. I’ve had
the opportunity of standing next to folks listening to their comments,
and they will see things that just blow me away. I hadn’t intended
consciously to have these things in there, but there they are.”
A fairly new Christian, Boyce said she worked
closely with her pastors to ensure theological integrity in her
paintings. “When you take artistic and creative license, you want to
ensure you’re staying with the truth of the Bible, not only the
story of the women.”
To support the seminary’s Women in Ministry
emphasis this February Asbury-Orlando Professor Brian Russell
delivered a lecture titled “Patriarchy, Women in Ministry and the
Authority of Scripture.” Dr. Paul Chilcote, associate dean of the
Orlando campus’ school of theology, spoke on the heritage of women
in ministry in the Wesleyan tradition, and the Rev. Dr. Barbara
Riddle, pastor of Ortega United Methodist Church in Jacksonville,
preached during the Feb. 28 chapel service and participated in a panel
discussion on women in ministry issues.
Boyce plans to compile the story behind the
collages into a book with prints of the artwork. Boyce formerly worked
with a substance abuse rehabilitation program in Fort Myers. Her
responsibilities included art therapy, a field she studied while
earning her master’s degree in art education. “It’s [art] very
effective in terms of non-verbal communication, which sometimes is
truer and more to the point than words,” she said. |
