ARTS: The Arts in Religious and Theological Studies (vol. 25, no. 1), November 2013

In this issue, Wilson Yates surveys the 25-year history of ARTS in, It Began in the Lobby of the Algonquin: A Reflection on the History of ARTS. Cambridge University scholar, Graham Howes, contributes Christian Wisdom and the Visual Arts, in which he challenges some mainstays in the religion and arts dialogue. We publish three poems by Pamela S. Wynn: My Dream About God; Belief; and Back Roads. Another British scholar, Charles Pickstone, examines the revolutionary dimension of the work of four artists short-listed for the prestigious Turner Prize in England: Martin Creed, Jeremy Deller, Yinka Shonibare, and Gillian Wearing, in his essay, Art, Religion, and the Public Sphere. Jim Malone, former Dean of the Medical School at Trinity College, Dublin, writes of John Synge's painting, Schrodinger in the Hand of God, as a means to explore the importance of creativity in science as in art. Bobbi Dykema explores artist Mel Ahlborn's appropriation of the Roman Catholic tradition of supplication to the Virgin in face of serious illness in Hope, Presence, Dignity, and Pain: Mel Ahlborn's Modern Love: Intercess and Wait. Canadian artist Bob Haverluck retells the story of King Nebuchadnezzar, in word and image, in his offering, The King of BIGGER and MORE. Finally, the issue reviews recent titles in theology and the arts, including Cecilia Gonzalez-Andrieu's Bridge to Wonder: Art as a Gospel of Beauty. Four additional titles are noted by Mark McInroy: Ruth Illman and W. Alan Smith, Theology and the Arts: Engaging Faith (New York: Routledge, 2013); Oleg V. Bychkov and James Fodor, eds., Theological Aesthetics after von Balthasar (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008); Christopher Irvine, The Cross and Creation in Christian Liturgy and Art (London: SPCK, 2013); and Aidan Nichols, Redeeming Beauty: Soundings in Sacral Aesthetics (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007).