ECVA - Sally Brower - Stories from the Road

Pilgrim Cross

Photograph

Artist Statement: In Jan Richardson’s poem, For Those Who Have to Travel Far, she writes: "There is nothing for it but to go and by our going take the vows the pilgrim takes: to keep an open eye for the wonders that attend the path;” On pilgrimage in Portugal, I entered a small sailor’s chapel and was immediately struck by the light from a windows casting the shape of a cross on my shadow. It was a reminder that there are always wonders attending our path if we keep our eyes open and stay attentive. When we set out on pilgrimage, we are always following the way of the cross, and we are always marked with the cross of the one we seek.

Bio: In my vocation as priest and as artist, I endeavor to evoke the holy. I use visual art and writing to invite others to awaken to the mystery of love at the heart of the universe, risk sacred encounter, and cross the threshold of their heart's deepest hopes.

I graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts and studied photography, encaustic and frame building with Taos artist Mikel Robinson.

I am currently working with photography from pilgrimages to holy places and in nature, each one a record of a moment when the divine spoke to me through the incarnate world. My jewelry making uses my photos of Mary and the saints to create contemporary reliquaries. Rather than containing a relic, each piece preserves the work of an anonymous sculptor from an ancient cathedral and a devotional image providing a sacred connection.