A wall in Holly Metcalf’s home office is covered top to bottom in artwork. Like an I SPY image, the collection becomes more interesting and detailed the longer you look at it, filled with photographs, drawings, paintings, and paper cut outs of all styles, sizes, and colors. Despite all their variation, the pieces have one thing in common: each has a tie to Jesus Christ.
Holly enjoys visiting museums and has inherited some art from her mother, former Young Women General President Elaine A. Cannon, but she isn’t deeply interested in art otherwise. “It really is a fascination with art about the Savior and His life more than anything,” she says of her collection. “Art really helps me personalize my feelings about Him.”
Bringing the Scriptures to Life
Holly first began actively gathering religious art in 1991 when she was called to be a seminary teacher in Seattle, Washington. “I felt like I needed every trick in the book to keep teenagers interested and to help them see the scripture stories in their mind,” she recalls.
For her lessons, she used all the Church art she could find, including pieces from the Gospel Art Kit. Gathering these images added dimension to Holly’s understanding of the gospel and helped her cultivate a visual testimony of the Savior.
“I fell in love with the way you can look at a picture, and in this case, a picture of the Savior, and feel the story a little more,” she says. “You’ll see things the artist has portrayed that catch your attention and bring out the pathos or the agony or the sweetness.”
But soon, the pieces in the Gospel Art Kit weren’t enough, so Holly looked for more art elsewhere. She began noticing images she liked in BYU Studies and other Church-related magazines and would rip them out for her lessons. She visited the Museum of Art at Brigham Young University, and there became familiar with artists like Carl Bloch and Brian Kershisnik, then bought their postcards from the museum gift shop. Holly particularly enjoyed finding pieces that her students hadn’t seen before or depictions of scriptural scenes they’d never thought about.
“The process really blessed me because I was thinking about Christ,” she says. “I was thinking about what He was teaching, what He was doing, and ‘how does this piece portray that?’”
As she gathered more and more art to use in her class, she began hanging some on a wall at home. “Pretty soon, I noticed that most of them were art of Jesus,” she says.
Drawing Strength from Art
After 13 years of teaching seminary, Holly was asked to teach institute. Having never served a mission, she was intimidated by teaching not only returned missionaries but also returned missionaries who were getting advanced degrees or working at places like Microsoft or Google.
“They were all very bright,” she says. “I was nervous.”
Following her first class, she was looking for something at home and happened upon her postcard of Carl Bloch’s painting Christ and the Young Child, which she’d purchased years before. After that day, she kept it among her notes as she taught from the podium each week.
“It reminded me that Jesus was standing behind me, sort of introducing me to the students. And He was standing behind them when they’d comment, and we had that in common. It comforted me.”
Now, years later, she continues to draw strength from the Christ-centered images that hang by her desk.
“When I’m sitting here working and I need a break, I look over, and it’s amazing which one will catch my eye at that time,” she says, then gestures to one painting. “It might be this little hen with the chicks gathered underneath her wings. It’s from a church in Jerusalem and reminds me that Jesus watches over me, He protects me, He helps me.”
How to Curate a Visual Testimony
From paintings by her daughter and art found in thrift stores to images xeroxed from books, Holly’s collection proves that art of the Savior doesn’t need to be expensive to be beautiful and to invite the Spirit. And she believes that there are artists all around us who are creating work we can enjoy.
“People in our wards and in our stakes are doing artwork that you might be able to get. ... Or it could be something that a grandkid or teenager does,” she says. “Look for what teaches you and what style catches your attention.”
She also recommends making an effort to notice art of Christ wherever you go—on walls, in magazines, on book covers, in greeting cards, in museums, and in Come, Follow Me manuals.
“Maybe a lot of it won’t appeal to you personally, but different pieces will appeal to different people,” she says. “Find things that speak to you.”
Read below what Holly said about her favorite pieces.
“One of my institute students gave me The Last Supper. She found it at a thrift shop, and she thought I would love it.”
“My granddaughter just got home from the Jerusalem Center. At the end, they did a little watercolor class. It’s a little picture of Bethlehem with the star shining. I love it because I love Christmas. I love the birth of Christ. I love thinking about the fact that the galaxy was in place to shine on His manger scene. It’s just so pretty, and I love the Holy Land.”
“My daughter Egan painted this. It’s kind of primitive art, but I love it because the colors and the design are simple, and you can see the purity and the holy state of a resurrected being. The chicken just adds a thing that is so cool. At Easter, we dye eggs, so it’s kind of an Easter picture. I love it. It makes me happy.”
“I see Him sweetly teaching these sisters both with their personalities, and it just reminds me that He teaches according to our needs.”
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