LAURA JANE KENNY | staff writer
Fourteen stations were scattered across both the West and East campuses from March 10 to 14. The Stations of the Cross were presented by the Campus Pastors offi ce and the Art Department to bring students the unique ability to engage in the journey that Jesus took before He was crucifi ed through art and expression.
The different stations tied in scripture and student involvement through a type of art called “installation.” This contemporary art form is designed to engage the viewer with the art and was used as a way to bring students closer to the Easter story. “The personal and neat thing isthe stations have the scripture that goes along with it. Just being able to go to the station and be able to read the scripture and do the interactive activity with it, you can understand what Jesus went through on this journey before he was crucifi ed,” graduate intern at the Campus Pastors office Meghan Matthews said.
As the intern for the Campus Pastors offi ce, Matthews had the opportunity to get everyone together. Art professors David Carlson, Kent Anderson Butler, Susan Ney, Guy Kinnear, and Melanie Weaver worked with nine classes of art students to set up and create the different installations around campus. “I just think this is something that not many students have experienced before or gotten the opportunity to do, to help them prepare their hearts for Easter time,” Matthews said. Weaver helped set up the different sites and was excited to give students the unique opportunity to get involved with such a contemporary art form that is not often used or understood.
“It is powerful because the installations are connected to the [geographical] site. Once they’re gone, people will still remember when they look at that place,” Weaver said The installations, which were not organized numerically, were set up to walk the viewer through the journey that Jesus had while He was approaching his crucifixion. The sites were not placed in numerical order because their setting was very important to the art.
“It is really powerful to have contemporary art. The church has been so divorced from art for so many years,” Weaver said.
