Dissatisfied with existing Christian approaches to modern and contemporary art, critic and curator Daniel A. Siedell charts a new course with God in the Gallery: A Christian Embrace of Modern Art (Baker Academic , 2009), which takes for granted the importance of engaging modern and contemporary art on its own terms, from the inside, as it were. Rather than simply imposed from the outside, Siedell’s theological perspective emerges in conversation with modern and contemporary art. Between Art and Religion responds to art historian James Elkins’s claim that art and religion cannot mix by reflecting on the theological implications of God in the Gallery. Siedell offers the image of the darkly lit hallway to describe how his work develops deep relationships between art and religion without destroying the integrity of each practice.
The Institute for Cultural Engagement, an official program of Multnomah University and Biblical Seminary