August 09

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Being Human

Posted by on August 9, 2022 in art, covid, Theology | Leave a comment

I have entered the second week of my annual leave and have got into the pace of slowing down and switching off (as much as a hyperactive brain can).

The luxury of time to think and mull ideas over, marinate in the experiences of the pandemic and my hope for the future.

Today I visited my favourite place with a friend: Liverpool Cathedral. The building always feel like home to me, a place of sanctuary respite, love and care. In ‘Let Go, And Let God’ I stated:

“When I come before God I am tiny and small and insignificant. That is necessary”.

[Peter Walker sculpture at the ‘Being Human’ exhibition, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, 9th August 2022. The pink neon sign in the background is by Tracey Emin and reads ‘I felt you and I knew you loved me’].

We are only human and in the grand scheme of things we are completely inept and completely insignificant.

The ‘Being Human’ exhibition at Liverpool Anglical Cathedral has sculptures by Peter Walker. It reminded me how of our smallness and mortality and our human need for connection.

The centre–piece of Walker’s exhibition is surely his giant hands called Connection, a sculpture featuring two giant-sized female hands, each towering two metres high. Situated at the heart of the ‘Being Human’ exhibition, Connection is a contemporary twist on Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel masterpiece, the Creation of Adam, which depicts God’s hand reaching out to meet Adam’s finger.

[Peter Walker ‘Connection’ as part of the ‘Being Human’ exhibition at Liverpool Anglican Cathedral].

The sculpture symbolises the isolation felt by many during the pandemic and the need for people to come back together.

[Peter Walker ‘Connection’ scuplture lit up in green. In the background we see the neon pink Tracey Emin ‘I Felt You, And I Knew You Loved Me’ sign].

It reminds me of the ‘happy clappy’ primary school banger ‘He Has The Whole World in His Hands’.

We have a human urge for control, for data, for safety, for certainty. Yet ultimately none of this ends in our our timing, and despite the best efforts of humans, it is out of our hands.

In Professor Lucy Easthope’s book When the Dust Settles, which I blog about here, she states:

““We and our children have been framed as vectors of disease. I wish we could have found a way to have kept shame, stigma and threat out of public health messaging. I hope that soon, we can find a way to reach back to each other again, without the fear” (Easthope, 2022, p. 270).

I have spoken/written/tweeted repeatedly about the ‘bad law’ during the pandemic, and I won’t repeat myself here. But seeing this sculpture of Mary Magdalene, who I have blogged about here, was very powerful and affirming.

[The Sound of Mary Magdalene-bronze, by Peter Walker].

In this earlier post, which now reads as stangely prophetic, I wrote:

“The gospel of St. John 20.1-18 tells us the story, and we imagine it almost in real time. A frazzled and faithful Mary Magdalene running to exclaim that the Lord’s body has been taken. Mary just wants the body back. Anyone who has suffered loss knows the desperate feeling of wanting to be close to what you have left of that person, their body, their shell, and to be able to treat them honourably, to ‘do them proud’, to lay them to rest….Mary couldn’t leave the tomb without finding the body of the Lord. She desperately wanted Him.

The determination, resilience and loyalty of a woman grieving cannot be underestimated”.

This then leads me back to Professor Easthope’s words:

“But perhaps it is also true that the human spirit needs to draw a line, to find a way to let the bones and the bodies rest” (Easthope, 2022, p. 43).

Walker’s reflective memorial ‘The Leaves of the Trees’ fits beautifully with my own writing and thoughts on the wisdom of trees here.

[Peter Walker ‘The Leaves of tthe Trees’].

The sculpture is made of 5000 leaves with the word ‘Hope’ imprinted on them, honouring those who died and bearing witness to the pandemic and the need for hope.

[Peter Walker ‘The Leaves of the Trees’ sign].

We are not betraying the dead by having hope, but rather that is how we honour them and care for the living.

We face an incredibly difficult winter ahead. Let us be filled with hope and faith and find our way back home to each other and a deep human connection.

Gemma x