Category: Mormon Arts

  • A Mormon Image: Irish Football

    The following picture was sent to me by a law professor that I know at Notre Dame. The picture was taken during the Notre Dame v. BYU football game last fall, which was held in South Bend.

  • A Mormon Image: The Angel in the Mountains

    Mormonism managed to make it as National Geographic’s photograph of the day.

  • A Mormon Image: Quilting the Tree of Life

    What counts as art is an interesting question. We have a bias toward thinking of art in terms of oil paintings, bronze statues, or marble carvings. One of the unfortunate effects of this bias is that it makes much of the art done by women invisibile. You’ll note that most of the work done in…

  • A Mormon Image: Temple Murals and Art Missionaries

    While many members don’t realize it, there is actually a fairly strong tradition of impressionistic painting among Mormon artistists. The origins of the tradition go back to the decision of the Church to send some budding young LDS artists to Paris as “Art Missionaries” in the late 19th century. This painting, a study for the…

  • A Mormon Image: The All-Seeing Eye

    During the nineteenth-century all-seeing eyes were a common Mormon image. They seem to have been borrowed from Masonry and represented the presence of God. Accordingly, the symbol was frequently associated with temples, and appears in numerous places on the interior and exterior of the Salt Lake Temple. This image, however, is much earlier and comes…

  • A Mormon Image: The 19th Ward Chapel

    When Brigham Young laid out Great Salt Lake City in the 1840s, he modeled it on the Mormon experience in Nuavoo. Thus, the city was divided into wards, which were combined to form the original Salt Lake Stake of Zion. In all there were nineteen of these wards, and they continued to be the core…

  • A Mormon Image: A Photograph of Joseph?

    Some believe that this image is a photograph of the Prophet Joseph Smith. If they are right, it is the only known photographic image of Joseph . . .

  • A Mormon Image: C.C.A. Christiansen

    Since blogs seem to thrive on regular features, I have decided to start one here at T&S. Because my father is an art historian and a curator at the Museum of Church History and Art, I have always been interested in the images and art that Mormonism has produced. Thus, I will begin regularlly posting…

  • An Image for Kaimi

    Here is what I have always thought was the best visual depication of Kaimi’s theory of Book of Mormon geography. The painting is by the wonderful Minerva Teichert.

  • He Forgets Not His Own

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  • A Mormon Image: Our Army

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  • Another post about hymns

    Greg’s recent post about hymns made me think again about an issue I’ve been reminded of every several months for the past two years. I live in the Bronx, and my ward has somewhat unusual demographics. It is probably 60% African-American, including the Bishop and First Counselor, which I had never seen in a U.S.…

  • Reason’s Stare

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  • Eliza R. Snow in the New York Post

    A couple of weeks ago I was perusing that paragon of journalistic integrity, the New York Post (today’s cover: “JACKO: Now Get Out of This One!), and saw a phrase that I’d previously only heard sung (much too slowly) in church. The lead of George Will’s column was “Of capital punishment, Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney…