Religious Art

Another Sunday is here, and I am meditating on the amazing week that past and the one starting right now. Today I have religious art on my mind. I was shown an image of Jack Black as Jesus last night, and I really wanted a similar piece in my home. I can’t find the one I was shown, so I created my own.

There are very few depictions of Mohammed in the world, because it’s prohibited by Sunni law. Here is one that I found of him on Wikipedia. (he is in the fire, talking to Abraham and Moses and Jesus)

I realized there are no great depictions of Muhammed anywhere on the internet, yet we have billions of Jesus and Buddha and Vishnu. I tried to have Midjourney make an image but it was rejected and prohibited. I went to Venice.ai (unrestricted ai that you can try) to make the image below. I just asked it to draw Muhammad the Prophet of Islam:

I grew up in a religion that had lots of imagery that members put in their home. There are large businesses and galleries selling Mormon art all over Utah. My neighbor is one of the famous artists named Greg Olsen who did this one of Jesus:

My two years in Italy taught me that most of the art from the Renaissance is religious, you couldn’t really paint outside of that genre. The bible was the main prompt for artists to work from. This isn’t too different than Mormon art that deals with themes from the Book of Mormon and early pioneer heritage of the people coming to Utah and settling here. This is Lehi’s family leaving the shores of Yemen or Oman enroute to New York.

And check out Joseph Smith seeing Jesus and Elohim in upstate New York on this stained glass done in 1913.

The power of art is so obvious. If you see it enough, how could it not be real? Of course Lehi came over with Nephi in a boat, I saw it every time I opened my scriptures. How could Joseph not have hung out with God in the forest, I have seen 100 different artist paint that moment.

Art has always been used to create belief in things we haven’t seen for ourselves. The playbook is thousands of years old. I do wish we had iphones back then just to get a few of these miracles in photo format.

What should religious art in the year 2025 look like?

Religions, the ones we can all name easily, deal in the business of belief sharing. They usually ask for worship in exchange for comfort, peace and healing. If your religion isn’t bringing comfort and peace, maybe it’s time to shop around.

I wonder if religious art of the future will be more feminine? I wonder if we can see more focus on mother nature herself.

I got a call last night from my boss, who informed me he had tinkered all day to create wallpaper for his Samsung Frame TV. I want the same images for my Frame, so he quickly thought of a way that we can all share art on our TVs.

We are going to offer Medicinal Art as part of Phi to anyone with a TV or screensaver computer. We think there is imagery that can create belief in yourself and even be healing and comforting and increase your very health-span. At first this service will be simple and not customized for you, but eventually your personal health data in Phi will create unique imagery just for you.

Scott X - 4:20 Daily News