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A Conversation with Sister Kathleen Holmberg, CSJ Painter of Icons - An Iconographer |
| The following article is an interview with a former staff member of St. Joan of Arc parish. The primary purpose for this discussion, was to examine one aspect of the journey of the spirit. These written snapshots are conversations between two people in which the person being interviewed willingly shares his/her ups, downs, reflections and life lessons with you the reader. In this case this is a conversation is with an artist and the role of art in religion. We hope that you enjoy this conversation and that it is of some help to your spiritual pilgrimage.
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Several months ago I was briefly introduced to a Sister Kathleen Holmberg, CSJ. I was told at the time that she was a painter of icons. Some months passed and our paths crossed again. This second meeting led me to ask her about the world of religious imagery. I admitted I was extremely curious, and I had a need to dispel some of my own ignorance. All I knew before we met, was that icons had been a source of great controversy with our spiritual ancestors. So on a clear cold December morning, I sat at Kathleen’s dining room table and laid out before me were several jewel-like samples of her work, accompanied by small jars of pigment, some delicate brushes, cloths, and a mixing dish. We talked for over three hours and Kathleen, ever the teacher, painstakingly walked me into a world of art, history, and the theology of God becoming man.
 I would like to refer once more to the sense of mystery that emerges in icons. It’s foundation is the mystery of the Incarnation, in which God has wished to take on the face of man. Through the contemplation of icons, inserted the whole of liturgical and ecclesiastical life, the Christian community is called to grow in it’s experience of God, becoming more and more a living icon of communion of life amongst the three divine Persons. It is toward this objective that the Christian East and West intend to go.
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A lot of things take root at St. Joan of Arc, so why was I not surprised to learn that Kathleen started to paint icons at a period of time when she was on staff at St. Joan of Arc. She was the Director of Religious Education for two years and one year she did Pastoral Ministry. The years were 1987 to 1990. She painted her second icon for Father Murtaugh. She has kept the very first one... maybe to remind her of the beginnings of a transition and as a measure of how far she had come as an iconographer. Even this first icon, which she showed me, caught the eye, with it’s earth tone colors and sheen. Kathleen, when asked, said she had always wanted to paint and the challenge of blending one’s spiritual search with the making of a work of art strongly appealed to her. What totally fascinated me was her initial approach. She simply read a book and followed the instructions. Even this method demonstrated that she did indeed have the talent for it.
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Kathleen Holmberg comes from an artistic family; her younger sister, Sister Hansgar, is a professional artist. She grew up in the Midwest and attended St. Joseph’s Academy in St. Paul. At eighteen she joined the community of the Sisters of St. Joseph. She took vows as Sister Mary Eric, and for twenty years she taught. She taught all primary grades and was eventually a principal and a superior. There came a point when Kathleen felt burnt out so she went in search of her own renewal. First she went South to Atlanta. There she taught for several years. She came back to the Twin Cities, tried going back to teaching but was restless. She did different things including a couple of rounds as a maintenance worker. For the last five or six years she has worked teaching English as a second language at Learning In Style, a learning center for immigrants on 26th and Blaisdell in Minneapolis, run by the Sisters of St. Joseph. When she first started to paint icons, she was self-taught. Looking for new ideas she went to Pennsylvania for training. She bonded with other iconographers, took more workshops, even traveled to Russia. As she was working her way into this unique world of icon painting, she improved and grew in her ability to produce stunning religious icons.
fter the first hour of my initial questioning, I found I was being drawn deeper into the study of this artistic ritual. Kathleen patiently walked me into her world of icons. She explained that in the early Greek Christian communities, the common burial customs called for a portrait painter to paint the face of the deceased on the cover of the flat top coffin. She said there was a likeness to the deceased person, but she explained, they also incorporated their religious beliefs, so they made subtle changes. The eyes were made larger to convey the notion that the deceased person now saw eternal life. The mouth and nose were made smaller because there was no further need for the use of the senses. From this custom comes the icon. There are legends that create more mystery around the origin of icon painting. The icon’s total goal is to take the Word of God or Scripture and transform it into a visual picture. The icon is seen as a bridge or window between matter and spirit. What the Gospel proclaims to us by using words, the icon proclaims the same message using pictures, prescribed forms and colors. One has to do a little studying to learn the language of the icon but once you understand that the enlarged eyes and ears symbolize seeing the next life, that features are exaggerated or de-emphasized, and everything in the painting must symbolize something, then it takes on a new meaning, a meaning about belief or about spiritual learning.
A central belief among Eastern Christians is that since man is created in the image of God, he thus carries the icon of God Himself within his soul. The holy images, painted in accord with scriptural tradition, feed the soul as does passages of sacred scripture.
Actually the study of icons is complex as their history within Christianity. The Jewish belief system allowed for no images or paintings of the human form within their synagogues. The early Christians were suspicious that the artwork of the pagan world and they were afraid it would be carried into Christian thinking. There has always been a struggle as to how Christ might be portrayed. Can the use of matter really demonstrate how Jesus might be the son of God. From the earliest times right on to today, it is the question of who is Jesus Christ? Is he God and man? How can these two natures be one and equally complex is the question of how an artist can portray God as man and do it justice? Those who defended the use of icons saw them as pictures of the written word. The icon was to be a picture designed to teach a spiritual concept to a largely illiterate world, the icon conveyed the message of scripture and served as a reflection into the kingdom of God. They were painted to speak about Gospel proclamations through their beauty, their colors and there subtle exaggeration of form.
I listened to Kathleen Holmberg explain the steps, or the rules of painting called canons, for how one paints icons. Icons should be painted on wood boards. First one must glue a cotton cloth to the board, then brush on a coat of gesso or white chalk like paint that can take up to a day to dry. This process is repeated up to ten times. When this chalk-like paint dries, it is possible for the painter to etch in a working outline of the proposed icon. Next step is the creation of a halo. It is started by painting the halo area with red clay, then one uses tissue thin sheets of 23-karat gold leaf. This represents divine energy or light. When this is completed, the painter starts to apply color, using the egg tempera and pigment mix, starting with the darkest shades first. As each layer is applied, the paint shade is lightened. In Greek icons, there is the use of brush strokes. In the Russian style, the painter puddles the pigment on to the canvas and pushes the pigment into place, yet both methods rely on layering the paint. Once all the layers of paint are applied, what the viewer sees is somewhat flat or opaque but a coat of oil or varnish is applied as the final step. They refer to this process as the ’Baptism of oil.’ The oil or varnish causes the undercoat of gesso, and the layered hues of pigment, plus the effect of gold leaf, to become very translucent. Modern technology has introduced the use of acrylics. Both egg tempera and acrylic in time will harden to a marble-like surface that can last centuries. Icons are not random paintings, they can only conform to prescribed norms that follow a religious tradition. Those who take up the challenge of painting an icon are encouraged to look at it as a prayer form. In times past, prayer and fasting and a blessing of the materials preceded the beginning of painting an icon. The painter never signs his or her name but their technique and personal talent do mark their icons.
say that icon painting is a special vocation, a calling that pulls one into the mysteries of life and of God and the ongoing effort to join the worlds of spirit and matter. We are so much part of earth but we do feel and experience the spiritual. Finding ways to express this is challenging. Music can and does appeal to our spirit. But our eyes also seek the spiritual. Half of the Christian world looks at religious icons with their eyes and they see them as mirror to the world of God. Some fourteen years ago, Sister Kathleen Holmberg’s spiritual journey led her to a book on painting icons. She picked up a board and brush. Since the year she painted her first icon, she has come to understand more... the meaning of God etching into our lives, the image of the divine, and light upon light.
I think icons are very important for our age, assaulted as we are by the visual media and made to feel that there is not enough within us, that we are not enough without purchasing their product immediately. If we eat junk food, our bodies will reflect that choice. If we feed our minds on materialism and the values of this world, our lives will reflect that choice and so will our eternal destiny. Icons are a way of opening a screen, window or vision of the Kingdom. It takes a little study to learn the language, but it is a familiar language. It was born in the New Testament and is still governed by it.
