There really needs to be a standard when it comes to Church artwork and architecture these days

[AltarSoldier]

I wont say the name of the parish but I m almost speechless. That looks nothing remotely like how Our Lord is expected to look like, - the figure looks bald! And I dont even know who the figure on the right is supposed to represent. Where on earth do Bishops and clergy find their architects and artists these days? Is this just a way to “save money” or to not trigger anyone that might think a church that looks too ornate is affront to the poor?

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[OurLadyofSorrows]

And I dont even know who the figure on the right is supposed to represent.

Looks like Mary to me.

That looks nothing remotely like how Our Lord is expected to look like, - the figure looks bald!

Looks like Jesus crucified to me, on the Cross

I say to people who are critical of art , become artists and restore the art to what they believe should be represented.
With the response you have to this artwork, I feel you are objecting to the un photo like concept we have of Jesus and Mary.
Photo like as in we see the art, we see the photo, the image is the same.

 

[AltarSoldier]

I say to people who are critical of art , become artists and restore the art to what they believe should be represented.
With the response you have to this artwork, I feel you are objecting to the un photo like concept we have of Jesus and Mary.
Photo like as in we see the art, we see the photo, the image is the same.

Ok Then. With that logic we should be ok with this garbage science gave us

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[Salibi]

No, there really shouldn’t.

Architectural styles have varied throughout history and by country. The style you’re probably thinking should be the “standard” is the medieval or Gothic European style that I personally don’t favour over the Byzantine or Maronite styles. Other church architecural styles include the Coptic and Armenian styles.

That looks nothing remotely like how Our Lord is expected to look like, - the figure looks bald! And I dont even know who the figure on the right is supposed to represent

I read somewhere that Jesus as a first century Jewish man probably had short hair, and what even does the phrase “expected to look like” mean? What do you mean by that? Are you aware of the dozens of ways Jesus is represented in Christian art?

With that logic we should be ok with this garbage science gave us

Why would you not be okay with that?

 

[Titivillus]

Ok Then. With that logic we should be ok with this garbage science gave us

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I have no reason to object to that image as a depiction of Our Lord. Do you?
(I likewise have no reason to defend it as an image of Our Lord, but what would you propose is wrong with it?)

De gustibus non est disputandum

 

[OurLadyofSorrows]

Ok Then. With that logic we should be ok with this garbage science gave us

That image was never claimed to be Jesus.
You are quite misinformed about who this image claimed to be. Thank sensational media for that.

“In 2001 forensic anthropologist Richard Neave created a model of a Galilean man for a BBC documentary, Son of God, working on the basis of an actual skull found in the region. He did not claim it was Jesus’s face. It was simply meant to prompt people to consider Jesus as being a man of his time and place, since we are never told he looked distinctive.”

from

What did Jesus really look like? - BBC News

Thats my first comment, my second is why such an emotional outburst over this image?

And my third is this image below is one used by numerous artists through the generations

The little-known but incredible story of the Holy Face of Manoppello 
 - LifeSite

The Holy Face of Manopello

 

[Titivillus]

“It was simply meant to prompt people to consider Jesus as being a man of his time and place, since we are never told he looked distinctive.”

Just the opposite, in prophecy:

He grew up like a sapling before him,
like a shoot from the parched earth;
He had no majestic bearing to catch our eye,
no beauty to draw us to him.

He was spurned and avoided by men,
a man of suffering, knowing pain,
Like one from whom you turn your face,
spurned, and we held him in no esteem.
Isaiah 53:2-3

 

[redal]

art (including architecture) and literature are not for the faint of heart, nor can there be a “standard” that will appeal to all tastes. We have argued among ourselves for centuries on what is tasteful, appropriate, and inspiring and what is not.

Even the incarnate son of God, dying naked on a cross as a common criminal is viewed as scandal by some, and glorification by others.

 

[AltarSoldier]

Emotional outburst? You’re Reaching for the top shelf with your words there.

That image is inconsistent to what many saints like St. Faustina saw and described as Jesus. Also the shroud of Turin is still regarded as the most vivid and Revere images of Our Lord. Depictions of Christ as we known him throughout history go back to the earliest centuries of the church, minor differences but share a consistent pattern. If Jesus looked in any way the picture the scientist proposed we probably would have had a saint describe him as such which would forever change how the Church sees the physical appearance of Christ. Every thought of that?

 

[Tis_Bearself]

We get a lot of threads complaining about modernistic Church architecture on here, but this one really sets a new bar.

There is a huge crucifix over the altar, with a realistic Christ hanging from it, not some modern art type representation of Christ, not a “risen Christ”, not a Christ without the crucifix, but a huge, standard crucified Christ, and you are worrying because Jesus appears to be bald?
How do you know he wasn’t bald in real life?

As for the figure on the right, it’s pretty obvious that it is a risen Christ. The Christ has his arms outstretched and is coming off a cross shown behind him.

I’m sorry but this is a very juvenile concern.

 

[AltarSoldier]

Someone just said the figure on the right is of Mary. You see how this can cause more confusion than reverence? There should be concise depictions that don’t raise questions and confusions. How do I know he wasn’t bald? Idk ask Faustina if she was making a most when Jesus gave her the image of Divine Mercy. You see it as juvenile but there are other people that care or see it as a bit off putting.

 

[AltarSoldier]

Could you direct me to the bible passage that describes Jesus’s hair style please?

For many scholars, Revelation 1:14-15 offers a clue that Jesus’s skin was a darker hue and that his hair was woolly in texture. The hairs of his head, it says, "were white as white wool, white as snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined as in a furnace. So we can toss speculation of him being bald out the window

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Someone just said the figure on the right is of Mary. You see how this can cause more confusion than reverence?

The figure on the left of the altar in the framed picture is Mary, it’s Our Lady of Guadalupe obviously. This figure is on Christ’s right so maybe the person is confused about what we meant by “right”.

The wooden figure on the wall to the right of the picture as we look at it is clearly not Mary because if you enlarge the picture, it is a man, with facial hair. I don’t think Mary had a mustache and a goatee. I furthermore stand by my statement that it is Risen Christ and I bet if you were standing in front of it rather than looking at a photo taken from a distance, that would be obvious to you too. No other figure in Church statuary is typically depicted with their arms out like that except Christ.

 

[Lou2U]

There have been so many different depictions of what Jesus may have looked like. I don’t think it’s a hill to die on, and I don’t think a ‘standard’ is necessary. As other posters have said, it’s so subjective such a thing would be impossible.

 

[OurLadyofSorrows]

To me, this passage is precisely a man with no distinctive attributes.

He had no majestic bearing to catch our eye,
no beauty to draw us to him.

and we held him in no esteem.

A man we would walk past without a second thought, nothing to cause a person to remember through physical bearing

 

[Tis_Bearself]

How do you know the soldiers didn’t pull out his hair or cut it off as part of the mocking and torture? How do you know Jesus didn’t shave his own head right before the Last Supper?

More importantly, we have had depictions of Christ over the years looking all different ways. There have been dozens of bald Christs as well as Christs of all races and ethnicities with all kinds of hairstyles. Where is it written that Christ must always look a certain way, or that Christ must always look exactly how he looked when he walked the earth (which we don’t even know for sure how he looked?)

 

[OurLadyofSorrows]

Emotional outburst? You’re Reaching for the top shelf with your words there.

this garbage science

That image is inconsistent to what many saints like St. Faustina saw and described as Jesus. Also the shroud of Turin is still regarded as the most vivid and Revere images of Our Lord. Depictions of Christ as we known him throughout history go back to the earliest centuries of the church, minor differences but share a consistent pattern. If Jesus looked in any way the picture the scientist proposed we probably would have had a saint describe him as such which would forever change how the Church sees the physical appearance of Christ. Every thought of that?

Mary consistently appears in a readily identifiable form, Indian in Latin America, Caucasian in Portugal, in Rwanda, as a beautiful Rwandan.

But what do you think a first century middle eastern Jew looked like?

Many famous artists went time and again to that image at Manopello when working on images of Jesus. We see this form in many great artworks.

 

[AltarSoldier]

Again, we have saints that saw Jesus and some that have descriptions of how he looked. Also - again - was Saint Faustina making a mistake when she told the artist to paint what she saw in her image of Divine mercy? Apparently there’s a problem there that for some reason we can’t come to an agreement on. The Bible is one thing but a canonized Saint of the Church can offer a better detail of what they are and describe. Just saying

 

[OurLadyofSorrows]

Again, we have saints that saw Jesus and some that have descriptions of how he looked. Also - again - was Saint Faustina making a mistake when she told the artist to paint what she saw in her image of Divine mercy? Apparently there’s a problem there that for some reason we can’t come to the conclusion. The Bible is one thing but a canonized Saint of the Church can offer a better detail of what they are and describe. Just saying

What is your image of Jesus, post a photo.

 

[redal]

If Jesus looked in any way the picture the scientist proposed we probably would have had a saint describe him as such which would forever change how the Church sees the physical appearance of Christ. Every thought of that?

I know you didn’t ask me, but I have thought of that.

I’m reminded of Dr. King’s statement of hope that someday children " will not be judged by the colour of their skin , but by the content of their character".

My thoughts are similar about our Lord…He doesn’t have to be handsome, muscular, tall, et al. Perhaps the saints have never said a word because they saw divine, not physical traits, as important.