Kateri Aris Tolo

2012-02-23T16:47:00.001-08:00

A Lesson from Psalm 139

The costumes and stage elements were painted as a collaborative commission with choreographer Cynthia Newland. While conceptualizing and designing the costumes, I drew from a longing. I long for the change that is happening deep within those who are in Christ to be worn as a garment. I long to appear as the Lord Himself sees us. What does it look like, that fabric woven more finely and intricately beneath skin and sinews, muscle and bones? How delicate and beautiful is that garment that is Christ himself? Sin snatched that robe from us and left us naked and ashamed. Through Christ I have received it once again, but I wear it inside out. Lord, would you turn me right-side-out again?

Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139. Read it again.

(Photo from Belhaven dance piece "Searched and Known")

Should I Forget...

2012-02-10T11:13:00.000-08:00

In a moment of distraction or anger it is easy to forget to love. As I look back at drawings I can't help but remember the time it took to glance on the faces carefully crafted by the hand of God Himself. For me drawing is an act of remembrance. Drawing is an act of love.

Abuelo

Allison

Allison by the Sea

Caitlin

The Crowd

Daniel

Isaiah

Jacob

Karissa

Katie

Kevin

Krista

Laura Christel and Kinsley

Lydia

Marlowe and the Sea

Mom

Parker

Sarah Linfield

Kateri

Trimmed and Burning

2011-12-11T21:39:00.001-08:00

Lord, soon we will be in your house, together with all of them, the ones who went before. We will stand before you stretched for miles, blinded by gold, love, joy. Anxious to see what has been rectified, we wait for the story to come out right again. Thank you for hurt, disappointment, and sadness. They have taught us to love. Keep our hearts trimmed and burning, ready to enter. Only do not be too long; we are waiting.

Nativities I, II, III, & IV

Rectified I, II, & III

Community

2011-12-06T06:02:00.001-08:00

I take for granted the fact that I am surrounded by others. Not just any particular others, but others who happen to be quite great; others who make up the artistic community that I love. All is in harmony when we do as the Lord commands us, spending our thoughts and energies on serving and uplifting them, putting our identity into His hands.

It is times spent alone, however, that the doubts creep in and blur our clear sight. Being an artist requires this time alone. Let me correct myself, everyone requires those times of quiet devotion. These are likely what enemy hates most; the moments packed with the most potential to meet with God. His aim is disruption, using a strange weapon of choice; a rippled mirror, something vague and imperfect. He creeps around quietly waving that mirror, hoping for a moment to snare us by showing us a glimpse of ourselves in it. Oftentimes one look into the twisted reflection captures us and we find ourselves hypnotized. From one angle the warping creates a distorted ideal we find pleasing. The crafty one will then turn that mirror so it contorts our faces into ugly shapes and our darkest fears. In a seemingly generous gesture, the enemy hands over the mirror and we believe the lie.

To forget the truth is a terrible thing, more terrible than any physical hardship or tragedy that could befall us. Forgetting our identity changes the way we see others. Instead of enjoying the intimacy of our brothers and sisters we begin to despise their Christlike beauty because it stands in contrast to our newly discovered ugliness. Cold, slithering envy takes its grip on our love, intent on stealing its life.

But remembering.... Remembering is the warm hands that cup our face, turning our eyes to the face of Christ, our true reflection. His does not change with angle or time or circumstance. If only we could look into that face, memorize it, make it our most enduring thought. We would search it out in the world around us, and behold! we would find it in the faces of those others!

Our Own Art Community

I am always excited at the incredibly varied worlds of discovery that form around artist. There are no two alike.

My own studio filled with wood scraps waiting to be repurposed.

Amelia Key creates musical structures with colorful, synthetic odds and ends.

Chris Brown's natural and built surfaces undergo a process of carefully built wax layers.

Emily Goff's natural world is a reconstructed and re-contextualized version of our own familiar one.

Senior Art Exhibition - 2011

2011-12-02T13:33:00.000-08:00

Kateri Tolo is a graduate of Belhaven University in 2011 with a major in Visual Art. She grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota at the other end of the Mississippi River, not knowing that God would have her follow it southward. As an artist she seeks continually seeks to create as a manner of worship and bring the viewer to a greater knowledge of God’s plan and promise for his people. She hopes that through her work she can help others to see, not only in the tangible sense, but also in the spiritual. “Everything I make breaks at one time or another in the making,” she says. “My hope is that as I work, toil, fail, and succeed, those who come in contact with me would see God’s provision and strength in all my weaknesses.”

Kateri was honored as the Freshman Art Major of the Year her first year at Belhaven; in 2010 she received the Research Club Scholarship Award from the Visual Art Department. She currently works as the elementary art teacher at Jackson Academy.

Should I Forget

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Recount

ink, gold leaf, wood

New Name

oil, acrylic, gold leaf, stone

Partake

acrylic, wood

Forgo

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, pigment, wood

Kept

acrylic, gold leaf, wood

Recall

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Recompense

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Recollect

ink, gold leaf, wood

Tried

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, muslin, pigment, wood

Limp

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Restitution

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Ardor

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Bind

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, pigment, wood

Farther Along

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

The Toil It Brought

oil, acrylic, ink, gold leaf, wood

Redress

acrylic, ink, gold leaf, muslin, wood

Sorrow and Love Met

oil and wood

SENIOR ART EXHIBITION

2011-10-30T12:36:00.000-07:00

Bring a friend and enjoy food, music, and art with the community.

Also, check out this short video by Azod Abedikichi and see some bits and pieces of the the making of this show:

An Art Show

The Toil It Brought

2011-07-02T13:45:00.000-07:00

The Toil It Brought

Oil, acrylic, india ink, gold leaf on wood panel

More Than Years

2011-07-02T13:37:00.000-07:00

More Than Years

Oil, wood, india ink, gold leaf on paper

Hebrew Triptych

2011-02-16T14:35:00.000-08:00

Hebrew Triptych

Kaph-Yarech (Hip Socket)

Kaph-Yarech (Hip Socket) A man lies struggling on the ground, a wrestling match within and without, determined to secure an inheritance. “Few and evil have been the days of the years of my struggle,” said Jacob to the Egyptian king in his old age. “Few and evil have been the days of my struggle,” I say to myself. I knew a man with a limp. A limp is not hereditary. A decade of struggling with a fading memory of this man, and the limp became mine as well. A swelling growth of scar tissue seems to be the only inheritance in sight.

Yod (Arm)

Yod (Arm) Sinuous strands shows through skin as muscles strain in the arm of an ineloquent man. His heart fights against faintness as it pushes blood through his weary body. Flesh and muscles quiver with fatigue and with their drooping the evil king prevails against the Children of God. The arm is upheld however, by a brother, by another who is able to share in the burden. The strength of the arm of Yaweh strengthens the arms wielding swords and spears, marking the ground with the blood of the enemy.

Tselah (Rib)

Tselah (Rib or side) A man lies sleeping on the cool grass. The divine arm reaches in, dividing flesh, dividing bone from flesh. A bride is removed from a man. From her a son is born. The son of the one who breathed life into all things hangs with sinuous strands showing through skin as muscles strain till it is finished. An obedient heart pushes blood through his weary body to his upheld arms. A spear reaches in, dividing flesh, dividing bone from flesh as blood and water flow. The river, the crimson strand winds its way through the lives, through the stories, through struggle, though now it is streaked with glory. The winding flow of suffering mingled with our inheritance.