All any artist can possibly deal with is appearance. One of the most interesting probabilities about Jesus is that he was not at all interested in having his portrait made for posterity. At the least, he was not going to allow himself to sit for any artist to do a portrait.

The only portrait he left is himself, transfigured on the mount… as Peter described him. Now that’s art!

Ray Charles Istre

Ugliness is abhorrence only in the eyes of man, which is socially constructed anyways.

Just passing by.

If the Lord wants to use me, fine

- Ray He wants to use you. And yes I will pray for you.

Blessings
- Eric

While I do support evangelistic efforts, I don’t consider this book to be in that vein. It is mainly about art and media portrayals of Jesus. It’s not that Jesus has become secular, but the portrayal of “Jesi” (plural imagery of Jesus) may in fact, be secular. Of course, we know better than to confuse Jesus with his artistic portrayals.

I’ve started out with this direction and plan to stay in it. If the Lord wants to use me, fine Anyone who gets to know Jesus, does so from hearing the Spirit of God. He is not an intellectual persuit.

God Bless you bro Be praying with me. I’ve sold my first copies to Hastings Book Store and want to do more. Will have a book signing on May 6, after two weeks of raffling off an original drawing at the store.

Ray

It’s good to hear your comments on that. It is really intersting how as society “we do a gazzillion attempts to portray him.” It also reminds me of other religious icons and symbols, such as the cross, which we are mindful of this Easter season.

We have taken the cross, which is arguably the most powerful thing that ever occured in history, and reduced it to a fashion accessory.

I am also encouraged by your pointing to God the Holy Spirit for revelation about Jesus. Although you have stated on your site and in the newspaper that Ugly Jesus is not an evangelistic endeavor, it seems maybe you are becoming more inclined to tell people to “look to Him” for the real answers…

Would you say it’s a form of covert evangelism because it causes people to ponder the questions, or is that too strong a statement?

Has this project changed you, and in what way? Have any of your views or motives changed as you created the project and now as you publicize it?

If you did research on it, I think you would find that Jesus is the most portrayed individual in the history of mankind. Buddah may be close because of the population in Asia, but the west has had massive printing and governmental support for the arts, especially religious art, over the past 2000 years. It is amazing to me, as a Christian, that Jesus was so uninterested in having his image remembered and how do we re-act?… we do a gazzillion attempts to portray him.

One of the questions raised in my book is, “Why is the ‘pretty’ or ‘GQ’ images so popular?” Given the fact that there are so many ‘Jesi’ in the art world, why is it that the popular ones are a certain look? Could the promotion of especially “pretty” and “GQ” Jesus have a competition going for branding control? Branding such as seen in the promotion of corporate logo’s, I mean. If this is not intentional, is the branding a practical development of the mass production of the images?

Jesus went to be with the Father. He said he would send the comforter, the Holy Spirit, who would show us the things of him. We have the Holy Spirit to teach us the things of Jesus.

To answer your question, the “good looking Jesus” (what I call ‘pretty’ Jesus) really got going in the Italian Rennaisance particularly by DaVinci and Raphael. The “GQ” Jesus seems to me to be what Michelangelo was trying to achieve in the Last Judgment. This large mural in the Sistine Chapel, has been seen as a statement by Michelangelo, of the judgment faced by the Roman Empire, of the armies invading northern Europe at the time. The Rennaisance may have been the height of the “Holy” Roman Empire, but it seems to be the beginning of it’s downfall as well. The reformation was about to get underway and it’s grip on Europe was beginning to loosen.

To me, art is a conversation between human beings. We get our revelation of Jesus from the Spirit of God.

As I was in the National Gallery in Washington DC a couple weeks ago, I noticed that there were other times in history when artists definitely seemed to portray Jesus as being “ugly”. Of course they also depicted people differently in general, but even relative to the other people within the same paintings, it seems they did not view Jesus as being above average or attractive…

Here are details from some photos I snapped while I was there…

Constantijn van Renesse (Rembrandt workshop), 1650/1652

Benvenuto Di Giovanni, 1491

Benvenuto Di Giovanni, 1491

Rimini, c. 1330/1340

I’m wondering if the image of “good-looking Jesus” is really a fairly modern phenomenon, and also whether it is mainly restricted to western society…

There is no way you or I can know exactly what Jesus looked like as a man. The whole issue with my project is limited to these images painted by artists and moviemakers.

When he was transfigured, he took on a whole new appearance with the Glory of God. It reminds me of the description in Revelations where his hair was like lambs wool. While the transfiguration was an actual event, the description in Revelations seems to me to be more of a spiritual description.

Don’t fret though, because Jesus will return and every eye shall see him.