Artists Notes
I have produced several large bodies of work that have taken a year or longer to complete. Each has been intense and all consuming for me. However, illustrating The Seven Days of Creation from the Book of Genesis turned out to be far more than that. I experienced an epiphany that changed my life.
The project began as a challenge in March 2000 from Dr.Carmilita Lim in Sebring Florida, where my sister lived. She asked if I could use digital imaging to illustrate The Seven Days of Creation. If she liked the results she would purchase a set as a Christmas present for her husband. I was intrigued by the challenge but not at ease with the subject matter.
I am Jewish, from the tribe of Levi, but have had no religious training. I never read or owned a Bible. This is not to say I don’t believe in God. My life’s experience has taught me of His existence, protection and guidance. I have skimmed the tenets of a number of religions but never joined a group. My religion remained a one-on-one kind of thing. Illustrating Bible verses was out of my comfort zone.
I decided to do a test with Day One before committing to the project. The concept came to me as soon as I saw my wife scoop a cantaloupe out of a shopping bag. The rendition came together within two weeks, and I enjoyed the process. Doctors.Carmilita and Abraham Lim liked the image so I committed to the project.
Day Two was another matter altogether. I tried and failed a number of times. After weeks of work I would tear up the print and start again. I would read and reread the verse. I just couldn’t visualize it. Reluctantly I dropped it and went on to another day.
By this time my wife Gail, myself, and our two dogs moved into our motor home and were traveling the country so I could photograph the various elements I would need to create the images for the project. I built a computer station in the motor home to enable me to work at night blending and bending my photographs into the digital illustrations for the series.
The concept for Day Three presented itself to me shortly after reading the verse. It took, however, 2 months to finish as I had to wait until we reached the Rocky Mountains to find the waterfall I needed to complete the picture.
When I resumed work on Day Two I was a thousand miles away from my starting point and in a different state of mind. I reread the verse and its meaning came clear to me.
When God separated the waters from the waters he created a greenhouse effect and our atmosphere. The waters above were to become the ocean of fresh water in the clouds that surround our globe. He laid the groundwork for what would become the earth’s circulatory system and the rains that make life possible.
Furthermore when he created the firmament He called Heaven and placed it between the waters it meant (to me) that heaven could be between sea level and the clouds. With my new understanding of the verse the illustration came together.
In Day Four I took a more literal approach. The concept of day and night on the mountain was in mind as I searched the country for the right landscape and sky elements to use in the image.
We drove to Death Valley for wilderness shots then to the state of Washington, in order to get photographs of a rainforest for Day Six. From there we traveled the Pacific Coast and I got the whale pictures I needed to re-do Day Five. Once I shot the whales, Day Five came together with the excitement I felt in creating the first four days.
By the time we reached Arizona in early November, 2000 we were on our way back to Sebring. I had all the elements I needed to work on Day Six.
The Bible passage tells us that this was the day that God created man and woman, as well as, the beasts and ‘everything that creepeth upon the earth’. I knew I should represent every major category of animal, to include arachnid, amphibian, reptile, foul, fish, mammal and insect. Also, it is the only time the plural for God is used is in Day Six when God said “Let us make man in our image”. I asked my wife, who had a strong Christian upbringing and is well versed in the Bible. She gave me a short explanation of the trinity. I didn’t think too much about and went ahead putting the image together. I decided to stay in the desert outside Benson Arizona to work on it.
I fell into a work frenzy for five days and nights putting together the sixty-some photographs that make up Day Six. It was then, in the quiet darkness of the Arizona desert about 3 a.m. that an astonishing thing occurred.
I had completed the composition for Day Six and went to add a spotlight effect that would highlight Adam and add some drama to the picture. I have done this many times, but something happened that had never happened before. Instead of the single white spotlight I expected three spotlights appeared, a red, blue, and green one in a triangular formation.
How could this happen? I only programmed in one spotlight. My first reaction was dismay. It was on a base layer and could not be undone. I couldn’t understand it and backed away from the screen to see what it did to my picture.
The three spotlights were exact in their placement. They not only added drama but color and mystery as well. Their position in the image created a cross of light that echoes the cross shape of Adam, Eve, the butterfly and the bird. This was too perfect to be an accident. Then it hit me, three lights, the Trinity, the reason for the plural used in the verse for Day Six. The Trinity was there on the day man was created.
Right away I realized that the colors of the spotlights were no accident. They are the primary colors, the colors from which all other colors are made, and when combined as colored lights make pure white light.
Chills went up my spine. I was not alone. I looked around the small cabin knowing that I would not see anyone, yet certain something much bigger then me was there. The Trinity would not be denied its roll in the Creation. It put itself in the picture. I knew my life would never be the same again, I was given a gift, and a responsibility to share it.
When Gail woke up and saw the picture she started crying. “Why did you put the Lamb and the butterfly in the picture? Do you know they are Christian symbols”? Of course I didn’t. “And those three lights. They must be the Trinity. How on Earth did you make this picture? I told her that I am not so sure I did, and explained what happened during the night. I returned to the work with a sense of mission.
The verse in Day Seven states that on the seventh day God ended his work. He then rested and sanctified the day. I returned to the cosmic view of Day One that shows earth as an empty sphere and show it as a completed sphere in Day Seven. I placed Adam and Eve resting in the center of the sphere to show that man and woman were the reason for all that went before them.
When we returned to Sebring I still had two months work ahead of me enlarging, polishing and learning the technology that would make the prints archival. A year had passed before I had a set of mounted prints.
When the day came for Gail to show the completed set of prints to the Lims, the Christmas season had long come and gone. I prayed for God to let me know if the work pleased him and if there is anything I could do for him if the Lims bought the set? The Lims bought two sets.
The next day the praise leader in a local church, Keith, came to deliver a keyboard that Gail purchased. He learned I was a percussionist and asked me to join him as he ran through a few songs to test the keyboard. He later asked if I would play with the church’s Worship Team.
I had my answer. I moved to Sebring, joined the church, and was baptized a year later.