What is the role of art in bringing hope and healing to the fractures of our world? Makoto Fujimura, a leading contemporary artist and the author of Art+Faith, talks with Amy Julia about creating beauty through brokenness, the art of waiting and making, and how the theology of God’s new creation transforms communities of Christ.
Makoto Fujimura is the author of Art+Faith: A Theology of Making, and his “art has been featured widely in galleries and museums around the world, and is collected by notable collections including The Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo, The Huntington Library as well as Tikotin Museum in Israel.”
Connect online:
- Website: makotofujimura.com
- Facebook: @makotofujimuraart
- Instagram: @iamfujimura
- Twitter: @iamfujimura
- YouTube
On the Podcast:
- Makoto Fujimura’s Books: Art+Faith, Refractions, Culture Care, and Silence and Beauty
- Silence movie
- Silence by Shūsaku Endō
- Embers International
- Kintsugi art
- 1 Corinthians 3, John 11-12, Luke 19
- Liuan Huska interview
- Margaret Mead
Making Art in a Broken World episode quotes | Makoto Fujimura
“I consider what I do to be prayer and theological work as much as aesthetic work, so I’ve always felt the presence of God in my studio, in the practice of making.”
“It becomes essential conversation for us to find our thriving. What does it mean to be a human being today, let alone a Christian? The arts fundamentally can bring us to a deeper conversation.”
”We are not going back to pre-pandemic normal. It’s a new world. It’s a world in which we have all suffered—and we have all shared in the suffering—and, therefore, we have an opportunity to create communities that would both nurture and protect those broken places and really be able to share because of our brokenness…A Kintsugi master even amplifies or exposes the fractures but does it in a beautiful way. And can we do that as communities, especially communities of Christ?”
“As I began to connect what I do in the studio with theology, the entire thing opened up for me to walk through my own darkness and brokenness and be able to experience God’s presence in that very hard place. “
“Waiting is such an important part of art. You cannot have music without pauses. You cannot have choreography without the body stopping. And so being still, finding that still point of the turning world, as T.S. Elliot writes, is very much at the heart of every art form.”
“If we are not making, we are consuming.”
Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.
Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White Picket Fences. Check out free RESOURCES that are designed to help you respond to the harm of privilege and join in the work of healing. Learn more about my writing and speaking at amyjuliabecker.com.
👁🗨Accessibility: You can read the transcript for this episode here or see this episode with subtitles on my YouTube channel.
To learn more with Amy Julia:
- Love is Stronger Than Fear | Season 4—Head, Heart, Hands
- S4 E9 | Choosing Courage in a World Divided with Natasha Sistrunk Robinson and Raymond Chang
- S4 E4 | Spiritual Practices That Heal with Rich Villodas
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