Art Museum: identity found

Recently our class participated in a inspiring tour of BYU's Museum of Art. Our "tour guide" was a wonderful woman by the name of Rita Wright. I was very impressed with the way that she used questions, ideas, and stories to enlarge our vision. I found that as she helped us enlarge our vision, personal revelation came.... and this art began not just a work of art nailed to a wall ... but instead it was a glimpse into the soul of man.

Questions!
As we moved from painting to painting Rita would continue to ask us questions such as "what emotion does this art evoke, how does this represent Christ, etc." As she asked these questions I was given direction to begin pondering and exploring my mind and feelings. As I did so thoughts and feelings came that I had not thought of before. I started seeing myself in the paintings. For example, there was one painting that was a woman holding a perfectly baked bread loaf. At first glance I thought it was a nice painting but had the desire to pass it by because it did not strike my first glance. Yet, As she kept us in front of this art piece I found myself in the woman. This woman was noticeably tired from her days work, yet with great posture and presentation bestows the bread to the audience. This is perhaps how I/we are everyday. Every day I personally strive and work for an goal, a person, or a desire. Most of the time I am tired, a little stressed, but persistent. I want so badly to do my best, give my all, and present it well. I strongly believe in sacrificing for what we desire most. This painting became a representation of that ideal to me.

As we moved on through the Art museum we were also stopped in front of a wall sculpture. The scene it portrayed was of a man in the crucifix position ( undoubtedly Christ himself) , who has a rod exuding from his finger. Connected to the rod was the hand of another man. Our tour guide gave us some ideas of what this could represent. Yet, we cannot be sure if the man is jumping up to hold on to the rod, or letting go and falling. As I looked at this sculpture I yet again found myself inside of it. The rod spoken of vanishes as it gets closer to the finger of Christ. This I interpreted as follows. We must hold on to the rod in order to be led to Christ. Yet, as we get closer to Christ the rod disappears ( kind of a walk in the dark , faith idea) and then we see Christ himself. Therefore this man who is on the rod I see as me. A person who has been trying to faithfully hold on to the rod, yet feels the rod disappearing and feels fear because of the unknown. Yet just like the sculpture…all I need to do is look towards the Savior and he will catch us.
Art is one of the most powerful tools that can bring us to Christ. How wonderful!:)