Clive Hicks-Jenkins - Christ writes in the dust - the woman taken in adultery

John 8: 2-11

The shapes of Christ and the woman are mirror images, almost interlocking. To read Christ’s expression, viewers have to turn their heads almost upside down.  The artist wanted the woman to be ‘streetwise, older, flaunting So she would be more difficult to forgive.’ The accusers in the foreground are even in tone, so as not to detract from the central characters. The stones are hidden behind their backs. People viewing the picture are ranged with them. The background is based on sketches of Montclar in Catalonia, which the artist visited in the spring of 2010. It is a charming and picturesque village but with darkness beneath, relating to events 70 years ago in the Spanish Civil War. Truth telling, reconciliation and forgiveness have not occurred there.  

Commentary based on A Guide to the Methodist Art Collection.