LAMENT – The Stations & Other Images of the Cross
Washington National Cathedral
Pilgrim Observation Gallery, 7th floor
February 24–April 11, 2009
The exhibition features twenty of Margaret Adams Parker’s Laments, woodcuts which treat subjects as diverse as genocide in Darfur, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder among combat veterans, and the consequences of unsafe drinking water in the developing world. These moving images of suffering bracket Parker’s stark black and white images of the fourteen traditional Stations of the Cross.
The exhibition is open daily through April 10th, from 10am to 5pm.
Parker writes, “In creating the Stations of the Cross my goal was to convey the physical and spiritual weight of Christ’s Passion. Working on these images – across the span of 10 years – constituted a powerful meditation on the ways that the incarnate God suffers with us and for us. That experience intensified my sensitivity to suffering and has led, quite directly, to the creation of the other Laments. I hope that, as the Stations allow us to participate in Jesus’ journey to the Cross, so the Laments call us to witness to the world’s suffering and then stir us to respond.”
About the artist
Margaret (Peggy) Adams Parker is a sculptor and printmaker. Her sculptures include MARY, installed in the Cathedral College and churches across the country, and Reconciliation, depicting the parable of the prodigal son, at Duke Divinity School. Her sculpture, Grieving, was among six final designs considered for Alexandria’s Contrabands and Freedmen’s Cemetery Memorial. Her woodcuts accompany Ellen Davis’ translation, Who Are You, My Daughter? Reading Ruth through Image and Text; her set of 15 woodcuts, WOMEN, is in the collection of the Library of Congress; and African Exodus serves as frontispiece to the UNHCR publication, Refugee Children. Parker is currently depicting the Communion of Saints, life-sized figures to be etched onto glass, for St. Agnes Catholic Church, Shepherdstown, WV. Parker has served as adjunct instructor at Virginia Theological Seminary since 1992. She writes and lectures widely on the church and the visual arts and served as curator for the most recent ECVA exhibition: Light of the World. www.margaretadamsparker.com
Events to Attend
* Sunday, March 15, 2 to 4pm : Reception with artist Margaret Adams Parker Open to the public
* Sunday, March 15, 3pm : Artist’s talk Open to the public
* Friday, March 13, 6 to 9pm : The Way of the Cross: A Lenten Pilgrimage with artist Margaret Adams Parker Contact 202-537-2373 for registration and fee
On View: to have seen what I have seen by Margaret Adams Parker, 2006, woodcut over collagraph with Solarplate etchings, 23” x 17”.
This print is based on the experiences of the artist’s son during his medical school rotation in the psychiatry ward in a VA hospital. Most of his patients were Viet Nam vets, although a few had served in Iraq, but their common problem was their inability to block out their memories of war.
The title is taken from Shakespeare’s Hamlet. It is a fragment of Ophelia’s lament as she observes Hamlet’s feigned madness: “O, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown…O woe is me/ to have seen what I have seen…” Ironically, while Hamlet is sane, Ophelia herself goes mad.