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Passing the Colors:
Engaging Visual Culture in the 21st Century
by Chris Stoffel Overvoorde
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2002. xi plus 199 pages and 24-page color insert
Passing the Colors is a welcome collection of chapters, a patchwork almost, in which artist and teacher Chris Stoffel Overvoorde thoughts, memories, and reflections on his dual passions of art and Christian faith. The book is in part a self-portrait, in words, of an artist, telling of his early life in The Netherlands, his move to the United States, his training as a designer and artist, and his life as a professor and sometime artist-in-residence at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Overvoorde tells his story in broad strokes, choosing not to overburden the reader with details as we work toward the book’s center.
The book is also a primer of sorts for artists who may be struggling with questions surrounding their vocation as both Christians and artists. Overvoorde, having faced such questions himself, is an able guide to finding one’s own answers. He also offers practical help to artists who may need help discerning the precise nature of their artistic vocation, describing, for example, the differences between the work of artists and designers. An appendix even includes samples of legal agreements with exhibitors and galleries, which will assist artists in dealing with some of the issues involved with making their work public.
In the final chapter, “The Artist and the Community,” Overvoorde takes up the most important aspect of the book: discussions of the mystery of our uniqueness and oneness with Christ, the role and power of art, and function of art in church, community, school, and home. This chapter holds perhaps the greatest interest for both artists and observers of art. One comes away from this section with a strong sense of the place of art -- in its making, in its being experienced, in its simply being -- as prayer.
Finally, Passing the Colors is an exhibit of the life work of Chris Stoffel Overvoorde. A generous color section offers samples of his work from many phases of his development (the book is also illustrated throughout with halftones). Overvoorde is an accomplished maker of prints, watercolor paintings, and oil paintings, and all genres are well represented. His skyscapes, typically very large paintings that originated in The Netherlands, the American Midwest, and the Canadian plains, are breathtaking even in this small format.
Passing the Colors, written during Overvoorde’s initial years of retirement from teaching, is a fitting celebration of his life and of the life of art. Its particular appeal to Christian artists cannot be overstated, and the book will be valued by students and practicing artists alike.
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