Exhibit’s Incarnation icons filled with symbolism of Christ’s birth

Judy Symalla said she may seem the least likely person to become an iconographer. After all, she was a math major in college with a business minor.

But she always had a creative streak. “I can do any of the crafty (things),” she said. “I crochet. I tat. I’ve built furniture.” She was an avid quilter and managed a quilting shop.

“But (iconography) is my first opportunity to create in which I was truly glorifying God,” she said. “And that’s why I knew I just had to give up everything else and do this.”

Her passion for iconography led to creating about 60 icons over the past seven years. That passion plus a love of Christmas resulted in three large icons illustrating the Incarnation. Titled Journey to Bethlehem, Incarnation of Christ and Epiphany, they form the centerpiece in an exhibit of 29 icons underway at a Stillwater gallery.

Each Incarnation icon measures 24 inches by 32 inches, which she believes would be a good size for display in a church. A typical icon measuring 8 by 10 inches or 9 by 11 inches may take about 60 hours to create, she said. The three Incarnation icons took significantly more time, including months of research and time to develop the sketches because they were her own design. Symalla copies traditional ones and creates her own.

“So much had to be considered to make sure of the beauty and elegance as well as really pointing to theological truths that’ll bring people closer to God,” she said.

An Artist Initiative Grant from the Minnesota State Art Board funded creation of the Incarnation icons.

Symalla, 56, a parishioner of St. Michael in Stillwater, values the ancient technique for creating Byzantine iconography, but incorporates a Western perspective, which she said enables her to create something true and beautiful. Iconography has traditionally been a more common artform in the Orthodox Church and Eastern rite Catholic churches, but it is growing in popularity within the western tradition.

Very few, if any, icons of the journey to Bethlehem have been made in the Orthodox tradition, she said. “And they typically won’t show Mary with a swollen belly,” she said, as hers does. Instead, an artist may use a small statue of Christ in the image, she said. “So this was … a whole new concept that I think we all relate to very well — the beauty of the Blessed Virgin Mary, pregnant, riding a donkey.”

Symbolism is omnipresent in icons. For example, in Symalla’s depiction of the journey to Bethlehem, a light from heaven shines on Mary’s belly, representing Jesus conceived by the Holy Spirit. She said Joseph’s “miraculous blooming staff” signifies he was God’s choice to be betrothed to Mary.

She calls the image “very pro-life.” And with each figure having a guardian angel, the message is there’s “no need to worry.”

The three Wise Men also is not a widely known icon, she said. “In color and design, I tried to make it more accessible to a viewer (who) may not be familiar with the ancient icon, as a way to bring them into understanding iconography,” she said.

Symalla learned about Byzantine iconography during an intensive week-long workshop with a master iconographer. She honed her skills during other workshops and training, and studying work of icon masters from ancient times.

Creating or “writing” icons for Symalla always starts with research. She recently chose St. Anthony of Padua for an icon because she considers him her “good friend.” Before creating the icon, she read about him. “All I really knew about him was that he found what I lost,” she said. “And him finding stuff was just a way to lead me to him.”

Learning his background, including his role as a doctor of the Church and a great orator, helped Symalla use the proper symbols. She looks to see what might be available in iconography for a particular scene. With everything in an icon having a specific meaning, “I try to pick the elements that I think are true to the Church’s teaching,” she said.

Symalla uses traditional materials, including egg tempera on the gessoed boards, providing a luminosity she believes would not be possible from any other medium.

“We have the light coming forth all the way from the board,” she said. The gesso — a liquid clay — is allowed to harden, then sanded and burnished to a mirror finish. “Then we breathe on it,” Symalla said, which allows the 24 carat gold she uses to stick.

“What’s beautiful about that process is, just as God’s breath breathed into us can soften a hard heart, we are softening the clay to accept the gold,” she said.

While writing her second icon, she started the St. Croix Catholic Iconographers Guild, where she serves as director. Founded to help students like herself continue learning between workshops, it has grown to more than 100 members.

Symalla considers the icons a form of prayer, “but they also give me an opportunity to share Christ with others.”