The Summer Program 2012 of the Way of Beauty Atelier at Thomas More College of Liberal Arts, Merrimack, NH. We are pleased to be offering three courses this summer - an icon painting week and two weekend retreats - Traditional Paths to Creativity and Inspiration. (Follow the links just given to apply) No experience or specialist knowledge is necessary for any of these courses. They take place in July 2012.
Both retreats offered teach about the forms of traditional art focussing on the baroque, the gothic and the iconographic, and how to pray with visual imagery especially in the context of the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours. The weekend is lived in conformity to the rhythm of the Church's liturgy. However, the emphasis is different in each one.
The first weekend is a repeat of what we offered last year and has a greater emphasis on the talks about the culture.
The second is more reflective and focusses more on the prayer, chant and contemplation of visual imager. It would be of interest to anyone, but was created in response to those who attended the first retreat last year and wanted to repeat the experience, but didn't want the same same lectures. So this is of a form that can be repeated year on year if you wish: I will pick out particular paintings to talk about as exemplars of each tradition; and we will spend more time learning the techniques of the prayer of the whole person including chant. As such, the hope is that anyone who has been through this would be able to teach members of their family or parish to chant the liturgy of the hours. No one need feel worried that they do not have the required musical ability. The chant is simple enough so that anyone who can approximately hit a note can learn it through listening; and beautiful enough that they want to.
