Kintsugi Healing, Christian Wall Art

What is painted

On the left, a young woman kneels on the ground in a wide ivory veil and robe. Her head is bowed and her eyes are lowered, but her right arm is already lifted. On the right, Jesus stands in a cream robe, his face outside the frame, and reaches down with an open palm. Their fingers are about to meet in the middle of the picture.

Fine lines of gold run across her veil and spread through the folds of her garment, joining like the seams of a repaired vessel. Behind them, sunlight floods through the clouds and over a hillside of olive trees and shrubs.

The painting is impressionist and oil-style, printed edge to edge with no words on it.

Kintsugi and the Gospel of healing

Kintsugi is a Japanese way of mending broken ceramics. The pieces are joined with lacquer mixed with powdered gold, so the cracks are not hidden but highlighted. The mended bowl carries its history openly and is often thought more beautiful than before. Here the idea is borrowed in paint: the gold lines are a picture of restoration, drawn on cloth rather than on pottery.

The Gospels return again and again to this gesture of Jesus taking someone by the hand. Of Peter's mother-in-law, Mark 1:31 says: “And he came and took her by the hand, and lifted her up; and immediately the fever left her, and she ministered unto them.” Luke 13:10-13 tells of a woman bent over for eighteen years whom he touched in a synagogue, and who stood straight at once and glorified God.

For anyone who is being restored

This is a print for a bedroom, a counseling office or a quiet corner where someone prays. It speaks to a woman recovering from illness, grief or burnout, to a friend after a divorce, or to anyone who has felt broken and found that the break became part of the story. Women's ministries and recovery groups often look for images like this one.

It is printed on demand in the United States as a giclée on heavyweight archival matte paper and shipped free to US addresses. No frame is included. Sizes go from 5x7 to 24x36 inches, with metric and A sizes as well, and a digital file is available.