Language English Publication history 1989–present | Edited by Gregory Wolfe Frequency Quarterly | |
Discipline Art, Culture, Faith, Literature Publisher Center for Religious Humanism (USA) | ||
Image is an American quarterly literary journal that publishes art and writing engaging or grappling with Judeo-Christian faith. The journal's byline is Art, Faith, Mystery. Image features fiction, poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture, film, music, and dance. The journal also sponsors the Glen Workshops, the Arts & Faith discussion forum, the Milton Fellowship for writers working on their first book, the summer Luci Shaw Fellowship for undergrads, and the Denise Levertov Award.
Contents
Material first published in Image has appeared in Harper's Magazine, The Best American Essays, The Pushcart Prize: Best of the Small Presses, The Best Spiritual Writing, The O. Henry Prize Stories, The Art of the Essay, New Stories from the South, The Best American Movie Writing, and The Best Christian Writing. In 2000 and 2003, Image was nominated by Utne Reader for an Independent Press Award in the category of Spiritual Coverage.
History
Image was established in 1989 by Gregory Wolfe and is non-profit quarterly based at Seattle Pacific University. Image was involved with the founding of Seattle Pacific University’s Master of Fine Arts degree, which launched in 2005. The SPU MFA is the world’s first university-based low-residency MFA program to integrate writing and Christian conviction, guided by teachers such as Scott Cairns, Robert Clark, Paula Huston, Gina Ochsner, Jeanne Murray Walker, and Lauren Winner.
The Journal Today
In 2009, Image produced its first book-length anthology, Bearing the Mystery: Twenty Years of Image to celebrate its twentieth anniversary, featuring 16 full color plates of visual art and nearly 500 pages of fiction, poetry, and essays by 90 writers. In 2014, Image celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary with a festival of choirs in Seattle and a special issue of the journal focused on younger artists and writers.
Image is distributed in print and via digital copies through Zinio. Image's website, imagejournal.org, also features a large archive of work from their twenty-five year history, available to subscribers.
Glen Workshops
The Glen Workshop, begun in 1995 and sponsored by Image, is a week-long summer conference featuring classes taught by professional poets, writers, and visual artists. The Glen is currently held annually at St. John's College in Santa Fé, New Mexico. Each year the workshops center around a specific creative theme. Recent themes for Glen Workshops have included "Acts of Attention: The Art of Discovery," "The Generations in Our Bones: Art and Tradition," and "Border Crossings: Art and Risk." Workshop classes often include fiction, poetry, memoir, songwriting, photography, and painting, among other options.
Arts and Faith
Image hosts an online forum called Arts and Faith, which facilitates discussion on topics such as film, music, literature, visual art, theater and dance, and television and radio, as well as general faith and life topics. The forum releases Top 100 and Top 25 Film lists each year, both overall and in specific categories such as horror films or films about marriage. Film critics involved in Arts and Faith include Jeffrey Overstreet, Steven Greydanus, Peter T. Chattaway, and Michael Leary of Filmwell.
Denise Levertov Award
Image co-sponsors the annual Levertov Award with the Seattle Pacific University English Department and its MFA Program in Creative Writing. Every spring they present the award to one artist or writer. The award is named for Denise Levertov, a twentieth-century American poet. Past recipients include poets Madeline DeFrees and Franz Wright, non-fiction writers Kathleen Norris, Thomas Lynch, and Eugene Peterson, fiction writers Bret Lott and Ron Hansen, and singer-songwriters Sam Phillips and Bruce Cockburn. The 2013 recipient of the Levertov Award is the poet Luci Shaw.