Holy Women and Subversive Sister Saints

 

Today, I have the great honor and pleasure to share an interview I had with the multi-talented and multi-gifted Angela Yarber.

Welcome, Angela! Being able to share your many talents with my readers, brings me great joy! To get us started, could you tell us a little bit about yourself? 

Aloha! I’m Rev. Dr. Angela Yarber. I live on Hawai’i Island with my wife and two young children; here, we run a non-profit, the Tehom Center, which empowers marginalized women by teaching about revolutionary women through art, writing, retreats, and academic courses. I hold a Ph.D. in Art and Religion, and I’ve been both a Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and a Professor of Divinity since 2006. For fourteen years, I was an ordained clergywoman and served churches as a pastor. I’ve published seven books addressing the intersections among the arts, gender/sexuality, and spirituality. Four of these books were listed in the top LGBTQ Religion Books by QSpirit. Finally, I’m a working artist who creates folk-feminist iconography paintings, collages, and Subversive Sister Saint icons of everyday people (and their pets) who do revolutionary work in our world.

Your artwork spoke to me the very first time I saw it. I know from our communications that Van Gogh, my favorite artist of all time, influenced your work. What is it that attracted you to Vincent’s art? How has this informed the work you do? 

I love learning about the history behind the artwork and the life of an artist. Van Gogh’s history makes him one of the few male artists who really resonate with me. Before dedicating his life to the arts, he felt called to ministry and really lived in solidarity with the poor working in coal mines. He truly cared about the least among us, and helping others find beauty around them. I’m also a sucker for swirls and texture, which he does so well. 

What medium do you work in? Why do you enjoy working in this medium? 

For over a decade, I’ve worked almost entirely with acrylic on canvas in my folk-feminist iconography. When the pandemic struck, I gave myself permission to experiment a bit, though. For years I’ve admired live collage, so I decided to try it in March 2020 and fell in love with the process. In these works, I take the faces of the goddesses I’ve painted and I surround them with live plants and flowers from the island, along with other natural, fabric, and paper elements traditionally used in collage. Then I take photographs of the live images and transfer them into digital art. After doing this throughout the pandemic, I also decided to experiment solely with digital collage in the Subversive Sister Saints series. All three iterations of elevating revolutionary women are hands-on and life-giving for me, while also being vibrant and accessible for viewers.

From your website, I learned that you have written several books. First, what genre of writing do you enjoy most? How did writing become part of your life? Where do you find your inspiration? 

I adore writing just as much as creating visual art. I’ll be honest in sharing that I’ve sometimes been pushed (internally and externally) to choose between the two, but I just can’t…and I don’t want to! My first six books were academic and address the intersections among gender/sexuality, the arts, and religion/spirituality. Though academic, most still have practical elements that join the theoretical and philosophical. I’ve also published a coloring book. And my book, Holy Women Icons¸ partners my icon paintings with essays about the woman portrayed, along with questions for contemplation to help readers apply the virtues of the revolutionary woman’s life to their own lives. Currently, I’m querying agents for my first official commercial book, Emboldened: Revolutionary Women, Radical Imagination, and the Queering of the American Dream. It’s about the revolutionary historical and mythological women who emboldened my little family to quit our jobs, sell our home, and travel for 18 months with our toddler. 

With both my writing and my art, my calling and my inspiration are the world surrounding us. At the Tehom Center, which houses my art and writing, I often say that the beauty of the world causes my jaw to drop in wonder. Simultaneously, the injustice of the world breaks my heart. My work—in writing and art—is to create bridges between these two realities, thereby radically imagining, and hopefully creating, a world where everyone can be surrounded in beauty. 

As you know, I am also a writer, artist, teacher, and minister. What drew you to becoming an ordained minister? How do writing, art and teaching meld with your ministry?  

Yes, it’s such a beautiful and profound connection we have! The first question is difficult to answer since my theology has shifted to more of a philosophy since my 2004 ordination; I’ve really moved away from the tradition of my ordination and religion in general. I now abide by more of a goddess and nature spirituality, while simultaneously continuing to study world religions with deep appreciation. For me, writing, art, teaching, spirituality, and social justice are so inextricably linked that I simply cannot separate them; each are mutually informative. 

Together and separately, they offer avenues for us to radically imagine a more just and beautiful world for all; they are also our tools for creating such a world.  

Could you tell us a bit about Tehom Center? How did it come to be? What do you do there and why? 

Tehom Center non-profit began as the Holy Women Icons Project about a decade ago. It started as an art exhibit of my folk-feminist icons, expanded into regular articles for Feminism and Religion, Believe Out Loud, Horizons, Bearings, and even Ms. Magazine. Then a book accompanied the art. The book was joined by retreats, workshops, and public speaking events. Then it became an academic course called Women, History, and Myth. When my queer little family traveled full-time in 2015, part of our intentions was finding a new home to house a small, off-grid retreat center to house this art, writing, retreats, and courses. 

When we settled on Hawai’i Island in 2017, Tehom Center quickly became an official non-profit. Our mission is empowering marginalized women by teaching about revolutionary women through art, writing, retreats, and academic courses. In turn, I continue to paint and collage icons of revolutionary women from history and myth, while also writing about them, and leading an Intentional Creative Process where I guide learners in painting their own icon; each step of the painting process is accompanied by rituals, readings, and embodied exercises. I lead group and private retreats that engage this process. And I’m in partnership with Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Union, Brite, Claremont, and the Graduate Theological Union to teach courses to their seminary students in this area (currently on pause due to Covid-19 travel restrictions).

Most recently, Tehom Center also started the Subversive Sister Saints series where individuals can commission icon paintings of everyday women, holy families, drag queens, and even pets (who I call “holy helpers”). This has been an incredibly meaningful new process of empowering and emboldening those who commission these pieces to see reflections of themselves as worthwhile, valid, and even holy. For marginalized women, in particular, this can be a revolutionary act of affirmation. Between the Holy Women Icons Project paintings and the Subversive Sister Saints, I’ve created nearly 200 artworks that amplify amazing women from history, mythology, and today.  

If you had one message to share with our readers, what would you say? 

You are worth the space you occupy in this world, subversive sister saints. So, hold your head high, spread your arms wide, and go forth knowing you are beloved and whole!  

To learn more about Angela and the work she does, visit her at:

Website:  https://tehomcenter.org/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tehomcenter 

Instagram, and Twitter @tehomcenter