Friday, December 18, 2009

Stained Glass

The local hospital had some new stained glass installed. I expected it to be more religious (since the hospital is a Catholic hospital and all), but the theme appears to be pretty generic: a heart, an anchor, a rod of Asclepius*, and a dove. The dove however could possibly represent the Holy Spirit, so I'll go with that. Hey it's art, I'm being subjective.



*Now that I think about it the rod of Asclepius might have been the two-snake, winged staff of Caduceus. I'll have to look the next time I'm there. The two have been confused for so long that they're used interchangeably now.

1 comment:

Laura Goff said...

I have designed and fabricated stained glass windows for several hospital chapels. Since people of all beliefs go to the hospital, the stained glass windows are designed to be spiritual to those who are spititual but the stained glass windows are not so religious that the windows offend people of other beliefs.

This is a link to one of my windows
http://sotaglass.com/regtrad/rgbaptisthospitaladminbldgpics.shtml.

The window has a waterfall which is living waters. It has a star which symbolizes the birth of Christ. Underneath the star is a dove which symbolizes the baptism of Jesus. From the dove springs a rainbow which is for hope. In the sky are 66 stars for the 66 books of the Bible. In the landscape are iris for the Trinity, daisies for youth, and even Jack-in-the-Pulpit. It has symbols of Christ and Christianity. But it is subtle.

Laura Goff Parham
State of the Art,Inc
Stained Glass Studio

PS
The Stained Glass Association of America is based in Kansas City. Our 2010 Summer Conference will be there. Perhaps you know of local churches and hospitals that have great stained glass. We always love to see local windows.