The Gospel according to a mobile

On the third floor of The Greensboro School of Creativity we have a mobile-maker. Although she makes much more than mobiles, they were how I first came to know her as an artist. Made of cut, bent pieces of wire and colorful butterflies or silver circles, the mobiles are remarkable pieces of art as they hang in her studio or in the hall, but the magic happens when the wind arrives. Suddenly the piece of art comes alive, dancing in the breeze, and I watch with child-like delight trying hard not to reach out and touch it.

It didn’t take long before I bought one of her mobiles, which now hangs in my daughters’ room. I will sometimes wander in, even when they’re there, just to blow on the mobile and watch it come to life. As I watch it swirl, its theology is not lost on me.

I have never made a mobile, but have many pieces of art in my life. Whether a painting, drawing, or piece of writing, my studio is full of pieces of art which hang like the butterflies in a mobile. The pieces of art, however, do not only dwell in my studio. At home, children assemble, a wife arrives, and a meal is prepared. Works of art, if you will, dangling beside one another, but it takes a breeze to come from somewhere else to bring the pieces of art to life.

Swirling and dancing, I not only give thanks for each piece of art, but also for the breeze that gives them life.