Images have invaded our modern lives with a vengeance. This onslaught of images competes with our word life. Sometimes it seems as if words are losing in this battle for the devotion of our eyes. Have images invaded the blank canvas of your prayer life? Are you looking for a sensory accessory to your prayers?

Consider James Turrell.

Born in 1943 in Pasadena California, James Turrell is an internationally recognized artist that works with light and space. His life work has culminated in a "slow art" project excavating a crater in Arizona, Roden: a permanent installation of light and space carved into the rock.

My first experience of James Turrell's work occurred in the Indianapolis Museum of Art. In the contemporary art section of the museum there is a dark hallway that connects two galleries. Halfway between the galleries is a small dimly lit room with a simple gray painting on the far wall. The first time I peeked in, I kept going befuddled. Yet, the oddity of the room caused me to rethink my quick dismissal. Why is a gray painting in that dimly lit room? After entering the room for a second look, a guard entered behind me and whispered, "touch it". Somewhat surprised, but curious, I walked slowly towards the wall and reached out my hand. To my sensory surprise, my hand passed through the wall into an empty space, that in that moment, I can only describe as beyond. The gray painting was actually a hole in the wall leading to a grey room beyond. The transition between the two rooms was obscured by a razor sharp edge and strategic use of dim light.

A gray rectangle in an empty room expanded my understanding of art, and gave me a new tool in engaging my faith. His work, is a space were I can see God without seeing God. In the empty space and light of Turrell's work, my prayers take on a depth that the visual noise in other places limits. The work of James Turrell is an amazing tool for taming the visual noise around us and focusing during prayer. Raised as a Quaker, Turrell’s grandmother would often tell him to “go inside and greet the light” during prayer meetings. Turrell’s work is “a way, on the outside, to remind one of how we see on the inside.” (Whittaker Interview)

For those of you in Southern California, a new James Turrell installation recently opened at Ponoma College Museum of Art and is open to the public.