By Katie Ginn
MCL Editor Katie Ginn recently interviewed five Mississippi artists whose walk with Christ informs their work onstage and in the studio. They shared about their early (and current) inspirations, how their art impacts their faith, and how anybody can – and should – engage with the arts for God’s glory.
Meet the artists
Antonio Mack
Rapper (as Martyrs Tone), Jackson
Early influences
“For me, it was just all types of music – some Christian music, pop, R&B, blues. I became a student of music. I was 8 years old when I started rapping.”
Returning to rap
After participating in Jackson’s hip-hop scene, coming to know Christ – and then working in ministry for several years – Antonio has returned to rap. He still works full time for the InterVarsity college ministry, but he released an LP last fall and will release a new single soon.
“When I started my journey (with Christ), I just wanted to serve Him, teach the Bible, and make disciples. About two and a half years ago is when the Lord really started impressing it upon my heart to return to music.”
“Now I’m starting to see the reason why He had me wait so long. I matured in Christ so I’d be ready to steward it well.”
‘Entry points’ for non-artists
“Just obey scripture. We’re told to sing spiritual songs (Colossians 3:16). Everyone won’t be a singer. But everyone can engage in it.”
“You may be going through something and you’re grieving. Maybe you find yourself singing more as you cry, or you go and try a grieving painting class.”
“You may never know what you’re good at if you never try. But the ability must always make its way back to seeking the Lord about what He wants you to do with it.”
Connect with Antonio
Visit https://www.martyrstone.com/, or follow @MartyrsTone on Facebook or @itsmartyrstone on Instagram.
Katelyn Harbaugh
Painter, oil and watercolor, Madison
Early influences
“My dad was an art minor and has always done woodworking. I also have an aunt who’s a very accomplished artist. And then … teachers saw in me an artistic talent and encouraged me.”
Hymnscapes
“(Right before 2020) I had been doing a lot of commission work … and I really wanted to create my own collection of art. And my husband and I were talking through, what do I love?”
“And I sing in church. So hymns came up. And then the idea of combining hymns with landscapes that I see when I hear them – or I’ll see a landscape and then a song will coordinate with that.”
“The hymnscapes became just a balm to me and others when the world was turned upside-down due to COVID. I love when that connection happens between different realms of art (like painting and music).”
‘Entry points’ for non-artists
“Anybody can learn to draw. I will die on that hill. And local galleries have classes all the time. Pop into those. And I think our Mississippi Arts Commission has a roster of teaching artists.”
“You can also now on YouTube learn almost anything. … I used YouTube to learn a lot of specific watercolor techniques.”
“There is beauty in the process. And I think that ties to our spiritual lives. … we’re being sanctified slowly, painfully slowly at times. But it’s beautiful, and God has asked us to enter that.”
Connect with Katelyn
Visit https://www.katelynharbaugh.com/, or follow @KatelynHarbaughArt on Facebook or @katelynharbaughart on Instagram. You can also see her art in person at Pacesetter Gallery in Flowood.
Kathy Thibodeaux
Founder and artistic director of Ballet Magnificat!, Jackson
(With a satellite school and company in Brazil)
From Thalia Mara to Jesus
“My mother introduced me to ballet when I was about 6. … She started me at the Jackson Ballet. I had a wonderful time there, had wonderful teachers. Thalia Mara was one of my teachers … And dance was always my life, until I met my husband and he introduced me to Jesus.”
“This year we’ll be celebrating our 40th anniversary of Ballet Magnificat! – and our 50th wedding anniversary. And I’m turning 70! I’m thankful we can still use our gifts for the Lord, no matter how old we are.”
40 years of Ballet Mag
“God has done so much. When we started in ’86 … everybody was going, ‘We’ve never heard of dancing for Jesus.’ Belhaven offered us some studio space and office space … We just trusted God to provide.”
“Now we’ve been blessed with a school and a company. The company is in Croatia right now.”
We’ve been to 50 countries, sharing the gospel through dance. Ten years ago, we started a school and a company in Brazil, which is thriving.”
‘Entry points’ for non-artists
“I’m glad the Bible says, let them praise His name with dancing (Psalm 149:3). With ballet, the earlier you start, the better. But we do have wonderful adult ballet classes at our school. They are thriving. And as we get older, we’ve got to keep moving. Ballet can be fun, and we welcome all ages.”
Connect with Kathy and Ballet Magnificat!
Visit https://www.balletmagnificat.com/, or follow @balletmag on Facebook or @balletmagnificat on Instagram.
John Maxwell
Playwright and actor, Jackson
‘Red Hot Henry Brown’
“My mother introduced me to the stage when I was 6. She loved to play the piano … I had a straw hat and a cane and a checkered coat and (sang), ‘My name is Red Hot Henry Brown … ’ (Later, in college), I auditioned for a musical to meet girls. And I put my toe out on that stage, and it was ‘Red Hot Henry Brown’ again. And I said wow, I love this.”
He called home: “Mom, I don’t want to be a lawyer. I want to be an actor.”
Her response? “Great, go for it.”
A homeless John the Baptist
Years ago, a Seattle church called John and said, “We want somebody dressed like a homeless person who gets up and talks to us as if he’s John the Baptist.” John agreed to do it.
“Some people wanted to call the police (when I got up and started talking),” he recalls. “But the preacher was saying, ‘No, no, let him have his say.’” John scared the congregation so much, they put five times as much money into the offering plate.
‘Entry points’ for non-artists
“If you want to write, write. If you want to dance, take classes. You don’t have to do it professionally. The creative process is what we all are a result of. So it is in us all.”
Follow John’s latest work
John’s comedic play “Buck Nekkid for Jesus” is becoming a movie, filmed on location in Mississippi. According to the film’s Facebook group page, the movie is about “a down-on-his-luck gas station owner (who) wrestles with shame, sin, and his own failures,” and an “eccentric faith healer Sister Pearle,” who “becomes convinced it’s time to save his soul.”
John describes the film’s subject matter and language as “rough” but says ultimately, “it’s about death, resurrection, and redemption.” Follow the film’s progress at https://www.facebook.com/groups/bucknekkidforjesus/.
Mandy Ellard
Painter, pastel and oil, Madison
The people who pushed her
“As a child, I was still and quiet and focused when I was drawing or making things. And like Katelyn, in the school districts, the right teachers encouraged me. And the time I spent with my mother always involved theater, music, museums.”
“I got an art scholarship to Delta State and thought, ‘What am I going to do with that?’ And then I had a husband that said, ‘You just have to keep doing art.’”
Finding inspiration on the road
“I love to get in the car (and find landscapes to paint), especially when my husband is driving. He’s in real estate and loves to look at land and properties.”
“I have friends – if it’s within driving distance, we’ll all get in the car and go (paint) plein air (outdoors), which is really fun. I love (painting) the Delta.”
“Nothing that I paint is overtly Christian or biblical – but the feeling of creating is. God is the ultimate and the very first Creator. We’re all imitators, or maybe the right word is collaborators, with that Spirit when we create.”
‘Entry points’ for non-artists
“(Find someone to) teach you. … I’m with the Pastel Society of Mississippi. We have many artists show up who’ve never tried pastels, and I can’t wait to get my hands on them. …. I get as much joy from (teaching my medium) as I do actually doing it.”
Connect with Mandy
Visit https://www.mandyellardart.com/, or follow @mandyellardart on Instagram. You can also see her art in person at McTaggart Fine Art in Flora and Left Bank Gallery in Ridgeland.
A conversation about faith and art
Katie Ginn: What is the biggest way your faith impacts your art, or vice versa?
Mandy Ellard: That takes turns for me. There are times when my faith has to take the lead, and there are times where my art assures me into faith.
Katelyn Harbaugh: Everything I do, I want it to be anchored and doing it for God’s glory. And everything I do is influenced by how He’s made this world … Even painting a portrait of a person’s face, seeing how intricately He has created them – that causes me to worship Him more and understand Him just a little bit better.
Antonio Mack: (My faith helps me) tell real experiences of heartache … I wrote a song about a childhood friend who committed suicide. So the way I’m able to tell these stories and talk about this fallen world … My worldview, I’m able to relay it in a way that can reach people.
Things you might not typically say in a church setting, you may say it in music.
Kathy Thibodeaux: I always wanted to be a professional ballerina. I thought it was going to make me happy, and it didn’t. And then I met Jesus, and it totally changed my desires from dancing for myself to dancing for the Lord.
KG: Before you knew Christ, did you ever think you’d be running your own ballet company?
KT: No. I was shy. I don’t consider myself a leader. … so I’m really dependent on God every day for everything.
John Maxwell: I had been doing my one-man show on William Faulkner (‘Oh, Mr. Faulkner, Do You Write?’) a long time, and it got great reviews, but I just felt a real emptiness. And I was a ‘sort of’ Christian at the time.
I had done ‘Faulkner’ at Clemson University, and I had come back to this very cheap motel … where you walk through the door and the (smell of the) cleaning fluid hits you. The people at the desk are surprised you want the room all night. (laughs)
I was so depressed. I got on top of the bed – I dared not get under the sheets – and I prayed for about an hour. (And) I began to realize that God wanted me to do His work. Not that ‘Faulkner’ wasn’t His work. I heard somebody say, ‘Faulkner’ was Peter’s fishing. Peter had to fish first.
I started putting together a monologue on Paul. And then we had moved to Seattle, and (I got the call from the church about portraying a “homeless” John the Baptist; see “Meet the Artists” section).
When I left that church, I was so pumped up …. so charged with a mission. And I (eventually) wrote six religious monologues that I performed around the country. Then I started writing one-act plays, then full plays, based on biblical stories.
But when I write through those … I want to write through the truth as the Holy Spirit leads me. One of my biggest tools is prayer.
KG: Are there particular artists or works of art that inspire each of you today?
M: I have a group of ladies that I paint with. (That artistic community) moves me as much as anything.
KH: Makito Fujimora creates abstract works with minerals that he grinds himself. He calls it slow art. I admire him a lot. He’s written several books that are very impactful.
Through teaching (art at St. Augustine School), my students really inspire me … And then I would say all of these Mississippi artists. I grew up in mostly Colorado. Moving here, there’s such an importance of the arts, and people actually value it to a high level.
A: There are a lot of artists that I listen to. But one of the earliest convictions for me to do Christian hip-hop was the fact that I did not hear artists coming from the angle that I felt like would benefit people who I personally knew.
I think a lot of the newer Christian hip-hop artists are being influenced by artists who just came out two or three years ago, which really limits your scope and what you think you can do. There was a loss of the storytelling and the not-so-always-pretty approach. And I like the upbeat songs, I made some, but I like music that speaks to deep places.
KT: My husband (inspires me). He’s a musician, and he’s been involved with the Christian music industry since 1989. He was a former child star and left Hollywood going down a spiral … Then Jesus totally changed his life. And that’s about when I met him.
He still plays concerts. But I’m just very thankful for a husband that loves the Lord.
J: The playwrights who really influence me are the old school, like (Anton) Chekhov and (Henrik) Ibsen and Arthur Miller and Thornton Wilder. And I don’t know that they’re Christian writers at all. … But again, if it’s the truth, it’s spiritual. Because that truth is out of the true human condition.