Letter from the Editor

Art can be a charge to action. It can highlight injustice, incite debate, and mirror our own failings. However, art can also speak to us in peace and stillness - a stillness through which God calls.  In quieting the distractions of the world and allowing us to notice and engage with the beauty around us, we are drawn into the presence of the beauty’s Creator.  Mother Teresa once said that “God is the friend of silence.”

The cover image of Issue 6 | Spring 2024, A Kid in Art by Max Townsend, manifests this artistic silence. The photograph features a small child framed inside an art installation while running joyfully by. The child’s arm rises in motion, but the overall photo is utterly still.  Such juxtaposition invokes feelings of serenity and wonder: wonder at the beauty in a fragmentary moment, in human art’s capacity to imitate the creative activity of God, and in new life. A remarkable number of other pieces from Issue 6 also highlight the marvels which we can only access in peaceful attentiveness. The Yellow Fiat, by Emily Thomas, describes “love’s little delights” found in rush hour traffic. Chesterfield, Missouri, August 2022, by Anthony Mazzola, captures the “soft-worn” offerings of a grandfather’s prayer. The issue contains more than one photo of a flower. 

I hope that the art of Issue 6 | Spring 2024 will invite you to consider the glory of God’s creation. I am graduating, and while my time with Vermilion must end, my love for the magazine’s message, mission, and community will not. I will always be honored and grateful for the gift of Vermilion, and I eagerly await the magazine’s future pursuits of beauty, truth, and craftsmanship. 

Most of all, I give thanks for the artists that have submitted their works, for our faculty advisor, Dr. Amanda Auerbach, and for the publication’s tireless undergraduate staff members. Without them, none of this would be possible. 

Judith Prevost

Editor-in-Chief  

Spring 2024