Nauvoo Temple Stained Glass by Tom Holdman: The Baptism – Part 1 of 2
Written by Donelle Gearheart.
On April 4th, 1999, Gordon B. Hinckley, President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter -Day Saints, made the following statement: “I feel impressed to announce that among all of the temples we are constructing; we plan to rebuild the Nauvoo Temple.” The proclamation brought excitement and anticipation to faithful saints all around the world, and, undoubtedly, even beyond the veil; but it particularly struck deep into the soul of Tom Holdman, stained glass artisan. “It made me want to jump for joy. I felt that I was meant to do glass for this holy edifice. I hoped that I could.” His passion and pursuit would not take a direct path to Nauvoo, but wound first through Palmyra and then Winter Quarters, where he made stained glass windows for the LDS temples there. “I needed the experience I got in Palmyra, and also in Omaha, to train me more, to teach me more, in order to do this monumental project of Christ in the Nauvoo Temple.” Christ is the focus of the art glass window The Baptism, located directly across from the font in the baptistery of the newly rebuilt Nauvoo Temple. Tom Holdman knew it had to be the best window he had ever completed.
The work began with the conception of the idea. Tom met with the architects on January 4th, 2001. They knew where they wanted to place a stained glass window, but all they had for him was the size of the opening. Responding to their request for ideas as to the theme of the proposed window, Tom replied: “Being in the baptistery, wouldn’t it be wonderful to show Christ being baptized?” Hence, The Baptism. When completed, the window would portray Christ as the focal point, with his hand open and reaching outward as if to say, “Come follow me”. Tom recalls: “That and other symbolism came flooding into my mind. I did not come up with the ideas. The lessons are too powerful for me to have come up with the meanings. God gave me the ideas.” Tom wanted to address all of the emotion of that experience of a perfect person being baptized. “I wanted to capture the awe John must have felt as he personally witnessed divine manifestation of Christ as the Messiah, the Son of God.” Also, because of the way that stained glass enhances light, he knew this event would be beautiful in glass, imagining the window revealing all the light streaming from the heavens. The architects, too, were convinced. Then came the hard part: bringing the window to life.
The process of creating such a stained glass window is time-consuming and requires attention to detail. Because the Nauvoo temple was to be a replica, as close as possible to the original 1840's building, only antique glass made in Germany was used. This meant a painstaking process of painting and firing to achieve the appropriate shading and texture required for the conceived detail, in addition to the usual sequence of steps which follows:
Briefly, an initial rough draft or sketch is drawn to flesh out the window’s theme. Tom makes use of posed models that are actually outfitted to the characters and the time being depicted.
Then he proceeds with the fine sketch. This is presented for approval to those in charge, including President Hinckley in the case of temple windows. Once it is accepted, the actual work on the window itself begins.
The lead lines and steel structure have to be figured out so they support the piece and are strong enough to hold the weight of the glass. Pattern paper pieces corresponding to the drawing are cut out. Decisions are made about which colored glass to use for which pieces. Then the pattern is traced onto the glass so it can be cut. The individual glass pieces are usually laid out in their respective positions, often with lighting behind them to aid decisions as to appropriateness of color and so on, as well as to assist with painting the detail. The paint is made up of colored crushed up glass in powder form. It is added to alcohol and an even coating is spread over the whole piece of glass.
Then Tom actually brushes out the excess to produce the highlights or the textures he desires. It is like backwards or negative painting. He’s subtracting color or doing it in reverse. Says Tom: “It hurts your brain to think about the negative. It was hard to learn. It still is hard. I always need to switch back and forth. I have to do a positive here and a negative there, so it’s kind of challenging.” Once painted, the glass is fired at 1,200 degrees Fahrenheit to make the design permanent. Then, it is time to put the whole picture together. The Baptism window was leaded to hold the pieces collectively. Once done, the leading is reinforced with a steel structure which is connected to the back of the window following many of the lead lines like an outline, so that it is hidden but gives strength to the window. The stained glass window is then ready to be placed.
It is interesting to hear Tom discuss details about how some of these steps unfolded while he worked on The Baptism. “It was an overwhelming task just to have on the wall a blank piece of paper upon which I was now supposed to draw Christ being baptized. I came up with a lot of preliminary sketches.” He worked on drawings for over 7 months. In fact, originally, Tom’s sketch included 3 observers to the baptism of Christ on the shore: an old man, a young woman, and, next to her, an eight year old child. They represented all ages and symbolized how Christ showed the way for every man, woman, and child.
The fact that the child was eight denoted the anticipation of an imminent baptism of her own at the age of accountability. “Also,” Tom goes on to explain, “The child is so innocent and pure that she could actually see the heavens open and see the dove descending.” Her placement in the drawing was such that she looked heavenward; noticing the spiritual manifestations, while all the others watched the baptism itself. Upon reviewing the completed sketch, including several subsequent adjustments and revisions, the brethren in charge determined that the additional people should be removed in order to allow a true focus on Christ. Tom’s response is an example of faith and obedience to all of us. “I was really distraught about it. I had felt strongly about putting in these people. I was praying about it to try and get over my disappointment. Then I felt the Spirit say, ‘I will help you make this window more beautiful than it would have been with these people in it. Trust me. Believe in me.’ So I said, ‘Ok, I’ll take them out.’”
Another example of faith was demonstrated during this initial phase. “It was a very, very humbling experience to have to sketch Christ being humble and submissive to His father. I had attempted it a couple of times, but all of the emotion just wasn’t there. He didn’t look humble yet majestic enough. The brethren kept telling me to retry, saying ‘We feel this will be your best work, but it is not there yet. Keep trying. It will come.’ So, after all those attempts, I got down on my knees and I prayed to God, saying ‘Heavenly Father, this is an overwhelming responsibility. I haven’t really had any art training per se, except that which you have given me here. Help me draw this experience as it needs to be drawn.’” Tom’s supplication led to promptings to draw a more traditional Christ with a more Jewish face. Christ’s eyes are closed with his head bowed in reverence to the Father. His hand is open, signifying his preparation to receive the Holy Ghost in addition to symbolizing his invitation to us all to do as he is doing. Tom spent almost one full night painting the head of Christ. “I kept fooling around with his eyelashes, his eyebrows, and his nose. It was 4:00 in the morning. I just kept doing more; adding things. I stood back, looking at the work, and I felt the Spirit say, ‘Do not put one more brush stroke on there. This is how it needs to be. This will capture how Christ is humble; how he is strong. He is powerful, but yet he is at peace. So, put down your brushes right now and put it in the kiln.’ I did. And it was right.”
The dove was one of the last additions to the sketch. When Tom had taken out the extraneous people, the whole composition didn’t balance. It was his wife Gayle who suggested putting a dove there. Tom resisted, feeling it was best to not actually include it in the scene. However, he woke up toward the middle of that night and was unable to get back to sleep, even after taking three sleeping pills! Thinking the scriptures would lull him to sleep; he began to read about the dove and cross-referenced his searching all through the scriptures. He read until 6:00 in the morning, until he realized how important it was to have the dove in the drawing. “I said, ‘Ok, I understand why it has to be there.’ And I went to sleep after that.” As it turned out, it so happens that John the Baptist is actually looking toward the dove. “It is perfect, how it evens out all of the composition. It was meant to be.”
After the sketch was finalized and approved, the magnitude of the endeavor Tom was about to embark on became evident. “The drawing sat out there on my wall for a while, because it scared me to death. I thought, ‘How am I supposed to do this in glass?’ I was very overwhelmed. I remember talking to my helpers about it and they said, ‘Oh, great. If it scares you to death...we’re petrified!’ It was just so overwhelming to me. I was going to paint all of the grass, for instance, and do all of the leaves. Every single piece had to be painted.” He set to work.
Completing the window “was a very moving emotional experience; it was a wonderful experience; it was a hard experience. It was every emotion you can imagine. I had joy; I had frustration; I had sadness; I had elation.” Tom would say: “I worked as hard on this as I’ve worked on anything else. It was harder to do this than my mission. I had to pull out every ounce of strength that I had. I put a piece of me in this window, which will always be in there.” He wanted to make it perfect for the House of the Lord. He had a vision of what it needed to be. His aspiration is that those who attend the temple will be able to learn much from this depiction of Christ’s baptism. “So often, all of us only learn through our ears, but God also teaches us through our eyes. So, if we can feel the Holy Ghost and allow the Spirit to help us open our eyes, we’ll see all of the meaning. You have to learn with your eyes, not just with your ears.”
(This will continue in Part 2)