Ecclesiart is an online project that raises awareness of significant works of modern and contemporary art since 1920 in UK churches and cathedrals.
The selected works represent the diversity of high quality church commissions and reflect developments in artistic practice and ecclesiastical art and design. You can explore the collection using the tiles below or by using the Ecclesiart map.
We seek to encourage increased responsibility towards works which may be under-appreciated or at risk and hope that this selection of works provides inspiring and challenging examples of art in churches useful to any parish or individual wishing to commission a new work.
We welcome nominations of new works to be added to Ecclesiart. Please email us with a short text about why you think a work of art should be included with a short theological reflection on the work and its context (no longer than 150 words) and if possible please include images. Please note that we do not accept nominations from artists for their own work.
All permanent works shortlisted for the Award for Art in a Religious Context are added to Ecclesiart. For all other nominations, the Director and trustees of Art and Christianity reserve the right to select works which they determine as meeting the criteria of aptness to context, artistic and technical merit and appropriate theological meaning.
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Christopher Le Brun: Desert Window
The Desert Window was commissioned in 2014 for the LSE’s new Faith Centre, an interfaith worship space as well as a centre for rigorous interreligious dialogue, research and training. The window’s subject points to the significance of the desert both as a place of spiritual intensity for many religions, and as a place of ‘inter-religious encounter’, in the words of the chaplain, the Revd Dr James Walters. The window thus expresses the role of the Faith Centre as a ‘place of stillness for all people, where different religious groups can “set up camp” for a while, but also a place to encounter people of other faiths, to hear their stories and to share hospitality.’
Nicholas Mynheer and Roger Wagner: Enhancements to St Mary’s (aumbry, window, font cover)
Nicholas Mynheer (b. 1958) and Roger Wagner (b. 1957) were commissioned to contribute to the enhancements programme at St Mary’s, Iffley, a Romanesque parish church in east Oxford.
Sophie Hacker: Revealing Glory, Renewing Hope
The design is inspired by a 17th century map of the town and includes significant historical landmarks such as neolithic earthworks and an early medieval castle. The main road clearly marked on the map becomes a horizon line in the window. In the ‘sky’ above, a golden shape glows with light where the ruins of Ludgershall Castle now stand.
Thomas Denny: Transfiguration Window
This work 'was created in honour of Bishop Michael Ramsey, and intended to reflect his theological interests, in particular his fascination with the Transfiguration of Christ... The window is in the South Quire Aisle and is 16x16m in size. This window is technically very assured and of high quality. Its location means that it can only really be seen at close quarters, and it is indeed very detailed in its depiction of biblical images.’
Ceri Richards: Windows, tabernacle and reredos
Ceri Richard's reredos and stained glass were conceived as a single triptych, abstractly flowing one into another. The tabernacle has more obvious imagery: the heavens, the chalice and the cross.
Eduardo Paolozzi: Stained glass windows
This window was designed by Eduardo Paolozzi, who was born in Leith, to replace the plain glass rose and lancets in the Resurrection Chapel. Given in memory of Mary Carmichael, a much loved member of the congregation, it was dedicated in October 2002. When the sun floods through the window, it transforms the plain stone and woodwork into a kaleidoscope of colour.
Marc Chagall: Stained glass windows at Tudeley
The Chagall windows at Tudeley were commissioned by Sir Henry and Lady d'Avigdor-Goldsmid in memory of Sarah d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, their daughter who died in 1963 at the tragically early age of 21, in a sailing accident off Rye. Sarah d'Avigdor-Goldsmid and her mother had visited the 1961 Louvre exhibition of Chagall's work.
Anne Vibeke Mou: Window for St John’s, Healey
A highly detailed yet monochrome window depicting billowing clouds. This work was joint winner, along with James Hugonin's window for the same church, of the 2011 ACE award for art in a religious context.
Thomas Denny: St Thomas Chapel windows
A triptych of modern stained-glass windows hanging in Gloucestershire Cathedral's South Ambulatory Chapel, the central one recalls the story of doubting Thomas, while those either side are abstract articulations of Psalm 148 which praises God's creation.
Marc Chagall: Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord
Window based on the theme of Psalm 150
Shona McInnes: Oil Industry Chapel window
Contemporary window chronicling the North Sea Oil industry, with links to Aberdeen and in memory of all those who lost their lives in the industry. The window won a Saltire Award for Arts in Architecture.
John Piper and Patrick Reyntiens: Light of the World
Light of the World is vast stained glass window, fully architecturally integrated in the Chapel of Robinson College, Cambridge.
Shirazeh Houshiary: East window
St Martin in the Fields’ East Window by Shirazeh Houshiary in collaboration with Pip Horne was commissioned as part of major redevelopments within the church and its curtilage.
Rona Smith: North Elevation
Rona Smith’s North Window panel is constructed from a web of whirling squares suspended in the window alcove. The squares spiral out from a central 'eye' whilst the panel itself curves into the space forming a sculptural arc which echoes the two dimensional pattern.
Léonie Seliger: Godmersham windows
In 2015, Leslie Smith, the then Chairman of the Friends of Godmersham Church, approached the stained glass artist and conservationist Léonie Seliger with an idea to create new glass work for the church in memory of his late wife, Sue. The two windows at the apsidal east end of the largely unadorned North Chapel were chosen. The PCC soon approved the designs, which are a gentle celebration of nature and which recall the pattern made by exposed stones and their dark mortar joints fixed into the limestone arch above.
Ceri Richards: All Souls and All Saints windows
Two windows installed in the Gibbs nave of the Cathedral. All Saints is the East window of South aisle and All Souls the east window of the north aisle.
Ptolemy Mann: Oceanic Ray
This new, modern church was a collaboration between the architects Greenhill Jenner and Portal Architecture commissioned to replace the original church destroyed by fire in the 1970s.
Jonah Jones: Window, baldacchino and mosaics
Jonah Jones' concrete-glass window, baldacchino and mosaics are installed at the Catholic Church of St Patrick, Newport, Gwent. The large window shows the saint in purple archbishop’s vestments.