A stained glass window long created for a small church in Rhode Island 147 years ago has been identified as historic, one-of-a-kind performance of Jesus as a black man.
The work of the studios of Henry Sharp, a prominent 19th century American stained glass manufacturer, the 1877 window is a marked departure from his usual output. Instead of depicting a singular holy figure, the 12-by-5-foot window tells a full narrative, with scenes of Jesus at the well with the Samaritan woman and with the sisters Martha and Mary. All characters have dark brown skin.
“The window is really quite transgressive in a lot of ways,” Virginia Raguin, a professor at the College of the Holy Cross, in Worcester, Massachusetts, told Artnet News, noting only the unusual skin tones, but the depiction of scenes from men and women as equals. “There are a number of things that are extraordinary about it.”
An expert in stained glass from the 13th century to the present day and having published widely on the subject, Raguin was called upon to examine the mysterious window by Hadley Arnold, an art historian and architect who was in the process of converting St Mark’s Church to Warren , Rhode Island, in his private home.
Henry Sharp Studio, Dark-Skinned Jesus Addressing the Samaritan Woman at the Well in a Window of St. Mark’s Church in Warren, Rhode Island (1877). Photo by Michel Raguin.
The Russell Warren-designed Greek Revival Church was built in 1830, but the parish closed in 2010. Arnold and her husband bought it from the diocese in 2012, but didn’t notice the unusual skin tones in the church. one of the windows until the end. a decade later. At first, the couple were unsure if they were interpreting what they were seeing correctly. But after considerable research, Arnold is convinced that the artist intended to portray Jesus as a black man as a radical statement about equality, both race and gender.
“It’s a rebel window,” Arnold told the Journal of Providencewho first reported on the discovery.
The first test the window had to pass was whether the dark flesh tones would have matched the original appearance of the artwork. Although there is paint loss on the window in the darkest browns and blacks – as seen in Mary’s hair and in the outlines of many details – the paint on the flesh remains intact.
Henry Sharp Studio, Dark-skinned Jesus addressing sisters Martha and Mary in a window of St. Mark’s Church in Warren, Rhode Island (1877). Photo by Michel Raguin.
“The colors of the glass may flake off, but they don’t change like oil paint because they’re baked into the glass,” Raguin explained, noting that the black paint deterioration is typical of Sharp’s other windows. the time, probably resulting from unsuccessful use. of Borax.
Sharp Studios had also made three other windows for St. Mark’s, all of which used milky white glass for the skin. It seemed clear that dark skin was a conscious choice.
“My immediate reaction was, yes indeed this is a black Jesus,” Raguin said.
The next step was to research the provenance of the work.
A woman named Mary P. Carr donated the window in honor of sisters Ruth Bourne DeWolf and Hannah Bourne Gibbs. Little is known about Carr, other than that she did not marry and her parents and brothers died before she was 35.
“I guess Ruth DeWolf was a surrogate mother for Mary,” Raguin speculated.
DeWolf and Gibbs were both donors to the American Colonization Society, which helped former slaves settle in Liberia. But although they appear to have been abolitionists, DeWolf also married into a family that made their fortunes in the slave trade, and Gibbs into one of their ship captains.
Henry Sharp Studio, Dark-Skinned Jesus in a Window of St. Mark’s Church in Warren, Rhode Island (1877). You can see the paint loss of the black paint in the outlines. Photo by Michel Raguin.
Raquin’s theory is that Carr donated the window in honor of the sisters as a way of acknowledging the shame that DeWolf – who was then deceased – had felt about where the money she had had come from. inherited from her husband.
“It was a statement that Jesus is the color of Jesus in your heart, all over the world,” she said. “If Jesus is my brother and I’m black, Jesus is black.”
The church left few records of the work, but the minister gave a speech shortly after its unveiling, telling the congregation that “the peculiar form of the scripture scenes depicted, as in the exquisite beauty of the execution, is a most appropriate expression of those Christian personages in whose memory it was erected.
Henry Sharp Studio, Landscapes in a Window of St. Mark’s Church in Warren, Rhode Island (1877). Photo by Michel Raguin.
The window is also unique in that it features landscapes in the background, which would not become a popular feature of stained glass until the turn of the century, thanks to the work of Louis Comfort Tiffany.
Because landscape painting was often the preserve of female painters at the time, Raquin thinks Sharp likely hired a woman to handle Carr’s unusual commission request – rather than challenge someone who handled normal studio output to create a work that represented such a big departure from their expertise.
Arnold has removed historic stained glass from the church and hopes to encourage more research into the works. She is working on building an LED-lit frame to display the Black Jesus window, which she would like to donate to an institution.
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