It's easy for time and space to fall away in Adrian Kellard's "The Learned Art of Compassion" exhibit. During my visit to the Museum of Contemporary Religious Art (MOCRA) at St. Louis University last week, I entered the exhibit on a clear autumn day and was surprised to see the sun setting as I left.  

 "The Learned Art of Compassion" commemorates two important artistic and social milestones: the twentieth anniversary of the artists' death and the thirtieth anniversary of the identification of the HIV virus that causes AIDS. As an ambitious artist gaining international acclaim in the 1980's, Kellard's life was tragically cut short at the age of 32 because of complications due to AIDS.  Kellard was a New York native who left his working class background to study art at The State University of New York (SUNY) and to later receive training under a celebrated artist in his program. His work tells the story of his encounter with success, illness, and spirituality.

What I love about Kellard's style is that his art is practical. Almost every one of his works serves a useful function: a calendar-themed privacy screen, a decorative table, a prayer vigil with a built-in clock. Kellard's installations are not only captivating in their confident play with colors (blood reds, kelp greens, bumblebee yellows); they are also surprisingly hopeful. I forget that these murals and carvings are made by the hands of a man suffering from AIDS.

Drawing inspiration from his working class background and his academic study of German Expressionist printmakers, Kellard's work is an expose of "high" and "low" art. Themes of transcendent religious experience are rendered with hardware store materials like pine wood and latex paint, vestiges of his low-income background. In the same way, Kellard makes the divinity of the Christian tradition accessible by portraying it with a style that quotes pop culture icons.

I appreciate how Kellard's work rethinks the humanity of Christ. We witness Christ's sorrows and his joys, his good days and his bad days in carefully crafted woodcarvings. We also experience Kellard's own process of healing and how intensely he relied on the mercy of Christ. In his largest installation "Healing, Learned Art of Compassion" the face of Christ resembles that of someone with AIDS. His eyes are sunken in. He looks grey with illness. In this practice of empathy, Kellard sees himself as someone both broken and sanctified, sick and well.

When you go to see "The Learned Art of Compassion," you will be blessed by the honest storytelling of these works. Time spent in the exhibition leaves the viewer with a renewed sense of what it means to be well, and hopefully, a lesson on how to learn compassion.  

Regular museum hours are 11 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., Tuesday through Sunday. Admission is free, though there is a suggested donation of $5 or $1 for students and children. Call (314) 977-7170 or visit the MOCRA web site for more information.

Photo: Adrian Kellard, St. Francis screen, 1985.
Latex on wood with hinges. Collection of Antonia Lasicki and
William Devia, Niskayuna, NY.