Jesus Appearing to Mary Magdalen 1940

Esther Newport imagined this scene of Jesus Appearing to Mary Magdalen sometime during her life. I love the quietness of this image, the flatness, the stillness. There's this real sense of devotion in Newport's work; you can see it in the careful way she's laid down each line, almost like a prayer or meditation. It's not a flashy painting, but there's something really earnest about it. I'm curious about Newport's process. I imagine her working alone, maybe late at night, slowly building up the image, color by color. I wonder what she was thinking about as she painted? Was she trying to capture a specific feeling or memory? I love the rocks that look like brains, and the tiny marks in the sky behind the yellow sun. Newport reminds me of other self-taught artists like Bill Traylor or Clementine Hunter. All these artists were in conversation with each other, even if they never met. They were all figuring out ways to translate their own inner visions into something tangible, something that could be shared with the world.