life and death

to me, one of the quintessential concepts of Christianity is from philippians 1:21. the idea of both living like Christ and having to die to your own impulses and humanity in order to truly live that life really struck a cord with me when i was first introduced to it. when i initially outlined some sketches to illustrate this concept, i tried a mathematical theme (0+1=3; 1-1=1), but the sketches didn't seem to truly match the verse and were scattered without a specific focus. i finally landed on the idea of a sickle. The initial response to the image for most people in our society would probably be death, as a sickle is mostly associated with the "angel of death."  That's the first half of the image.  However, at its simplest form, a sickle represents a harvest, as in reaping crops. This part of the image represents the new life we have in Christ. I used the image along with a red tree (representing death on the cross and, in some ways, life) and green, vine- like shapes in order to emphasize the idea in this watercolor.