Overview

The Shapes Are Real is a collection of thirty-three poems by the Christian poet, Jill Pelaez Baumgaertner, occasioned by thirty-three of the dramatic sculptures of the Romanian Christian sculptor, Liviu Mocan. Photos of the sculptures are presented along with the poems inspired by them. The Shapes Are Real can be read as a series of devotional poems presented in the pages of an art book in which poems and sculptures inform each other.

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Reviews

""The exquisite arrangement of sculpture and poetry in this book offers such a profound experience of both pleasure and spiritual depth that I am left almost at a loss for words. In the time you spend with the book, you will find an alternative to the trivial and the terrible that sometimes seem to dominate current American life. Like me, maybe you, too, will pick this book up over and over to re-experience its breathtaking vision. Get two copies: one to keep and one to give to someone you love."" --Jeanne Murray Walker, Poet ""After living through communism and the Cold War, a time of suppression and restraint for artists, Liviu Mocan emerged stronger and more creative than ever. Now this pairing with the poet Jill Baumgaertner gives a buoyant example of the power of art set free. Poets compress meaning into words on a flattened page. Sculptors search for new media--wood, brass, marble, bronze, gold, iron, sandstone, walnut, oak--to express the same truth in multiple shapes. Together, they offer a feast for the eyes and the mind."" --Philip Yancey, author of Where the Light Fell: A Memoir ""Philosophers have written entire libraries about the unity between image and word. In the verses of the American poet and in the sculptures of the Romanian artist, we have a happy creative affinity, springing from a spiritual affinity and from the same Christian ideals. The whole world tends in the soul of the two authors towards the heights, towards the throne of the Creator. Elevated forms, ascensional momentum, religiosity, which sustain spiritual burning, praise of those who long for the peace beyond nature, the peace that the Lord gives."" --Adrian Popescu, Poet ""Adam, the firstborn, not from the womb but from clay, animated with divine breath, is given the amazing task of naming creation. How did words come to be placed, in the beginning, next to each reality, each creature, each feeling . . . ? I cannot help but think that it was a coincidence. Perhaps the poetic side that humanity has never lost was revealed to Adam then. And then, a thought comes to me, that some of Adam's descendants are divided into two: those who create images and forms and those who feel the need to decipher them through words, sometimes giving birth to poetry."" --Virgil Scripcariu, Sculptor ""Words 'can go only so far.' Baumgaertner's ekphrastic poetry and Liviu Mocan's remarkable sculpture reach toward 'the ladder's top, ' 'suggest what lies beyond / what lies ahead.' Beautifully produced, the book's poems and sculpture enhance appreciation of their shared vertical, heavenward thrust. Each adroitly interweaves images of creation, planting, and crucifixion. Each is 'always about ascending.' What 'we cannot do . . . / ourselves' this marriage of sculpture and poetry facilitates in a book for pondering, prayer, and praise."" --Bonnie Thurston, author of Saint Mary of Egypt: A Modern Verse Life and Interpretation ""Jill Peláez Baumgaertner's poems in The Shapes Are Real are moving meditations inspired by the work of Romanian sculptor Liviu Mocan. Like the shapes this book celebrates, Baumgaertner's poems present themselves almost as three-dimensional objects, intricately-made linguistic engines that generate energy implicit in the art the poet beholds. Images of ladders, pillars, and crosses abound, moving the earthbound reader's gaze upward towards the infinite and the (im)possible: 'We stand in earth, in dust, / and reach for shapes / we see through mist.' The vertical thrust of Baumgaertner's powerful lyrics reminds us that words, like the Word himself, serve as both means of conveyance and destination, and constitute a kind

Author Information

Jill Pelaez Baumgaertner is Professor of English Emerita at Wheaton College, Illinois, where she also served as Dean of Humanities and Theological Studies. She is the author of six other books of poetry, a study of Flannery O'Connor, and is the editor of two poetry anthologies. She also serves as poetry editor of The Christian Century.

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