Pictorial Art for Interreligious Dialogue

Dr Christopher Longhurst

A handbook for teaching and learning interreligious dialogue through pictorial art.

We all understand the importance of constructive dialogue between people of diverse religions, and we can all appreciate the enjoyment received from viewing pictorial art. What, therefore, does the use of pictorial art for interreligious dialogue look like?

PICTORIAL ART FOR INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE, commissioned by the 2020 International Fellows Programme of the King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz International Centre for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue (KAICIID), explores the unique usage of pictorial art to undertake interreligious dialogue. It presents a practical guide to help educators learn and teach an effective and enjoyable interreligious dialogue within their academic settings.

This book offers an alternative to prevailing approaches to interreligious dialogue through its Structured Arts-based Educational Dialogue (SAED). The SAED approach will transform pictorial art into a channel for dialogue through the artwork’s form, content, and subject matter, serving as speaking points in the dialogical process informing the life experiences and religious ideas of the dialogue partners.

Herein lies a new power for interreligious dialogue, to know and love the religious other through a mediated, personal and arts-based dialogical approach.