Duke Divinity School
Chinwe Edeani is a second-year MDiv. student at Duke Divinity School who is completing the Certificate in Theology and the Arts alongside her degree. A self-taught photographer, Chinwe’s still-life and nature photographs have been displayed in galleries and shows in Baltimore, MD. Her academic, theological, and artistic work focuses on light and shadows. She is a former software engineer and holds a Master of Arts degree in Theology from St. Mary’s Ecumenical Institute in Baltimore.
How can we preserve that which we do not love? What makes a place alive to us? What makes a place dear to us? What practices energize the interconnectedness of humans and non-humans in the world? How do we become alive to the indispensability of the world and thus practice radical care for creation? I will be drawing on Jeremiah 29:4-7, where the Israelites are instructed to lean into practices of connectedness to their place of exile. Here, practices of love and care in human relationships become inextricably linked to practices of care and conservation of place. This exilic posture becomes an important theological framework for us as we consider how we are to live faithfully in our present exile, within our exilic world of growing ecological disaster. The creative practice of photography can offer us some help here. Drawing on my experience in photo-walking, I will discuss the spiritual dimension of photo-walking, focusing on the concepts of attention, beauty, and place. Photography is a visual medium where one is forced to pay attention. By walking, the scale of attention is shifted, narrowed to focus on what is within one’s view. The world is not a nebulous, impersonal entity out there. Rather, the world is here, in front of me, making itself known and offering itself up for my attention. The search for beauty is a claim that the world has gifts. These gifts are tied to a particular place which becomes alive to us when we are alive to it. I will be elaborating on the themes of attention, beauty, and place, while sharing photographs from my own photo walks. My project is to illustrate the power of art and practices of attention to deepen our awareness and connection to the world around us.