ArtWay

Beauty is not pasted over suffering but grows out of it—like the proverbial shoot from parched ground. Bruce Herman

Who we are

Marleen Hengelaar-Rookmaaker, editor-in-chief, has a background in musicology (University of Amsterdam) with minors in art history, philosophy and liturgical studies (Free University in Amsterdam). For many years she worked as an editor, translator, researcher and writer. She edited the Complete Works of her father (art historian Hans Rookmaaker) and has written about popular music, liturgy and the visual arts. She contributed to over twenty books. In 2019 she was co-curator of Art Stations of the Cross in Amsterdam. She has worked as co-editor on a book about (neo-)Calvinism and art, which was published in Dutch in 2020 and is soon to be published in English. She lives in Langbroek in the Netherlands.

Laurel Gasque, associate editor, is author of Art and the Christian Mind: The Life and Work of H.R. Rookmaaker, and Sessional Lecturer in theology and the arts at Regent College, Vancouver, B.C. and in art history at Trinity Western University in Langley, B.C., Canada. 

Victoria Emily Jones, assistant editor, lives in the Baltimore area of the United States, where she works as an editorial freelancer and blogs at ArtandTheology.org. Her educational background is in journalism, English literature, and music, but her current research focuses on ways in which the visual arts can stimulate renewed theological engagement with the Bible. She is in the process of developing an online biblical art gallery, a selective collection of artworks from all eras that engage with specific texts of scripture. Follow her on Twitter @artandtheology. 

Grady van den Bosch, researcher and assistant editor, is Master of Education in Arts. She has her own business, Studio Grady Art & Arteducation. She is also an artist. She is active in various Dutch national work groups concerned with art in the church. In addition, she was involved in the work group ‘Art in the Church’ in her own congregation, some of those as co-ordinator. 

Alida Sewell, translator Dutch to English, was born (1948) into a Christian family in the Netherlands. The whole family of parents and 8 children emigrated to New Zealand in 1961, where Alida attended the University of Canterbury. She met her English-born husband, Keith, in Australia. They have two sons. From 1998 until 2012 Keith and Alida lived in the USA, where Alida acquired an MA in Theology with High Distinction from Trinity Bible College and Seminary, and an MTh and PhD from the Free University in Amsterdam. Since returning to Australia as a retired pensioner, she is keeping busy writing and leading Bible studies, visiting the elderly and doing translation and editing work.  

Wim Eikelboom, chairman, is a journalist and art lover. He works as coordinator for the Dutch radio channel NPO Radio 1. He enjoys art in which he can taste the heart and soul of the maker and he subscribes to the idea that in every artwork the soul of the artist resonates as well as the soul of the one who loves the work. This is also his motivation for his work as chairman of ArtWay. 

Albert Hengelaar, treasurer, spent his career in relief and development aid. He works within the World Evangelical Alliance as Advocacy Officer at the Liaison office for the United Nations in Geneva. His hobbies are visual art and political history.

Henk Reitsema, secretary, works at the Dutch branch of L'Abri. He grew up in South-Africa, where his parents are missionaries. He studied philosophy at the University of Potchefstroom and theology at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, USA. Together with his wife Riana he has worked for the past 15 years at L’Abri, which was started in 1951 in Switzerland by Francis Schaeffer and in 1971 in the Netherlands by Hans Rookmaaker. L'Abri wants to search for biblical answers to the big questions of this time. Dialogue with our culture plays an important role in this.

Robb Ludwick lives and works at l'Abri Fellowship in Eck en Wiel (www.labri.nl) with his wife Christa. In addition to hosting and mentoring the guests, Robb writes and lectures on cultural apologetics and spiritual life. Through l'Abri he regularly meets and talks with artists and musicians about their artistic vision and the role faith plays in it. He has completed studies in literature, pastoral theology and philosophical anthropology.  

Wim Eilander built and manages the website. He is software engineer for a Dutch IT company and has a webdesign company called Webternet that builds and manages websites for companies and foundations.