Art Lives at Unity Church

Art provides another medium through which human beings experience gifts of the spirit. Response to a work of art may be on intense, profound levels. As with poetry or literature, theatre, dance or music, the visual arts provide meditative and emotional opportunities and appreciation of life's process, our cultures and society. Unity's Art Team serves the congregation by hosting exhibits in our Parish Hall gallery, cataloging and sharing information about Unity's extensive art collection, and inviting the congregation into art appreciation through various events and learning opportunities. For more information about the work of Unity's Art Team, please email artteam@unityunitarian.org.

February Parish Hall Artists

Steve Simmer
As a natural resource professional and Minnesota based outdoor photographer, I have a lifelong relationship with landscapes and with photography. My passion is to apply an intimate knowledge of the natural environment, which I developed over a full career in the practice of forestry, to visually express the wonders of nature. The camera records more than the eye can see; bending time and light, magnifying detail or changing the perception of motion. I feel successful when my art helps a viewer see, feel, or understand some aspect of the environment they had not previously appreciated.

My interest in photography was inspired by my father, a professional portrait and wedding photographer. I spent countless hours with him on photo shoots and in the darkroom. Thankfully, he was an incurable teacher. I like to say he tried in vain to teach me his craft – and I now realize he succeeded more than he knew. As I closed in on completing my career with the Minnesota State Forestry Division, I discovered that photography was waiting for me. I realized that photography would be a lasting and satisfying pursuit. The art and practice of photography has proven to be a bottomless well of joy and learning!

As an active member of the St. Paul Camera Club, I regularly submit work for critique by certified competition judges in monthly Salons. My photos have received many awards from the St. Paul Club and at regional multi-club competitions. I have also exhibited at Red Wing Arts Gallery, Art Reach St Croix, Praxis Gallery, Split Rock Lighthouse and AZ Gallery.

Ken Epstein
Growing up in New Jersey, I was captivated by the natural beauty of the Atlantic seashore and developed my artistic sense on sketchpad and canvas. The PHD program in Physics at UMN brought me to Saint Paul and I settled here afterward for a career at 3M. My boyhood artistic attachment to nature transferred to the lakes, prairies, and woodlands of Minnesota and found expression through the digital camera.

The subjects that most interests me encompass wildlife and close-up photography. The commonality in all subjects is the drive to create and display images that resonate with my innate human sense of beauty and hopefully yours too.

It happened by intention, that my backdoor faces the wooded hillside of Highland bluff in Saint Paul. Through the back windows I view deer, coyote, fox, hawk, rabbits, squirrels, and many of the resident woodland birds you’d expect to see in central Minnesota.

Proximity to photographic subjects make the daily or weekly practice of photography practical. It’s only a long walk or a short drive to the Mississippi River flood plain. Just a little further out, there are parkland gems that host water birds, pollinators, and small mammals. Still further, but within day-trip or overnight car travel, I’m drawn to sites where one can find less common subjects for example black bear, sandhill cranes, and prairie chickens. And, I enjoy photographing exotic animals at the Minnesota Zoo.

Shows: “Wings: The Beauty of Powered Flight in the Natural World.” 2017 at the Como Conservatory and 2018 at the National Wildlife Refuge in Richfield.

Spectacular Mural in the Foote Room

Chalice mural consisting of colorful tiles of all different shapes and colors

Chalice of Many Cultures
The Unity Art Team has recently installed a beautiful mural across the entire north wall of the Foote Room. It is entitled Chalice of Many Cultures. Initial planning of this mural began in 2019, was interrupted by the pandemic, and then restarted in the summer of 2022. The Art Team commissioned a talented local artist, Mica Lee Anders, to lead a group of Unity volunteers — youth and adults — in the design and creation of this work of art.

The overall concept for the mural was to reflect the values, mission, and ends of Unity Church — especially the idea that we want to create a multicultural spiritual home. As the volunteers discussed how the mural could work, a design concept emerged that it would draw inspiration from textiles, clothing, mosaics, pottery, artwork, and other motifs from cultures throughout the world. Mica Lee Anders then created an overall design in the shape of a chalice and flames made of broad ribbons composed of the designs created by volunteers inspired by those images.

Artists: Mica Lee Anders and her assistant, Briauna Williams, as well as the creative volunteers who contributed their artwork including Elaine Ambrose, Andrea Anastos, Isabel Benagas, SAM Greene, Ariel Hansen, Nancy Heck, James Hood, Mary Kerres, Elizabeth Karre, Halie Karre, Beth Klemann, Julie Lindholm, Karma Mecey-Hill, Leila Poullada, Barb Rogne, Paul Rogne, Pam Satre, Claire Umolac-Bunker, Aidan Lynskey Wells, John White, Ramona White, and Colleen Zuro-White.