Sacred squares? A non-representational study of James Smetham's (1821–1889) everyday artistic experiences of religion, faith, and spirituality

Abstract

This paper develops new ways of approaching representations to understand individuals' everyday experiences of religion, faith, and spirituality in the past. Drawing on non-representational theories' emphasis on practice and affect, it focuses on processes of making representations within religious, faithful, and spiritual practices. Contribuing to ongoing dialogues between art history and geography, it explores the material spaces such representations were made in and the spiritual spaces they created, arguing that this approach overcomes the difficulties faced by historical geographers trying to explore embodied and out of body experiences of religion, faith, and spirituality in the past. To demonstrate the potential of this approach, this paper focuses on miniature squares made by the Methodist and Pre-Raphaelite associate James Smetham between 1848 and the late 1870s. Approaching them as spaces that Smetham made and inhabited, it explores where and when he made them and how making and inhabiting them affected his body, mind, and spirit. By taking this approach, this paper simultaneously gains specific insights into Smetham's embodied experiences of religion, faith, and spirituality and out of body experiences of the spiritual realm. It also reveals his complicated relationship with the Wesleyan Church, particularly its impact on his mental health.