If you’re in the Pasadena area, my photographic exhibition, Teed: Portraits of [South] Sudan, opened at Art Center College of Design‘s South Campus today. It will be up through Friday, April 1st, and the school will be hosting an artist reception this Saturday night, March 26th, from 6pm–9pm. All are welcome and I’d love to see you there!

More photographs, details and directions can be found at on the show’s website.

This is one of the most exciting projects I’ve worked on my whole time at Art Center as its subject matter is a people so close to my heart. Ever since I started at Art Center, I’ve been interested in the work done in conjunction with Designmatters. I had the opportunity to be in the USGS Wildfire sponsored studio they facilitated last term and I’m so grateful for their sponsorship of this project.

It’s time for the 2nd annual list of my favorite albums of the year. Some of these are from 2009, I don’t get a hold of music as quickly as I used to. Enjoy!

Kevin Max – Cotes d’ Armor

Kevin Max is by far the most talented former member of DC Talk. Over the last decade he’s released albums spanning genres the likes of experimental pop, emotional rock, bluegrass, brit pop, and with Cotes d’ Armor, he jumps into the realms of synth and electronica driven rock. Highlights include the bizarre yet catchy “On Yer Bike!”, the almost humorous apocalyptical “Out of the Wild”, and the deeply emotional “Walking Through Walls” and “Even When It Hurts.” He records a beautiful new version of “Your Beautiful Mind,” a song that balances deep angst and grappling with God with an adoration of Him like few I’ve heard before.

Derek Webb – Feedback

This was by far my favorite album to design to this year. Derek Webb abstractly interprets The Lord’s Prayer instrumentally in three movements. Stylistically, it is the next step along the road from Stockholm Syndrome, balancing a mix of analog and digital instrumentation. The album was further interpreted by a painter, photographer, and filmmaker, creating a contemporary transmedia interpretation of one of the most powerful passages of scripture.

Manchester Orchestra – Mean Everything To Nothing

As much as my musical likings have expanded over the years, I still love listening to album likes this. It’s heavy, beautifully written, emotional rock done as good as I’ve ever heard it. Hull spends much of the first half of the album struggling with the fundamentalist culture which he was raised in. The album opens with Hull saying “I am the only son of a pastor I know who does the things I do, but if it was you I don´t think that it would matter.” The album moves to Hull sharing how he found meaning by loving someone who “means everything to nobody” but him and the album’s most powerful track, “The River” ends with Hull borrowing from the hymn, “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” and screaming “Oh God I need it, well I was wrong again, take me to the river, and make me clean again.” It’s an album that’s certainly rough around the edges, but a beautiful divine relationship shows through in the end.

Passion Pit – Manners

This album goes down sweet and smooth like a bag of Skittles. Passion Pit’s wonderful unique blend of warm guitars and synths overlaid with Angelako’s falsetto vocals is a joy to listen to. Every track brings a unique variant on their sound. I saw them play live in September, and I was pleased in how well they sound live, reinforcing how much talent these guys from Massachusetts have.

Lights – The Listening

I make a lot of late night drives, and this was my favorite album to keep me company. Lights plays synth pop, but the kind that is rooted in a song that holds it own with just her and a guitar (proof). The album is mature yet charming, filled with meaningful lyrics and creative synth lines and programming. Oh, and she likes The Chariot too.

Honorable Mentions

Imogen Heap - Ellipse
Vampire Weekend - Contra
Deas Vail - Birds & Cages
Tyrone Wells - Metal & Wood
Starfield - The Saving One

This is a documentary that my friend Daniel Crawford put together after our trip to Sudan this summer. He does a great job retelling his experiences in a heartfelt way. The documentaries covers day-to-day life, memorable moments, and what God taught him while he was there. Check it out!

I’m selling a few of the extra posters I made in archetype press last spring for As Cities Burn’s first LP “Son I Loved You At Your Darkest.” ACB has been one of my favorite bands since high school – I love their lyrics and I had a lot of fun working on this project.

They are 36” x 24” printed by wood type and ink on an oversized xeroxed collage. I only pressed 10 of them.

I’m selling the posters for $25 plus $7.50 for shipping. Sold out!

I can hardly believe that last month at this time, I was on my way home from Africa. Life has gone by so fast over the last month, but I still feel compelled to finish off my blogging for the summer.

The last weekend I was in Sudan was filled with many ministry opportunities. It started out with Sebit coming into my room late on Saturday night. The daughter of a local pastor has just died that night and they needed someone to fill in for him and teach at his church, as well as comfort the family and the church.

So the next morning, Missy and I rode out to a village just a few minutes from Tonj with Albino and one of the pastors from the school. I shared a message with the congregation about how in times of pain and difficulty, we can hold on to the truth that when Jesus came to earth, he was 100% God, and at the same time, 100% man.

We can trust in the truth that Jesus is all powerful and sovereign in the midst of our circumstances, and that from heaven he can see the greater picture in our suffering. We can also be comforted by the knowledge that Jesus was 100% man and has felt the deepest pain on earth a man can feel.

After the service, we walked over to the pastor’s home to pray for each of the members of his family and the community. The we stood alongside them as the buried the young girl.

We were able to make it back to the compound in time to hear most of Daniel’s message to the fellowship that meets there. Many of the elders of Peter’s church had come to the service that day. Their church had not yet reopened their doors because of everything that had happened with Peter.

Daniel delivered an inspired message and afterwards, a few of us were able to have a personal meeting with the church leadership. During the meeting, Judah (one of the students at In Deed And Truth’s school for pastors), accepted his appointment to replace Peter as the pastor of the main Episcopalian church in Tonj.

We shared with Judah and the leadership that this was an opportunity to start with a fresh slate. The community would be watching closely and this was an opportunity to show everyone how Christ can redeem even the worst of situations. I encouraged Judah to not put himself above others, but to lead as a servant and to make sure he had confidants that he could share his struggles with and remain accountable through.

I spent my last couple of day working directly with Suzy. In my day-to-day life, I am In Deed And Truth’s graphic designer and Suzy and I wanted to take advantage of our last few days together to get as much done as possible. Being back on the ground gave me a new passion for the ministry and gave Suzy, Sabet and I plenty of time to talk and share our lives and ministries face to face like normal people, instead of through a broken Skype connection.

At the end of the week, Missy, John, Joe and myself flew out to Kenya and were greeted by Gordon, In Deed And Truth’s Kenya logistician. The five of us had a great weekend in Nairobi together. The highlight was definitely visiting the Giraffe Centre and getting to pet and even kiss the giraffes.

I then flew to England to spend five days there before heading back to California. I stayed with my friend Alex’s family in London and got to spend a day there touring the city with my friends Cat and Laura. I went out to Oxford for a night and explored there, I made friends with two guys at my hostel, Zac and Andrew, who were from Australia and Canada.

Thank you so much for all your support and prayers that made this trip possible. I’m so grateful for all my friends and family back home and have loved seeing so many of you over the last month. Africa is a place where I feel so at home and so alive and I feel so blessed to have been able to return there again and see the people whom I love so much.

Thursday while driving to Maloney Daniel and I were discussing about how the lack of variety in the terrain in southern Sudan would discourage people from moving from home since one would have to walk hundreds of miles to reach another kind of terrain.

So I decided to ask Deng if there was a word in Dinka for mountain. He responded yes and told me that the word is “kool”.

I then asked him and Santino if they’d ever seen a mountain, they responded yes, but not in Tonj. They said there are mountains further south near Juba.

I then asked them how big they were to which Santino responded…

“You see that tree there, they’re even that big.”

We all had a great laugh. We all love sitting around sharing about the similarities and differences of life in Sudan, Kenya, and the USA – and this one was particularly memorable.

I love Dut. He’s the main security guard here on the compound. He carries a rifle pretty much everywhere. I’ve decided he’s a good guy to be friends with.

Dut doesn’t speak a word of English, I speak about two dozen words of Dinka, so we can’t talk too much; but every time we see each other we shout each other’s name and share a high five, handshake, or shoulder pat and repeat every Dinka greeting I know multiple times.

Dut is originally from Malony, the village where we’ve been doing weekly mobile medical clinics. The first time we went out there, I told him I wanted to take his picture in the beautiful grass fields there. He told me to wait one moment and then he ran over to get his daughter so that I could take their picture together. He had that proud father look on his face as I snapped their photo and his daughter was absolutely beaming.

A father giving his daughter that much love and joy is rare in Dinka culture, so I instantly liked Dut. One day in heaven, when language barriers are no more, we’ll be able to talk about our summer here together and laugh about all the great times we had. I think there will be some good ones.