Where Two or Three Are Gathered
Matthew 18:20Study and small group
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170 gsm archival matte paper, ships rolled
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The gap in the ring is left open
From across the room it is a ring of people, shoulders overlapping, everyone leaning a little toward the middle. One figure there is pale, almost lit, and the others seem to have turned toward that light rather than been arranged around it. Nobody stands at the front. There is no table, no handout, no one holding a page.
Between Thursdays the chairs sit empty and the wall behind them still says what the room is for. You walk past with a laundry basket and the circle is still there, still leaning in, waiting with no hurry in it.
One woman in the group calls it a circle of people leaning in. Another only ever sees the one bending toward the person who looks worn out. Someone's husband noticed the space in the ring first, the place where another chair could go, and asked who it was being kept for. Nobody agrees, which is how you know the room is doing its work, and not one of them has felt preached at.
The place in the circle nobody has taken yet
I keep going back to the space where the ring does not quite close. Two shoulders turned out, a chair's worth of air between them, as if the room is still waiting on someone. The light does not come from the window. It gathers around the pale figure in the middle and reaches the others slowly, the nearest first.
There is a hand half lifted toward the one sitting lowest, and it has not landed yet. I look at that more than anything else. What I hope, for whoever hangs this above their chairs, is that the room feels like it is holding its breath kindly, and that the empty place in the circle stays empty in a way that reads as welcome, not absence.
The one who hosts, and the ones who say thank you
One woman buys it for herself, the week she agrees to open her house again. She does not want a programme in that room. She wants to know what the sermon meant to you, and how the race is going for you, and the wall behind the chairs is the first thing anyone sees when they come in with their coat still on.
The other buyer is a whole group, at the end of a ministry year, standing in a kitchen deciding what to give the woman who hosted every Thursday. She has said it plainly: she truly does not want stuff, her house has enough in it. So they give her the room instead, something for the wall the chairs face, and they write the year on the back of the card.
It hangs behind the circle beside the bookshelf, the 45x60 cm framed size at eye level for someone sitting down.
What comes out of the tube or the box
- 170 gsm paper Matte uncoated as a print only sheet, coated silk when framed. No shine under the lamp beside the chairs.
- 12 mm black wood frame Flat square profile, 22 mm deep, matte finish, plexiglass front, no mat, the print running to the inner edge.
- Three sizes 30x40, 45x60 and 60x80 cm. The middle one suits the wall a circle of chairs faces.
What people ask before the chairs go out
1.What do I get my small group leader as a thank you?
2.What does where two or three are gathered mean?
3.What is a good gift for a woman who hosts Bible study?
4.Which size suits a hallway wall above the coat hooks?
5.What if she is particular about what goes on her walls?
The chairs go out on Thursday. The wall is ready before they do.
The circle, Matthew 18:20, in three sizes, framed or as a single sheet.
