Expression of faith: BYU Museum of Art presents 'James Tissot: The Life of Christ'

PROVO — The sailors are obviously having a hard time keeping the boat upright in the surging waves.

One strains at the helm as others huddle in fear. But in the center of the boat, a figure dressed in white stretches out his hand.

The painting is small but exquisitely done, rich with detail, full of impact and emotion. You can almost feel the rocking boat, almost sense the peace that is to come.

It is clearly the work of a believer, says Rita Wright, museum educator at the BYU Museum of Art, and it invites you to believe, as well.

That's one thing that Wright loves about the exhibition, "James Tissot: The Life of Christ," on display at the museum through Jan. 9.

The show includes 124 watercolors by the 19th-century French artist on loan from the Brooklyn Museum.

The exhibition is an expression of one man's faith, she says. But it has universal appeal.

"Every visitor will have different thoughts or impressions as they look at Tissot's paintings, but each will bring their belief in Jesus Christ. We hope this exhibition will cause, as Tissot put it, 'each and all (to) withdraw to ponder, as the Virgin did, these things in our hearts.' "

Tissot was "a wonderfully skilled artist. His works are beautiful, refined," Wright says. "They also have a spiritual power that grabs, that allows all viewers to be touched by the spirit."

How the works came to be created is equally interesting, she says.

The story of James Jacques Joseph Tissot, as it is for many devout believers, is the story of two lives: pre-conversion and post-conversion.

The "pre" Tissot was a fixture of French and English society who lived an extravagant lifestyle and had a lot of success in the world of Victorian art.

He was born in 1836 in Nantes, a French seaport. His childhood there inspired a lifelong interest in nautical things and contributed to his ability to paint shipboard scenes.

He went to Paris in 1856 to study art and became acquainted with the young James Whistler and also became friends with impressionist painter Edgar Degas.

Tissot traveled about the continent, exhibiting for the first time at the Royal Academy in London in 1864. He also anglicized his name to James.

In 1870, the Franco-Prussian war broke out, and Tissot spent some time in the army, but after the defeat of France and occupation of Paris, he left for England in 1871.

A few years later, he met Kathleen Newton, an Irish divorcee, who had had a child out of wedlock. Tissot flaunted convention by openly living with his mistress until 1882, when Newton, who was dying of consumption (now known as tuberculosis), cheated the disease by taking her own life.