John August Swanson

Wedding Feast (July) and Take Away the Stone (November). Los Angeles artist John August Swanson is noted for his finely detailed, brilliantly colored paintings and original prints. His art reflects both a passion for social justice and the strong heritage of storytelling he inherited from his Mexican mother and Swedish father. His works are found in the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History, London’s Tate Gallery, the Vatican Museum’s Collection of Modern Religious Art and the Bibliothéque Nationale in Paris. View Mr. Swanson’s artwork and learn about the process of making serigraphs at his Web site.

Horace Pippin (1888–1946)

Woman of Samaria (August). Horace Pippin was a self-taught African-American painter. When he was a young man serving in the 369th Infantry Regiment during World War I in France, his right arm was badly injured. He learned to draw on wood using a hot poker, then taught himself to paint with oils, using his left hand to guide his crippled right hand. He painted scenes of soldiers and the war, scenes from childhood, historical subjects such as John Brown and Abraham Lincoln, and religious subjects, including Woman of Samaria. Learn more about Mr. Pippin.

Frank Wesley (1923–2002)

Woman Taken in Adultery (September) and Cleansing of the Leper (February). A fifth-generation Christian, Frank Wesley grew up in a small village in North India. In his 20s his paintings were used in an Indian Christian magazine. Over the next 50 years he produced an astonishing body of inspirational work while living in India, Japan, the United States and Australia. In 1993 the book, Frank Wesley: Exploring Faith with a Brush, written by Naomi Wray and containing more than 100 full-color reproductions of his paintings, was published. Learn more about Mr. Wesley, and view more of his artwork.

Vie de Jesus MAFA (Life of Jesus Mafa)

Jesus Multiplies the Loaves (October). This painting is part of a set of pictures by anonymous artists whose purpose is to depict scenes from the New Testament in the context of the Mafa people, a north Cameroon ethnic group. The pictures are published in different sizes on cards and posters and on videotape. Learn more about this group and view all the paintings.

Gerrit van Honthorst (1590–1656)

Adoration of the Baby (December). Dutch painter Gerrit van Honthorst was a leading member of the Utrecht school, which was much influenced by the Italian painter Caravaggio. He was known for his nocturnal paintings, many of them with religious subjects. View a detail of Adoration of the Baby and see more artwork of this Dutch painter.

Lu Lan

Jesus Healing a Blind Man (January). Born in 1972 in mainland China, Lu Lan spent her early years in an intellectual family struggling to survive during the end of the Cultural Revolution. She earned her bachelor’s degree from the Nanjing Academy of Art in 1993 and created her “Biblical Stories” series of paintings after an invitation to the Chinese Christian Art Show in Hong Kong that same year. Since 1994 Lu Lan’s work has been featured in solo exhibitions in the United States and around the globe, from Germany to Japan. In 1995 she painted the cover design for the first Chinese English Bible printed in China. Read Lu Lan’s description of her painting Jesus Healing a Blind Man and her art. Learn more about this young artist and view more of her paintings.

Lucy Janjigian

Agonizing for Humanity (March). A widely traveled painter, muralist and sculptor of Armenian descent, Lucy Boyadjian Janjigian was born in Jerusalem, where she attended English mission schools. Her works hang in many public, private and corporate collections, including the Armenian Library and Museum of America, Watertown, Massachusetts, and Haigazian University, Beirut, Lebanon. Agonizing for Humanity is part of her series of paintings titled “Journey to Resurrection.” View more paintings in this series and other artwork by Ms. Janjigian.

Jyoti Sahi

Washing the Feet (April). Mr. Sahi is an Indian Christian artist and a respected writer and scholar. His father, who was Hindu, saw that Jyoti was baptized into the Scottish Presbyterian Church. Influenced by an artist friend of the family, Jyoti decided to become an artist when he was 7 years old. Through his art he has sought to illuminate Christian faith in light of the faith traditions of India. In 1984 he and his wife, Jane, founded the Indian School of Art for Peace (INSCAPE) in Bangalore. View more of his artwork on his blog.

Laura James

Fish for Breakfast (May). Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, and the daughter of immigrants from Antigua, Laura James paints religious subjects using the style of Ethiopian Christian iconography. In 2001 Ms. James was commissioned to create 35 images for a new edition of the Book of the Gospels. Her painting Fish for Breakfast is one of the paintings that appears in that book. Find more works by this artist on her Web site.