Protestant Icons

The Bible and Resistance

Seven portraits of witnesses in faith, depicted in the traditional manner of creating orthodox icons. But artist Harmjan Dam is a Reformed protestant theologian - and since reformation times, there are no "saints" in protestant churches like there are in Roman-Catholic or Orthodox churches.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945) sometimes is called in German "Ikone des Widerstandes" - an icon of resistance against Hitler. This strucks Harmjan Dam as an idea to create a total of seven "Protestant Icons" of persons famous for their resistance against depotism, hate, war, racism, apartheid and patriarchy.

The persons depicted are the Miao Methodist pastor Wang Xhi Ming (1907-1973), South African rebel and president Nelson Mandela (1918-2013), the German student Sophie Scholl (1921-1943), D. Martin Luther King (1929-1968), professor Dorothee Sölle (1929-2003) and Leipzig pastor Christian Führer (1943-2014), figure of the resistance in the GDR in 1989.

Part of the exhibit will be objects in relation to one of the "Icons" of resistance. General texts are in German and English. There is a booklet with object information in English within the exhibit.

An exhibition at the BIMU Frankfurt from Oct 2nd, 2025, till Feb 01, 2026.