Loughrea St. Brendan's Cathedral. Nativity 1908

Sarah Purser made this stained glass Nativity scene for Loughrea St. Brendan's Cathedral. The composition is neatly divided by the lead lines, like a comic book, and that makes me think about process and storytelling. The material here is glass, of course, and it's transparent so the light coming through is really important. You get these blocks of colour that are really vivid, but also kind of flat. The red of Joseph’s cloak, for example, is really quite arresting. Look at the way the light catches the folds in Mary's dress. It reminds me of Giotto, but with this very modern, graphic sensibility. I like to think that art is an ongoing conversation, and you can see how artists like Purser take ideas from the past and make them new again. It’s never really about a definitive meaning but more about embracing the ambiguity, and letting your own interpretation evolve.