Have you ever wondered where the art and pictures on the covers of Augsburg Fortress bulletins come from? The answer is many places, including independent artists, and there’s a whole process to select and acquire the copyright licensing for them before they reach your congregation.

Sometime around Easter, our image researcher begins her work. She’s an ELCA pastor with a passion for art and a good understanding of where to find beautiful and diverse images online. Equipped with a list of the all the gospel texts for the upcoming year and notes on colors, themes, and sources from Augsburg Fortress’s worship resource developer, she spends the next six months selecting possible images. Every single lectionary day starts with four possible images, which then get whittled down based on theme, design needs, availability for reprint, and variety of style and focus compared to other nearby dates.

Once there is a list of first choice images for every lectionary day, Augsburg Fortress begins the process of reaching out to artists and license holders to receive permission to print the images. Some art and pictures are from stock sites or in the public domain, but a large quantity come from independent artists. This year’s artists include Jan Richardson, Laura James, Mike Moyers, Kelly Latimore, John August Swanson, Ivanka Demchuk, He Qi, and many more. These artists often draw inspiration from their own faith and insight into gospel texts and we love being able to highlight and support their work.

Throughout the process of acquiring images, some images shift again, usually because they were not available to license. When this happens, we go to another of the four image selections and begin the process again. We also work with our designers to make sure that the images will print clearly and beautifully.

As soon as we have permission to print the images, designers begin editing them to fit the bulletin sizes and add gospel quotes to explain and illuminate each lectionary day’s image. After a couple rounds of edits, trying a different font here or centering something else there, the images are ready for test printing to make sure everything comes out beautifully. They’re also ready to have their thumbnail versions shared in this year’s Weekly Bulletin and Lectionary Insert Service customer brochure so you can see them. From there, you can place an order, and after a few final checks, we print them and send them to your church!

We know images can offer sacred imagination and new ways to reflect on the gospel. We hope you enjoy the variety of art and photography that you and your congregation hold in your hands during worship!

Check out our Weekly Bulletins and Lectionary Inserts service here!