Sunstone

Imogen Green holds a Theology degree from the University of Birmingham, where she focused on Latter-day Saint theology and material religion. She writes the Liminally Mormon, exploring Mormonism through a blend of academic insight and lived experience. Having once come close to conversion, Imogen spent six months fully immersed in LDS life before stepping away, an experience that continues to inform her research and writing. Her work blends British and transatlantic Mormon histories, with a focus on gender, visual culture, and resistance.

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From 19th-century anti-Mormon caricatures to modern depictions of Heavenly Mother, visual and performing arts have long been tools of resistance and reclamation in the Latter-day Saint tradition. This session explores how Mormon artists, across time, levels of authority, and geographies, have challenged dominant narratives and reshaped collective memory through their work. We'll examine how early satirical cartoons attempted to delegitimize the Restoration, and how the Church's visual response aimed to reassert control. We’ll consider the overlooked feminist currents in Minerva Teichert’s murals, the grassroots explosion of Heavenly Mother imagery, and contemporary feminist interventions in art and social media.

Central to this exploration is the 1961 British “Singing Mothers” tour, a striking example of performance as protest. These ordinary women, singing in tabernacle choirs and performing across the UK, subverted traditional domestic roles to assert a public and spiritual authority, using harmony as a subtle form of resistance.

Together, these examples reveal how Mormon art, whether official, oppositional, or grassroots, functions not only as doctrine but as dissent. This session invites us to consider what is framed, what is erased, and what is quietly breaking through.

(Based loosely around this article and essay: https://liminallymormon.substack.com/p/framing-women-how-mormon-art-paints)