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IAMCultureCare exists to cultivate human flourishing by
deepening Faith,
mending Brokenness,
and growing Beauty.

About IAM

International Arts Movement (IAMCultureCare) is a catalytic movement that is reframing how we speak of, affect, and nurture a new type of cultural conversation, and helping to infuse culture with a rehumanized microcosm of art, love, and beauty.

Why? Because we believe…

…Faith is vibrancy, not just orthodoxy.

…Brokenness is opportunity, not just tragedy.

…Beauty is necessity, not just nicety.

We are dedicated to a Biblical vision of flourishing, to a desire to create a generative conversation that gives attention to the care of culture, and to creating and stewarding the ecosystem of culture.” With the establishment of the Fujimura Institute, the core educational element of IAMCultureCare, the organization is poised to take a leading role in creating a cultural soil which makes life worth living,” as T.S. Eliot described.

We see IAMCultureCare (the organization) as consisting of two pillars: Culture Care the Movement (Global Community) and the Fujimura Institute (our educational and cultural engagement arm).

GLOBAL NETWORK

Our goal is to provide a framework for generational stewardship of Culture Care around the world to impact the culture through art, music, business, or any creative endeavors. We provide a model to connect and establish Estuaries” toward Culture Care. IAMCultureCare is not a society headquarters or central source for the functioning of each group; we are, instead, vision casting entity developing a vision for cultural stewardship.

INSTITUTE

Defying fractured, fragmented modern perspectives, the Fujimura Institute encourages artists and thinkers to collaborate, cooperate, and inspire their audiences to piece together a whole” view of the world.

Through our Kintsugi-Peace Making effort through Academy Kintsugi, launched on the twentieth commemoration of 9/11/01 in New York City, we have had over 1500 who attended Kintsugi Experiences with over 27 certified trained facilitators. The founders of Academy Kintsugi, Mako and Haejin Fujimura, has brought Kintsugi-Peace Making presentation to significant groups and individuals including Pope Francis, UK Parliament, as well as to the slums of Southeast Asia. 

The Institute’s other events and initiatives help connect creative people from different fields so they may design generative collaborations. These events include collaborative exhibits, such as the current QU4RTETS project, and Art, Love and Beauty” and new Beauty+Justice” lecture series, featuring artists thinkers, Fujimura Institute scholars and creative catalysts that promotes generative conversations, and sparks new ideas and cross-disciplinary projects.

Fujimura Fellows program works under the institute and have had chapters in Fuller Seminary and Bucknell University and Mako and Haejin Fujimura continues to mentor catalysts after graduation. They are developing a generational stewardship model that manifests generative, generational and generous stewardship. 


PARTNERSHIPS

Our programs are be created interdependently in partnerships with other organizations. Currently we work closely with Embers International and Windrider’s Institute at Sundance Film Festival.

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About IAMCultureCare

IAMCultureCare is a vision to steward the ecosystem of culture toward flourishing. We do this by creating a language for artists and non-artists to live generatively, and by spreading the aroma of beauty” in the harsh context of their professional and personal lives.

With a focus on beauty and generosity, and guided by a cultural history informed by faith, IAMCultureCare brings a refreshing approach to affecting many aspects of culture, including the arts, business stewardship, education, and more.

The greater IAMCultureCare community around the world exists around the world to be a source of healing in broken places. You can connect with IAM members on our Facebook group, IAMCultureCare Twitter and Instagram accounts. The writings and artwork of the founder Makoto Fujimura present important perspectives on shaping culture through art and beauty, and provide an inspirational base from which the work of the movement naturally flows. Art+Faith: A Theology of Making” (Yale University Press)

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About the Fujimura Institute

THE MOVEMENT

The Institute’s events and networks has helped to connect creatives and creative catalysts from different fields so they may design generative collaborations. These events include collaborative exhibits, such as the QU4RTETS project, and a continuing Makoto Fujimura and Julia Hendrickson dialogue series and interviews of Fujimura Institute Scholars on YouTube and our Culture Care podcast with Fellows, artists and thinkers to promote catalytic conversations and spark new ideas and cross-discipline projects.

THE INSPIRATION

The divisions in modern life are growing deeper and more contentious between opposing academic disciplines, political parties, denominations, cultures, and classes. The world rewards increasingly granular specialization, but the world’s philosophical and practical problems increasingly demand the knowledge and cooperation of experts from diverse backgrounds. Makoto Fujimura has seen this fragmentation and has endeavored, personally and through IAMCultureCare, to motivate other creatives to work together to resist the alienating effects of a divisive society.

Fujimura is a leading contemporary artist whose process driven, refractive slow art” has been described by David Brooks of New York Times as a small rebellion against the quickening of time”. A Presidential appointee to the National Council on the Arts from 2003 – 2009, Fujimura served as an international advocate for the arts, speaking with decision makers and advising governmental policies on the arts. In 2014, the American Academy of Religion named Makoto Fujimura as its 2014 Religion and the Arts” award recipient. In 2023, he became the first artists to receive the Kuyper Prize. He has had numerous museum exhibits including Tikotin Museum in Israel, Sato Museum in Japan, Asir Museum in Taiwan, American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center, and Gonzaga University Jundt Museum. Robert Kushner, in the mid 90’s, written on Fujimura’s art in Art in America this way: The idea of forging a new kind of art, about hope, healing, redemption, refuge, while maintaining visual sophistication and intellectual integrity is a growing movement, one which finds Makoto Fujimura’s work at the vanguard.” Fujimura has authored 4 books, and his most recent book Art+Faith: A Theology of Making (Yale University Press) has been called by poet Christian Wiman as a tonic for our atomized time”.

Educated bi-culturally between the U.S. and Japan, Fujimura graduated from Bucknell University in 1983 and received an M.F.A. from Tokyo University of the Arts with a Japanese Governmental Scholarship. His thesis painting was purchased by the university, and he was invited to study in the Japanese Painting Doctorate program. Fujimura has also received 4 honorary doctorate degrees.

Fujimura is married to Haejin Shim Fujimura, the Managing Partner of Shim & Associates, P.C. and the CEO of Embers International, Inc. The Fujimuras co-founded Academy Kintsugi and work together to connect creation of beauty with bringing justice into the world to end violence against the poor.

FUJIMURA INSTITUTE SCHOLARS

We recommend books and teaching of our Fujimura Institute Scholars (Dr Esther Meek, Dr Curt Thompson, Dr Pete Candler and Dr Satyan Devadoss) as foundational texts to further develop your Gestuary” (a term coined by Esther Meek) in your community and schools. 

The Institute’s name honors Makoto’s father, Osamu, a pioneer in acoustics research. The board of International Arts Movement oversees IAMCultureCare and Fujimura Institute as a core educational element. 

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Meet the Board

Makoto Fujimura

Makoto Fujimura is an internationally renowned artist, writer and speaker who serves as the director of Fuller Seminary’s Brehm Center for Worship, Theology, and the Arts. He is also the founder of the International Arts Movement and served as a presidential appointee to the National Council on the Arts from 2003 to 2009. His books include Refractions: A Journey of Faith, Art and Culture and Culture Care.

Recognized worldwide as a cultural shaper, Fujimura has had work exhibited at galleries including Dillon Gallery in New York, Sato Museum in Tokyo, The Contemporary Museum of Tokyo, Tokyo National University of Fine Arts Museum, Bentley Gallery in Arizona, Taikoo Place in Hong Kong and Vienna’s Belvedere Museum. In 2011 the Fujimura Institute was established and launched the Four Qu4rtets, a collaboration between Fujimura, painter Bruce Herman, Duke theologian/pianist Jeremy Begbie and Yale composer Christopher Theofanidis, based on T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets.

A popular speaker, Fujimura has lectured at numerous conferences, universities and museums, including the Aspen Institute, Yale and Princeton Universities, Sato Museum and the Phoenix Art Museum.

Among many awards and recognitions, Bucknell University honored him with the Outstanding Alumni Award in 2012, and the American Academy of Religion named him as its 2014 Religion and the Arts award recipient. He has received honorary doctorate degrees from Belhaven University, Biola University, Cairn University and Roanoke College.

Matt Heard (Chair)

Matt Heard is the Founder and Principal of THRIVE, a teaching, speaking, and coaching initiative that engages people to flourish as fully alive human beings to God’s glory in every arena of their life, journey, and culture. The seeds for Matt’s vision were planted when he studied at L’Abri in Huémoz, Switzerland with Francis Schaeffer, who introduced him to the writings of the late Hans Rookmaaker, an art historian known for proclaiming, Jesus didn’t come to make us Christian; Jesus came to make us fully human.”

He and his wife, Arlene, are the grateful parents of three adult sons and two daughters-in-law and they divide their time between Colorado Springs and Orlando. A graduate of Wheaton College and Reformed Theological Seminary, Matt is the author of Life with a Capital L: Embracing Your God-Given Humanity. He is also on the Board of Directors for Reach Beyond, and is a member of the faculty and Board of Reference for Summit Ministries. Whether speaking, coaching, serving, re-creating, or relaxing with friends and family, Matt relishes the privilege of experiencing Christ not only as Way and Truth, but also as Life. He can be contacted through his website, matt​heard​.org.


Bruce Shaw (Treasurer and Secretary)

Bruce Shaw is the Executive Director of The Denny Center for Democratic Capitalism at Georgetown Law. Prior to joining the Denny Center, Mr. Shaw served as Managing Director at FCLTGlobal, a not-for-profit that develops research and tools which encourage long-term investing and business decision-making.

Mr. Shaw began his career as a consultant with McKinsey & Company, where he focused on strategy and organization work for energy, transportation and technology clients. He joined Holly Corporation in 1997 and initially served the company in a number of business development roles. In 2008, Bruce was named SVP and Chief Financial Officer for Holly’s two public companies (Holly Corporation and Holly Energy Partners); from 2012 to 2016, he served as President of Holly Energy Partners (NYSE: HEP) and as a senior advisor to Holly Energy’s parent company, HollyFrontier (NYSE: HFC).

Mr. Shaw also serves on the boards of The Institute on Religion & Public Life (publisher of First Things magazine) and The Covenant School Foundation.

Mr. Shaw received his MBA at The Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College and has a degree in Mechanical Engineering from Texas A&M. He completed an ALI Fellowship at Harvard in 2018 where his research focused on the foundations and future of capitalism.

Coming Soon

John Olsta

Michelle Olsta

Jasmin White

Julia Hendrickson

Julia Hendrickson is an artist and theologian with a primary research focus on the intersection of prayer and praxis. Her studio practice provides the foundation for reflection on this topic with an emphasis on opera Divina, daily work as prayer. Alongside this artistic discipline, 

Julia is involved in various academic communities, as a teacher and student. She has an M.F.A. from Cranbrook Academy of Art in Print | Media & an MDiv from Fuller Theological Seminary, where she became a Fujimura Fellow. While waiting for paint to dry, Julia reads a fair amount, takes very long walks, and documents flowers. 




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