Behind The Artwork: Have It All - Bethel Music
It was September 2014 when our Creative Team first began the visual exploration of what “Have It All” could become. As with all our projects at Bethel Music, the Creative Team is one of the first departments that begins working. It’s our job to present through words, pictures, and film; the sound of a movement.
With this in mind, we began collecting visual inspiration. As the designer for this album, I was in charge of curating our visual research and turning inspiration into design comps. We used Pinterest for the curation of visual ideas and concepts, via their “secret boards” option. This allows for all of our creative team to pin ideas and share their personal vision and inspiration for each project.
As a creative team we were inspired by the woman from Bethany who anointed Jesus with her costly perfume found in Mark 14. So we set out with a concept of “Have It All” being the depiction of our modern day “jars of perfume” – our individual sacred offerings and sacrifices. We did an expansive shoot to get visual content for the album cover, booklet, all promo videos and lyric videos.
Original "Have It All" album artwork concept
At Bethel Music we place a high value on excellence and beauty – we believe it’s a part of the gospel and a part of worship. Our goal is that this would overflow into everything we do; when we approach our work it’s no different. We bring our best offering – one that inevitably costs us something.
That’s exactly what was about to happen…
Three weeks before our original manufacturing artwork deadline, we were challenged by our leadership team to change the artwork direction in favor of something (yet to be discovered) that was more epic – more true to an album titled “Have It All”.
I’ll never forget the meeting we had at a local coffeehouse, where our Creative Team gathered to hear the news from our Creative Director, Kiley Goodpasture. At first I think we were all shocked, as this mammoth pivot arrived so close to our print deadline.
In life we always have two choices when a situation arises that is unexpected: we can either partner with a spirit of fear and negativity (which often manifest as taking offense), or we can choose to see the mountain, however “discouraging”, as a chance find a new creative solution. Kiley exhorted us to believe for fresh inspiration and, rather than take offense, embrace this as a chance to be supernaturally creative. After all, we have the God of all creativity on our side, living inside of us, waiting to pour out new solutions.
While I don't condone this kind of pivot as a rule of thumb, in this case it truly was what the Lord had for us, and we all felt the grace to knuckle down and create something new and beautiful.
More exploration and further refinement for "Have It All"
Our new art direction led to our friend Chapman Hamborg traveling up to Redding for just over a week where he spent 8 days forming and sculpting the anatomical human heart that is now the cover.
The final album cover for "Have It All".
The intention behind this art pivot was to portray the essence of our worship process and the kind of season the album’s music came from; namely, surrender. When surrendered to the Lord, our hearts are sculpted and molded by a good Father into His image, amidst pain and suffering our hearts are refined; going from glory to glory. We were drawn to the words of 1 Peter 1:3-16 (MSG), “Pure gold put in the fire comes out of it proved pure. Genuine faith put through this suffering comes out proved genuine. So when Jesus wraps this all up, it’s your faith, not your gold, that God will have on display as evidence of His victory.”
Watch a video of the extended sculpture process here.
I pray that this album, its melodies, lyrics, and artwork will be a blessing and encouragement to you on your journey with Jesus. May Holy Spirit fill you with creativity and favor to keep pursuing His heart, with greater capacity for surrender, and may you go from strength to strength in any trial that you’re walking through.