In September 2024, I visited St. Hildegard Abbey, a Benedictine monastery built between 1900 and 1904. I spent four days in the guesthouse and interviewed three women: two nuns and one visitor who, like me, was spending several days in retreat.

Silent Impressions contains a three-part artistic documentary about life in the monastery and a manuscript written by machine instead of hand. The films each explore a distinct aspect of convent life: the role of women in the Church, the preservation of sacred texts through book restoration, and the personal decision to become a nun.

While nuns are often reduced to deafening clichés, Silent Impressions examines the role of the contemporary nun, one who quietly resists outdated narratives. At St. Hildegard Abbey, the younger generation longs for renewal, even as it walks alongside elders devoted to tradition.

The manuscript explores the disappearance of scriptoria following the rise of the printing press, a paradigm shift echoed today in the digital revolution. The margin lines, rubrications, decorated initials, abbreviations, border ornamentation, and illuminations resound as a postmodern echo of the medieval nun in a digital arm

Silent Impressions ultimately presents two timelines that reflect one another: past and future, preservation and reinvention.

In September 2024, I visited St. Hildegard Abbey, a Benedictine monastery built between 1900 and 1904. I spent four days in the guesthouse and interviewed three women: two nuns and one visitor who, like me, was spending several days in retreat.

Silent Impressions contains a three-part artistic documentary about life in the monastery and a manuscript written by machine instead of hand. The films each explore a distinct aspect of convent life: the role of women in the Church, the preservation of sacred texts through book restoration, and the personal decision to become a nun.

While nuns are often reduced to deafening clichés, Silent Impressions examines the role of the contemporary nun, one who quietly resists outdated narratives. At St. Hildegard Abbey, the younger generation longs for renewal, even as it walks alongside elders devoted to tradition.

The manuscript explores the disappearance of scriptoria following the rise of the printing press, a paradigm shift echoed today in the digital revolution. The margin lines, rubrications, decorated initials, abbreviations, border ornamentation, and illuminations resound as a postmodern echo of the medieval nun in a digital arm

Silent Impressions ultimately presents two timelines that reflect one another: past and future, preservation and reinvention.