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Leader-Telegram College art student Jess Tewes of Hudson found out last year what it's like to be a valued artist.  Tewes was so good as an archaeological site illustrator in Israel that officials said they didn't need to bring back a predecessor who had helped to train her or even an Israeli artist familiar with the lay of the land.
Detail is so important that documentation of the historically and biblically significant finds is done with drawings - not photographs, which could skew small bits of perspective, Tewes said. A Bush Foundation Student Research and Scholarship Fellowship has allowed Tewes to work summers with the Northeast Church Project at Sussita/Hippos Excavations, sponsored by the Zinman Institute of Archaeology at the University of Haifa. The department of religion and theology at Concordia University in St. Paul, where Tewes is a student, is part of the project, which has focused on excavating a church. A Greek center during Roman times, the site became a Christian center during the Byzantine Era, around the sixth century. The project will wrap up this summer after 10 years. Excavations are scheduled July 2 through 31. The crews have found biblical artifacts and nine bodies buried near the church. Pottery shards typical of the Byzantine Era have been unearthed, Tewes said. "This helps prove and set the place's time in history," Tewes said. Project officials believe the mountain they are excavating is where the Bible says Jesus was cleansing a man, and as a result of that process pigs were thrown to the Sea of Galilee about a mile away. Tewes, who graduated from Hudson High School, said she was hand-picked based on her credentials. "It's not as much drawing fast as it is drawing accurately," Tewes said. "We are constantly using a grid or a ruler to measure." Tewes was trained in observation and technical archeological illustration by Marko Fields, a resident artist at Concordia. "Graphs and charts cannot measure Jessica's development as a highly capable site illustrator. She excelled in her mentored studies and she possesses a remarkable artist's skill set," Fields said. Most of the training from Fields centered on detailed rendering and learning how to measure and draw objects on a grid, and then transfer the images to smaller scales on graphed vellum paper. The scale drawings are scanned by a computer. The images then are layered, depicting stages, dates and depths of excavation. {mosgoogle left 7887083644} Crews typically awaken at 4 a.m. and board a bus that heads halfway up the mountain to the dig site, which is on a ridge 1,200 feet above the Sea of Galilee. They walk the rest of the way because the bus can't negotiate the terrain. "Then I would start drawing once it gets light out," Tewes said. After a 9 a.m. breakfast, work continues for another two hours before workers quit for the day because of the extreme heat. Working initially with another illustrator, Andrea Chandler, Tewes painstakingly illustrated all of the excavated items. Her work included previously unrecorded architectural finds from 2006 and 2007 and gave her the experience to replace Chandler. Tewes also contributed to the comprehensive site plan, an ongoing process that includes much of the school year, officials said. After work each summer, the Concordia team also chronicles its work in a book. "Sometimes I would not care if I never see chalk again," Tewes said. "It's very tedious. You have to get in the mind-set in the heat to put on headphones and go with the flow."
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