Brian Kershisnik

She Will Find What Was Lost depicts many angels blessing and looking at a woman, who seems to some viewers to be unaware of their presence. It was on the cover of the February 2017 Ensign, and is on display in the LDS Conference Center as part of the LDS Church's collection. Viewers interpret the painting in different ways; some see it as depicting divine revelation and others see it as showing family history. Of the painting, Kershisnik wrote, "My intention for this piece was to speak to the most intensely private and intimate kind of supernatural interference, influence, and assistance... Many unseen forces are interested in you, love you, and work to influence matters for your profound benefit. Most of what we all do is resist it, misinterpret it, or mess it up, but my experience indicates that these unseen efforts persist impossibly. I thank God for that."

In June 2017, the BYU Museum of Art opened the exhibition The Interpretation Thereof: Contemporary LDS Art and Scripture. Kershisnik's work, Descent From the Cross, is included in this exhibition, which Sean Rossiter criticized for depicting Christ too lightly, and as he argues, limiting the emotional weight of Crucifixion of Jesus. In 2011, Geoff Wichert criticised some of Kershisnik symbols as being esoteric and theologically specific. Writing for the Phoenix New Times, Tricia Parker commented that the people in his paintings are emotionally ambiguous because they are literally two-dimensional, but that this ambiguity makes them relatable.

There is great importance in successfully becoming human, in striving to fully understand others, ourselves, and God. The process is difficult and filled with awkward discoveries and happy encounters, dreadful sorrow, and unmitigated joy sometimes several at once. I believe art should facilitate this journey, rather than simply decorate it, or worse, distract us from it. It should remind us of what we have forgotten, illuminate what we know, or teach us new things. Through art we can come to feel and understand and love more completely—we become more human... I firmly believe that when a painting succeeds, I have not created it, but rather participated in it. I paint because I love, and because I love to paint. The better I become at both, the more readily accessed and identified is this grace, and the better will be my contribution.

Nativity depicts the birth of Christ. Kershisnik painted Nativity in 2006 while he was a visiting professor at BYU. Kershisnik started the 17-foot-long (5.2 m) painting to create "something ambitious", after encouraging his students to do the same. The painting shows Mary nursing the baby Jesus, two midwives, Joseph, and a dog with her pups underneath a concourse of angels. Kershisnik said that his experiences of the births of his own children felt "densely witnessed" and inspired the painting. He also explained the iconography of the dog as a representation of fidelity and faithfulness, a common symbol in religious art. Bren Jackson, an art critic, wrote that the midwives exemplify the "fellowship of sisterhood" and Kershisnik adds that he would imagine that there would have been women there to help Mary. In the painting, Joseph is nearby, but separate from Mary and her child, and has an overwhelmed expression. The angels have distinct faces, which according to Jackson, invites viewers to consider what their role in observing the birth could have been.

Leslie Norris's neighbor asked Kershisnik to do a portrait of Norris. Kershisnik agreed to do it and give the neighbor the first chance to buy or refuse the painting. When the portrait was finished, the neighbor did not want to buy the painting, which Kershisnik then sold to the Utah Arts Council in 1994. Norris himself wanted to buy the painting afterwards, but the painting remains in custody of the Utah Arts Council.

After graduating high school from the International School of Islamabad, Kershisnik attended the University of Utah intending to study architecture. After a year, he left to serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Denmark. He transferred to BYU where he studied art and eventually focused on painting. During his undergraduate studies, he received a grant to study in London for six months. He received his Bachelor of Arts (BA) from BYU in 1988, after which he studied printmaking at the University of Texas at Austin where he received a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in 1991. Upon the completion of his master's degree, he and his family moved to Kanosh, Utah.

Brian T. Kershisnik (born 1962) is an American painter. He studied art at the University of Utah, Brigham Young University (BYU), and the University of Texas at Austin. He lives in Provo, Utah.

Kershisnik was born in 1962, in Oklahoma City. He is the youngest son of four children and grew up both in the United States and internationally. His father worked as a petroleum geologist, moving internationally with his work. The family lived in various locations around the world, including Angola, Thailand, and Pakistan. He spent his childhood summers in Rock Springs, Wyoming, visiting his grandparents.