Visitors were invited to write and draw their own “theses,” print them out, and nail them to the wooden door in the church.

A thesis is a paragraph, an announcement, or a protest, which in this case can be presented in either words or images.

The resulting work is meant to commemorate the event in Wittenberg in Germany in 1517, when Luther nailed his 95 theses to the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church, thereby marking the beginning of the Reformation in Europe.

The development of printing and the beginning of the Reformation were concurrent events. Protestants in Northern Europe used this new technology to spread the Reformation by printing both the Bible and propaganda pamphlets.

The first Theses event took place in Hólar in Hjaltadal last summer as part of the Hólar Festival. The history of printing in Iceland began in Hólar, the first printing press having been set up there around 1530 by the Bishop of Hólar, Jón Arason. Bishop Guðbrandur Þorláksson later used the same press to spread the Reformation in Iceland, publishing a large number of books in Icelandic, the most important being the Bible translation that appeared in 1584.