Commission illustrating Pope Francis’ Laudato Si’
University Ministry Office, University of San Francisco, CA
featuring St. Francis of Assisi & St. Kateri Tekakwitha
September 2022
Acrylic on canvas, 64" x 80"
Commissioned by Rev. Dónal Godfrey, SJ
In memoriam of his parents, Robin Godfrey and Mary McCambridge.
"Praise be to you, my Lord, through our Sister, Mother Earth, who sustains and governs us, and who produces various fruit with colored flowers and herbs.”
- St. Francis, quoted by Pope Francis
The request was to draw inspiration from the 2015 encyclical by Pope Francis, Laudato Si’: On Care For Our Common Home, which calls us all to an integral ecology.
Included are various examples of flora and fauna found on the land, sea and sky. We also see St. Francis of Assisi & St. Kateri Tekakwitha (two patrons of the natural world), examples of renewable energy sources, and an acknowledgement of various faith traditions.
The challenge for me was to celebrate the diversity of life, as well as remind us that we are within a most precious garden, created by God. What was going to be a globe shifted to an egg, in reference to the glorious, bejeweled eggs designed by Fabergé. We are born from the Earth, the symbolic womb. The "egg" with which life hatched, infused by the Holy Spirit. St. Francis poetically refers to our world as "Mother Earth", so the shape of the bodies of water imply those of a uterus and birth canal.
Visiting favorite art pieces at the DeYoung Museum, a pietra dura (stone inlay) piece got me thinking about the Earth as a treasure; jewels; gemstones. Thus the spectrum of life forms are depicted as the spectrum of rocks that make up this planet.
As the two saints were to be featured prominently, I decided to have them presenting the planet to us. I drew inspiration from antique maps, with their text and human figures near the bottom or sides. As for humans on the Earth, look closely atop and there is a Madonna and baby Jesus, shaped after the Holy Mother and Child in Stefan Lochner's 1440 painting Madonna of the Rose Bower. And is that a unicorn? In medieval art, a unicorn often represented Christ.
For energy, we have solar, wind, tidal and geothermal. The architecture is of houses of worship, in San Francisco. Featured left to right: Masjid Darussalam (Islamic Society of SF), Vedanta Society of Northern California, St. Ignatius Catholic Church (on the USF campus), Congregation Emanu-El, and the Buddhist Church of SF.
I am thankful that Fr. Dónal Godfrey gave me the opportunity to create something celebrating God’s Garden Globe.
It has been an honor and a blessing.
