It Looks Like It's Made of Legos to Me

 

 

 

I wish this wasn't real, but it is...

 It is not what we expected, and not what most of us want. This year’s Vatican creche has been laughed at and ridiculed for looking like a science fiction story or children’s toys. One figure was often described as looking like Darth Vader, though to me he looks more like a Sontaran from Doctor Who. More excitable people called it demonic, pagan, and idolatrous. Conservative English writer Tim Stanley called it “absolutely terrifying” in a tweet. This tweet from Edward Pentin has a short video of the whole creche.

“At the end of this extremely difficult year people are looking for beauty, for something to elevate, inspire, and unite them, and the scene offered in Saint Peter’s Square gives them something else altogether,” said the art historian Elizabeth Lev. “The misshapen figures in the Nativity scene lack all the grace, proportion, vulnerability, and luminosity that one looks for in the manger scene. The entire point of this holiday is the second person of the Holy Trinity taking human form, born as a baby of flesh and blood, and there is nothing particularly human about the forms we see before us.”...

 The creche is embarrassing. It’s not the depiction of the birth of our Lord faithful Catholics want and the world needs to see. I’ve often complained that Catholics ought to be more careful about airing our dirty laundry before the world, or allowing our internal debates over theology and praxis to become stumbling blocks to those outside the Church. I don’t want to give scandal with this piece. I want to admit the obvious — this creche is comically awful — but I also want to try to put it in some perspective.

Prairie Home Companion Pretty Good Joke of the Day

What was the last thing that Jesus said at the Last Supper? “OK, anyone who wants to be in the picture get on this side of the table…”

Please Dispose...Mercifully.

Not to put too fine a point on this, but....man, this is ugly.

 “No one likes it, apart from blind people, and I'm sure even they can sense it's profound ugliness as it passes by.” Richard Curtis, from "The Boat That Rocked"

Jesus (I assume) carrying the Lamb (I assume), which is really him. From the Gospel of John:

"Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."

For me, the way the heads are combined (3 eyes!) makes them look strangely like Siamese twins connected at the face. And the look? Reminds me of...

I would like to meet the person who thought this up, painted it, and then said, "Beautiful!".

Don't Go in the Attic! Wait! No! GO in the Attic!

A 400-year-old painting that might have been executed by Italian master Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio has been found in an attic in southern France.

Eric Turquin, the French expert who retrieved the painting two years ago, says it is in an exceptional state of conservation and estimates its value at 120 million euros (about £100m).

The picture, whose authenticity has not been established, had been left for more than 150 years in a property in the outskirts of Toulouse.

Called 'Judith Beheading Holofernes,' it depicts the biblical heroine Judith beheading an Assyrian general, and is thought to have been painted in Rome circa 1604-05.

Judith, a widow, was said to have seduced Holofernes before getting him drunk and killing him with his own sword. 

Typically for a Caravaggio painting, it is the moment of the greatest dramatic impact - the decapitation itself - that it depicted.

Fitting with his mastery of light and shadow, which the Italian developed into a technique known as chiaroscuro, the painting is dramatically lit from the side to emphasise the facial expressions of the murderer and her maid, Abra.

Mr Turquin told a press conference today that there 'will never be a consensus' about the name of the artist.

Caravaggio is remarkable. He did a lot of Catholic art. Do you see a theme?

Beheading of John the Baptist

David with Goliath

Abraham and Isaac

Crayola Feast of Blessed Fra Angelico, February 18th

A little late, but I saw the video today and wondered if any of Fra Angelico's paintings is on display?

He was known to contemporaries as Fra Giovanni da Fiesole (Brother John of Fiesole and Fra Giovanni Angelico (Angelic Brother John). In modern Italian he is called il Beato Angelico (Blessed Angelic One); the common English name Fra Angelico means the "Angelic friar".
In 1982 Pope John Paul II proclaimed his beatification in recognition of the holiness of his life, thereby making the title of "Blessed" official.Friesole is sometimes misinterpreted as being part of his formal name, but it was merely the name of the town where he took his vows as a Domincan Friar, and was used by contemporaries to separate him from other Fra Giovannis. He is listed in the Roman Martyrology as Beatus Ioannes Faesulanus, cognomento Angelicus—"Blessed Giovanni of Fiesole, known as 'the Angelic' "

The Annunciation

Vasari wrote of Fra Angelico that "it is impossible to bestow too much praise on this holy father, who was so humble and modest in all that he did and said and whose pictures were painted with such facility and piety."

Deposition From the Cross

 What made me think of Fra Angelica today...

Catholic Cruella DeVille

Father Z. visited the Galleries of the Palace of the Doria Pamphilij where he came across this bust of Olimpia Maidalchini...

Olimpia Maidalchini

She sounds like quite a character.

When you go to the Gallery, don’t miss learning about this one.  Donna Olimpia.  She must have been a fright to live with.  At one point she talked Innocent X, her brother in law, out of the licenses for the brothels in Rome, arguing that it wasn’t right for the Holy See to have them.  She immediately took the income and put the family crest over the doors.  At one point she locked the Pope in his room.  Interesting.

Here's what Wikipedia has to say:
 
Maidalchini's reputation can be seen in her unflattering bust by Alessandro Algardi (circa 1650), currently in the Doria Pamphili Gallery. Maidalchini was notorious for guarding access to Innocent X, and utilizing it to her own financial benefit. Her wired widow's hood in the bust was interpreted by Ann Sutherland as a jab at the fact that neither Maidalchini nor her family provided for the burial of Innocent X after his death in 1655, which was paid for by Innocent X's former butler.
Eleanor Herman says that Olimpia locked the Pope alone in his chamber on the night from 26 to 27 December and she went to her palace in fear that the Pope died that night and that her palace was sacked and burned. The morning of the 27th, she was barred access to Innocent X's chamber, much to her chagrin since she was expecting to steal the two chests full of gold that were hidden under Innocent's bed. Right after Innocent's body was removed on 29 December, she entered the chamber, removed the chests, and then ran to her palace to lock herself in fear of what angry mobs could do to her. Olimpia, and many other people, removed papal treasures from the papal palace during the convalescence of Innocent, to the point where he died in absolute poverty since everything had already been stolen from him by his last days of life^. Olimpia allowed the pontiff's body to stay unburied for three days, and to be buried in "the simplest of forms imaginable". claiming that she was a poor widow that couldn't arrange a proper burial^.

A "Come To Jesus" Moment

FORT WORTH(CBSDFW.COM) — Doctors can’t seem to explain it, but one Texas family is sure it was the hand of God that brought their son back to life.
17-year-old Zack Clements is a strong, healthy and outgoing high school athlete. He goes to school and plays football at Victory Life Academy in Brownwood, Texas.
It was there last week the teen suddenly collapsed while running in P.E. class.
He was rushed to the hospital where doctors worked to revive him.
According to Clements, “they said I was without a heart beat for 20 minutes.”
When doctors finally got a pulse, Clements was airlifted to Cook Children’s Hospital in Fort Worth.  He would wake up there in the intensive care unit days later.
His recovery has been hard to believe, but even more amazing is the story he tells of what he saw when his heart stopped beating.
“When I was out those 20 minutes, I saw a man who had long ruffled hair and kind of a thick beard, and it didn’t take me long to realize that that was Jesus,” he said.
 " I went up to him and he put his hand on my shoulder and he told me everything would be alright and not to worry.”

Luckily, he got a picture with his cell phone.

Bird is the Word

An interesting story about the unofficial portrait painter of the Vatican...

Shen Jiawei

VATICAN CITY — Artist Shen Jiawei’s paintings of Chinese soldiers during the Cultural Revolution were so popular with Mao’s regime that 250,000 copies of his most famous work were made into propaganda posters and distributed throughout the country.
Four decades later, Shen now has a different patron commissioning his work: He has become, somewhat inexplicably, the unofficial portrait artist of the Vatican. He painted the first official portrait of Pope Francis and recently completed a huge rendition of the second most powerful man in Rome, Cardinal George Pell, the Vatican’s money guy.

Here's the portrait.

Reminds me of....

Picturing Mary

The National Gallery of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C. is holding an exhibit entitled, Picturing Mary: Woman, Mother, Idea". I don't know what the idea is, but the paintings are amazing! There is an interactive on-line version located here. Check it out!

Madonna with the Child, Sandro Botticelli (1467)

Interestingly, one of the sponsors of the exhibit is Jacqueline Badger Mars, whsi weird because her husbands last name is Badger. ANyway, she is ranked as the 15th richest person in America, worth more than $19,000,000,000 as an heiress to the Mars candy bar empire.

"God's Gonna Cut You Down"

The "You" Johnny Cash  is talking about is this....thing, seen here talking to with St. Wofgang:

Always Listen to Your Father

Or you might as well cut of your ear. From Wikipedia: The father of Vincent van Gogh tried unsuccessfully to get his son to voluntarily take treatment for his disorders in Gheel. See the post below about St. Dymphna to find out why!

Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear, Van Gogh

The Crayola Feast of Fra Angelico, February 18

I knew he was a painter, but I had no idea he was:

1) a saint, and
2) the Patron Saint of Painters!

An Italian painter of the early Renaissance, Guido di Pietro (1395-1455) was a member of the Dominican community in Fiesoli, Italy. Fra is a contracted form of the Latin word frater, which was the title for a friar.

 Pope John Paul II beatified Fra Angelico on October 3, 1982, and in 1984 declared him patron of Catholic artists.

Here's some of his work...

Fiesole Triptych

 

St. Lawrence Distributing ALms

Annunciazione 

 

 

 

 

Diocese of Las Vegas UPDATE

From Eye of the Tiber:

VATICAN CITY––An official at the Vatican Press Office today announced that the Vatican was in preliminary negotiations with Las Vegas bishop Joseph Pepe to swap Michelangelo’s The Last Judgment with the world-renowned painting The Rise of the Sentients located inside Guardian Angel Cathedral in Las Vegas, Nevada. Monsignor Alexander Bader, a spokesman for the Sistine Chapel, told reporters earlier this morning that The Last Judgment, though exquisite in its own right, had “run its course.” “We do not doubt the beauty of Michelangelo’s piece,” Bader told reporters. “But the fact is that the wonderfully pure artistry and vibrant colors of The Rise of the Sentients, with its images of bare-chested sentients flying up, up and away to heaven or Krypton, call it what you may, lends itself to what the theme of our chapel ought to be…artwork communicating itself on an inner level, found not so much in the painting itself, as it is in the viewer…very much like our faith.” Bader did not disclose many specifics about the trade, saying only that it was officials at the Sistine Chapel that initiated the offer, and that thus far, Pepe has been reluctant to trade the piece. “Who could blame him? All I can say at this time is that Bishop Pepe has indeed denied our first offer. We are currently working on a proposal that could also include the Pieta, and possibly even the Basilica of Saint Mary Major.”

 

The Last Judgement by Michelangelo

Ghent Altarpiece

  From The Guardian:

"Just about everything bad that could happen to a painting has happened to Hubert and Jan van Eyck's Adoration of the Mystic Lamb (also known as the Ghent Altarpiece). It's almost been destroyed in a fire, was nearly burned by rioting Calvinists, it's been forged, pillaged, dismembered, censored, stolen by Napoleon, hunted in the first world war, sold by a renegade cleric, then stolen repeatedly during the second world war, before being rescued by The Monuments Men, miners and a team of commando double-agents. The fact that it was the artwork the Nazis were most desperate to steal – Göring wanted it for his private collection, Hitler as the centrepiece of his citywide super-museum – has only increased its renown."

And now, thanks to the Getty Foundation, you can see it up close and in INCREDIBLE detail. ONE HUNDRED BILLION PIXELS WORTH! Go HERE.

Goody's Feast of St. Therese of Avila, October 15

A Doctor of the Church, St. Therese was the founder of the discalced wing of the Carmelites. She had visions; in one of them a seraph drove a fiery lance into her heart repeatedly. Her writing about the vision moved the great sculptor/architect/dramatist Gian Lorenzo Bernini to carve The Ecstasy of Saint Theresa between 1647-52. You can view it at the Cathedral of Santa Maria della  Vittoria in Rome.

From the Khan Academy:

By the way, St. Therese is the patron saint of headache sufferers.

Father Z. Creeps Me Out...AGAIN!

"My friends, the Devil is real. (Pope) Francis sure believes in the Enemy.

Let’s review.
The Devil and the fallen angels hate you.
They have angelic abilities. They never sleep, never tire, are never distracted, have no need to travel from point a to b, and they never miss what you are up to.
Think this through.
Imagine what sort of profile on you some government agency could put together.
Angels, the holy angels and the fallen, have missed nothing of your live since the instant of your conception.  And they never forget anything.
Fallen angels, the enemy, the Devil, can’t literally get into our heads or thoughts or touch our will, but they don’t have to in order to know us really well.
And they hate you.   They hate you.  They hate you.
With relentless malice the “prince of this world” will work to trick you into letting him have some control in your life.  Demons will cleverly and with perfect timing stimulate appetites and passions based on how well they know your proclivities.   They strive to twist your heart and mind away from God in order to diminish even by a little the love everyone will share in heaven as they shine in the magnified glory of the Trinity.
The Devil and other demons are always held in check by God.  They cannot simply have their way with us or the material cosmos around us unless God permits it according to His plan.   But they are devious and tireless.
It is good that Pope Francis talks about the Devil, the enemy of our soul, the prince of this world.
Remember your Guardian Angels.  Call on them to help you.  Remember Our Lady, Queen of Angels. Remember St. Joseph, whom we invoke in his beautiful litany as the “Terror daemonum… the Terror of demons”.

 St. Michael Vanquishing Satan 

Raphael, 1518

Feast Day of Fra Angelico, February 18

Not a saint! Blessed, thanks to a decision by Pope John Paul II, but the term "Fra Angelico" means "Sainted Brother". His real name was Guido di Pietro, but his contemporaries called him "Fra Giovanni da Fiesole" (Brother John of Fiesole). Pope JPII also named Fra Angelico the patron of painters.

Coronation of the Virgin

The Annunciation