The Baptism of Jesus: Four Artworks

THE BAPTISM OF JESUS: FOUR ARTWORKS

The mosaics at Resurrection Cemetery at Affton, Missouri, in the Archdiocese of St. Louis include some of the most aesthetically pleasing works of religious art I have ever seen.

St. Louis has been dubbed “Rome of the West” because it was the mother diocese of many dioceses in the Midwest today.

The panels are skillfully executed and finely drawn. The artist’s interpretation is sensitive and sympathetic. Tilework is radiant and pleasantly textured.

They follow principles of graphic design—balance and proportion, rhythm and movement, unity and variety, among others. Various design elements are aesthetically apportioned (golden ratio), while asymmetry adds interest. Patterns, contours, and colors repeat yet vary, creating visual movement and rhythm. The consistent style throughout conveys a sense of unity.

The mosaics are among the last commissions of the Ravenna Mosaic Company, closed in 1988, “Ravenna” after the capital of the late Roman Empire where the famous Byzantine mosaics of the fifth and sixth centuries are located.

The art of Father Marko Ivan Rupnik created in conjunction with the Centro Aletti, Rome build on the conventions of classical mosaics—two-dimensional and graphic, cheerfully multihued and decoratively patterned. Pleasingly variegated tiling imbues mosaic art with inimitable appeal.

Rupnik’s mosaics have been complimented for their attributes of light, brightness, dynamism, and abundant design. Religious figures are depicted with idiosyncratically large eyes, a signature feature of his art.

Rupnik’s work has graced important sacred buildings, including the Shrine of Saint Pio of Pietrelcina, San Giovanni Rotondo, Italy and the Saint John Paul II National Shrine, Washington, D.C., where this particular piece is located.

The accomplished priest is today notorious because he stands accused of clerical sexual abuse. On June 15, 2023, the Society of Jesus expelled him for his “stubborn refusal to observe the vow of obedience.” His Vatican trial is ongoing.

Personally, I am smitten by his work because I find it highly aesthetic.

Is it possible to separate the artist from their art? Yes, it is to some extent possible to contemplate a work of art isolated and detached from the life and person of the artist. Caravaggio’s masterpieces, for example, are regularly displayed with admiration without regard to his conviction for murdering Ranuccio Tomassoni in a brawl.

  

Monastery Icons is a take on longstanding conventions of Byzantine iconography. They are set apart especially by their bright, rich colors, even as they maintain the highly graphic style of the Orthodox icon—linear, flat, stylized, and symbolic—notably resulting in their remarkable visual clarity. Embellished with text in English instead of Greek, the images are rendered more accessible to a popular English-speaking audience.

“John Baptizing Jesus” (1968) by Harry Anderson (American illustrator, 1906-1996) displays skilled draftsmanship and renders the Biblical event realistically in painterly style. The illustration strongly evokes the event as it took place about two thousand years ago so that we can almost locate ourselves in the scene and watch it as it happens.