St. Francis in the Desert

   October 4 is the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi. In commemoration I add this post on Giovanni Bellini's famous painting of St. Francis in the Desert, one of the prized possessions of New York's Frick Museum.

                                             

Giovanni Bellini: St. Francis in the Desert
(click on images to enlarge)

For over 50 years the Frick Museum in New York City has been my favorite museum. It is a small, easily navigated site quite unlike the Metropolitan only a few blocks away on 5^th Avenue. It’s magnificent collection of paintings, acquired for the most part during the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries by steel baron, Henry Clay Frick, spans the gamut of Western art from late Medieval to the Impressionists.

You cannot visit the Frick and fail to notice that patrons invariably stop in the great central living room to stare and wonder at Giovanni Bellini’s famous, “St. Francis in the Desert.” On one occasion a museum employee confirmed my guess that this painting, despite the presence of works by the likes of Titian, Rembrandt, and Renoir, is the most popular in the whole collection.

Born in 1430 Giovanni Bellini is arguably the first great master of the Venetian Renaissance. The Venetian version of the Renaissance has long taken a back seat to the Florentine but in the last few decades it has come into its own and today most scholars would agree that Bellini and his younger successors, Giorgione, and Titian, can hold their own as painters with Leonardo, Michelangelo and Raphael.

Indeed, the Bellini family studio is now seen as one of the great sources of the Renaissance. Giovanni and his brother, Gentile, who at one point went to Constantinople to paint the Sultan, inherited the studio from their father, Jacopo. Andrea Mantegna, a great painter in his own right, married one of the Bellini sisters and exerted a powerful influence on the studio. Scholars also suspect that both Giorgione and Titian were apprentices at the Bellini studio before they broke out on their own.

Although he painted the St. Francis around 1480, Bellini continued to paint well into the next century. Until his death he was sought after and courted by public, religious, and private patrons. He is best known as a painter of Madonnas and groups of figures ranged around the Madonna and Child often called “sacra conversazione.” Nevertheless, the St. Francis is a unique work in the history of Renaissance art.

What is going on in the painting? St. Francis stands in the foreground a little off center wearing his familiar robe.  Behind him is a kind of wooden structure that seems to lead into a cave. The mid-ground is largely made up of a barren landscape whose primary occupant is a small horse or ass. Prominent in the upper left is an oddly shaped tree that appears to be leaning toward St. Francis. In the distant background we see a majestic towered city.

In one interpretation of the painting Francis is receiving the stigmata, the actual wounds of Christ on his own body.  His hands are outstretched but it is hard to see if there are wounds. Moreover, traditional elements usually employed in depictions of the stigmata episode are absent. His companion, Brother Leo, is not shown and neither are Christ or an angel.

I prefer the interpretation of John V. Fleming in From Bonaventure to Bellini, an Essay in Franciscan Exegesis. In this often overlooked but extraordinary 1982 monograph Fleming argued that Marcantonio Michiel’s original description of the painting, when he saw it in the home of Venetian patrician, Taddeo Contarini, “St. Francis in the Desert,” was indeed correct.  Fleming saw the subject of the painting and every detail in it grounded in Franciscan spirituality.

The landscape in the painting is not La Verna, the site of the stigmata episode, but the desert of the Old Testament or Hebrew scriptures. In particular, it is the Egyptian desert. The prominent animal in mid-ground is the Onager or wild ass of the desert while the heron standing before it is a bird of the Nile delta.

Franciscans often associated their founder with Moses and Elijah and their life in the desert. In the background beneath the city there is a shepherd tending his flock just as Moses did before his encounter with the Lord. Indeed, the leaning tree so prominent in the upper left is the famous burning bush in which the Lord appeared to Moses. It is a laurel which at the time was believed to be impervious to fire. We also notice that Francis has removed his sandals and stands barefoot in the same manner as Moses.

The wooden structure behind Francis is a Sukkoth, variously translated as tent, hut, booth, or tabernacle, a kind of portable structure used by the Israelites in their wanderings in the desert. The Sukkoth also recalls the scene of the Transfiguration when Christ was revealed in His glory accompanied by Moses and Elijah to the three apostles, Peter, James, and John. Dumfounded, Peter offered to build three booths or Sukkoth for the Lord and his guests.

If we look closely, we will see beneath the right hand of Francis a rabbit in a hole in the rock, and beneath his left hand a jug. The rabbit was a symbolic reference to Moses who hid his face from the Lord and the jug is a reference to Elijah. Indeed, the abundant vegetation sprouting around Francis is a garden or carmel, another reference to Elijah who was supposed to have been the founder of the Carmelite order. Francis stands between Moses and Elijah in the same way as Christ stood between them at the Transfiguration. In Franciscan spirituality and imagery, Francis was the new Christ.

Just as Moses came to lead his people out of the slavery of Egypt, so too did Francis come to lead his followers out of the slavery of sin. The city in the background then is a place of danger and peril, both physical and spiritual. The desert is symbolic of the life of poverty and humility preached by the famous founder of the Franciscan order.

Most of the paintings acquired by Henry Clay Frick had a special meaning for him. A committed Mason, Frick admired Francis because of his love of Nature. Others who have viewed the painting since Frick added it to his collection perhaps have had their own reasons for admiring it. Even if we know nothing of Franciscan spirituality, Bellini’s painting is still an image of a human being standing open and receptive to the divine light and transforming the world because of it. 

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Assisi: Feast of St. Francis

                                              Assisi: A Religious Experience

October 4th is the Feast day of St. Francis of Assisi. Below is a little account of a visit to Assisi a few years ago.

                                   

Italy is one of the most popular travel destinations today. Besides its many attractions it has for the Catholic traveler a special significance. When my wife and I travel we like to go to Mass every day. Not only does every little Italian town have its own church, but each little district in the town will have its own church. Of course in the larger cities you can hardly cross the street without bumping into a Catholic church which is still functioning as a center of worship.

For a Catholic the spiritual benefit of attending Mass even in Italian is immeasurable. Still, I have to admit that for a tourist there are some ancillary advantages. First, it is a pleasure to observe Italians at worship. On Sundays the churches are well attended and Italians attend with gusto. They sing out the hymns more so than we do here in America.

At a daily Mass attended by half a dozen elderly women, they sang an a cappella version of the Ave Maria that was as good as anything I've ever heard.

Secondly, even though most of the precious art works that were originally in these churches have been removed to pinacotecas and museums, there is still plenty to see although the churches are extremely dark except when services are being conducted. In some churches if you drop a coin in a box, you will get a couple of minutes of light illuminating some masterpiece. Any tourist can do that but sometimes a Mass goer can get a special perk. If you attend the 10:30 daily Mass in the Baptistry in Florence, you will be allowed inside before the mob of tourists is admitted. Before and after Mass you will be able to walk around observing the incredible ceiling and walls virtually alone.

One year my wife and I happened to be in Assisi on October 4, the feast of St. Francis. Assisi is a special town on any day but it was really something that weekend. The day before was a Sunday and we attended Mass in the magnificent lower church of the Basilica of St. Francesco. The Mass was packed with pilgrims from all over come to honor St. Francis.

Assisi is a hill town with panoramic views over the surrounding Umbrian countryside but to me the most wonderful thing about Assisi is the sounds. Monday morning we were awakened by the incredible bells of San Francesco which rang steadily for more than five minutes at 7:00. Two hours later a procession from the town's central square, the Piazza del Comune, wound its way down the via di San Francesco to the Basilica. Every year a different region of Italy is represented in the procession. That year it was Abruzzo from the South. People marched  in their native costumes behind their local banners down to the Church to attend Mass.

Loudspeakers broadcast the proceedings for the thousands who couldn't get inside while `some politician gave a speech, and then gaily dressed singing groups performed traditional songs from Abruzzo. Finally, the crowd began to disperse for lunch and siesta.

That night after dinner my wife and I were walking back to our hotel. By then even the area around the Basilica was deserted. Yet as we passed the doors of the lower Church, we heard a small group of Americans singing the hymn of St. Francis.

            Make me a channel of your peace…###