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Exploring Italian Churches

By Architecture, Art and Faith, Painting

It is years now that I return to this subject matter of Italian architecture and it seems natural to share the origins of my inspiration. I was reminded of it all on my most recent trip to Italy to study Romanesque churches for the Passages exhibition. I’ve illustrated this post with sketches from fall 2023, though I’m writing about my first encounters with sacred spaces in Italy, 25 years previous.

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study of Piero della Francesca's Annunciation in Arezzo

Annunciation Master Studies

By Painting, Virgin Mary, Art and Faith

The Annunciation has been one of my favorite images for many years. My paintings seek to create modern interpretations of Mary. In preparation for this endeavor I took on a studio exercise creating small studies of famous Annunciation images. These Annunciation master studies are a study of art history as well as a meditation.

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oil painting of woman at a closed door with a dead tree

Eve: Closed Door to Paradise

By Painting, Virgin Mary, Art and Faith

My new painting “Closed Door to Paradise” explores the relationship between Eve and Mary. The painting shows the door to heaven, to Paradise, closed after Adam and Eve took of the forbidden fruit of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Eve’s doubt led to the closing of the door to Paradise. God forced them to flee the garden afterwards. They left the Garden of Eden and the harmony of life there and humankind has suffered from sin ever since.

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oil painting woman with stairway

Mary as Jacob’s Ladder

By Virgin Mary, Art and Faith, Painting

Ascent/Descent is a contemporary interpretation of the Virgin Mary as Jacob’s Ladder. This reading of Genesis 28 views Jacob’s vision of the stairway ascending to heaven as a pre-figuration of the Virgin Birth. Mary was the fulfillment of the LORD’s promise in this passage “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Through Jesus’ salvation (brought forth by Mary) we are able to ascend to heaven, and through Mary, Jesus descended to earth. Mary was the vehicle, the connection between heaven and earth which allowed salvation to come.

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oil painting of woman in a church

New Marian painting: Interrogatio

By Virgin Mary, Art and Faith, Figures, Architecture, Painting

My newest Marian painting “Interrogatio: Inquiry” depicts that moment of questioning “How can this be?” when the angel announced the Christ’s coming to Mary at the Annunciation. Mary’s vulnerability before God is represented here by the nude female figure. The grand space of the architecture represents God’s overpowering presence. The architecture also becomes a metaphor for Mary herself, often referred to in medieval texts as the Temple or dwelling place of the Lord because of her role in the Incarnation.

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oil painting of basilica of saint francis of assisi from uphill

New Painting of Assisi Basilica of Saint Francis

By Painting, Italy, Commissions, Art and Faith, Architecture

In a similar way, I returned to the shapes and images from my time in Assisi many times. I felt a sense of mystery in the images of rhythms of dark and light. Through drawing and painting I explored the arches of an alleyway multiple times. For me it was not simple documentation of medieval architecture. To me these passageways were like my pilgrimages themselves -a path to something beyond what was visible.

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female figure white arch gold background painting by Michelle Arnold Paine

Art Celebrates Women at the Ohio Statehouse

By Figures, Painting, Exhibits and Events

Since I recently began painting figures on metal leaf , I thought the “Red, White and Blue” exhibit would be a good moment to continue the challenge. In the drawings I leave the backgrond completely blank, allowing the lines to carry all of the expressive power of the figure. In a similar way, in the gold silhouettes I am using the gold for the negative space.

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gold mixed media painting contemporary icon

Contemporary Icons: Gold Silhouettes

By Figures, Painting, Art and Faith, Virgin Mary

My newest series of Gold Silhouette paintings are meant to be contemporary icons, modern interpretations of traditional icons. Whether architecture or figure, even landscape, my work has always centered on a theme of convergence between heaven and earth. Similarly, these new mixed media pieces juxtapose the expressive minimalist quality of my figure drawings with the other-worldly materials of metal leaf and paint inspired by iconography.

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Saint Joseph Maumee Watercolor

By Commissions, Architecture, Painting, Art and Faith

After I painted the Historic Church of Saint Rose in Perrysburg last year, a local family suggested a painting of Saint Joseph Parish across the river as a special anniversary gift. Her parents were married at St. Joseph Parish in Maumee, Ohio. Since they are still parishioners there, she thought a painting of the historic church would be a memorable gift to celebrate their years together. The architecture of churches communicates the eternal, where God comes to earth…

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Architectural Paintings Sacred Spaces Presence

Sacred Architecture Paintings: Building Inspiration

By Art and Faith, Architecture, Painting, Exhibits and Events, Italy

The exteriors of local churches shape the landscape of daily life-about-town, but their interiors have helped shape spiritual lives for centuries. In Europe, cavernous sacred spaces were built for throngs of religious activity, but now hold only shadows of those presences. The shapes of archways reaching towards heaven, the rhythm of dark and light passing through complex spaces inspire a sense of quiet awe and shadowy mystery.

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Park Street Arts Exhibit: Pilgrimage

By Exhibits and Events, Painting, Art and Faith, ArchitectureNo Comments

As a part of Park Street Arts, my series of architectural interiors will be on view at Park Street Church in the heart of Boston until October 19, 2013. This exhibit of paintings and prints is entitled Pilgrimage. The one-point perspective which dominates the compositions implies a destination. Our lives here on earth are the journey to that destination, a pilgrimage journey towards God.

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Annunciation/Birth

By Motherhood and Art-Making, Painting, Art and Faith, Virgin MaryNo Comments

The Feast of the Annunciation was moved to April 8 this year, since March 25 fell during Holy week. The Annunciation celebrates the moment when the angel Gabriel announces to Mary that she will bear the Savior. This series of Annunciation master studies I have shared over the last months is about waiting, and the expectation of new life. At times this “new life” has been a metaphor for new beginnings, forgiveness, spiritual renewal, but in 2012 the time of waiting was literal, as I waited, in pregnancy, for my baby girl to be born…

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Fede I, Oil on Canvas, 12x12, Architecture, Price $600

Convergence Exhibit – Reception March 23

By Exhibits and Events, Painting, Art and Faith, ArchitectureNo Comments

On display now at the Ashland Public Library is a series of my prints and paintings entitled Convergence. The title “Convergence” has two origins, and these two meanings themselves “converge” in the paintings. In part, “convergence” describes how, in ecclesiastical architecture in particular, celestial and terrestrial converge in built space.

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Annunciation after David by Michelle Arnold Paine

Annunciation after David

By Art and Faith, Exhibits and Events, Painting, Virgin Mary, ItalyNo Comments

This Annunciation transcription will be included in the exhibit Compassion: The Good Samaritan, opening at Adams ArtSpace, Harvard College, Cambridge this weekend.

The Annunciation is the moment when God comes to earth – when human and divine come together to become incarnate in Jesus, Savior of the world. The Incarnation, God’s greatest act of compassion.

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Annunciation after del Cossa

By Art and Faith, Painting, Virgin Mary, ItalyNo Comments

Appropriate to post another Annunciation transcription today, the Feast of the Archangels (Gabriel, Michael and Raphael). This particular Renaissance Annunciation infuses Classical architecture into the Biblical story of the Gabriel’s announcement to Mary. The painting also shows off the artists’ knowledge of perspective in the way that the artist places the angel in the foreground.

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Annunciation after Beccafumi, Oil on Canvas, 6x6 ©2012

Transcriptions: After Beccafumi

By Art and Faith, Painting, Virgin Mary, ItalyNo Comments

Another in my series of Annunciation transcriptions. The original Mannerist painting was completed in 1546 by Italian Domenico Beccafumi and is currently in the little town of Sarteano near Siena, Italy. I’m not always a fan of Mannerism, but I like the mirrored swooping curves in this painting and the sense of motion it creates, so different from the very still, stable Annunciations of Fra Angelico.

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Annunciation after Duccio, Oil on Canvas, 6x6, ©Michelle Arnold Paine

Annunciation after Duccio

By Painting, Virgin Mary, Italy, Art and FaithNo Comments

What is the purpose of “copying” a work of art? Franklin Enspruch phrases it like this in a review of Wendy Artin’s series of watercolors of the Elgin Marbles: “She is at once paying the sculptures due homage, studying them for artistic clues, and using them to reach upward in ambition and scale.”

Somehow, in entering in to someone else’s creation, one often emerges at the other end with a clearer, renewed sense of voice and direction.

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Annunciation, Ambrogio Lorenzetti, 1344

Annunciation after Lorenzetti

By Art and Faith, Painting, Virgin Mary, ItalyNo Comments

I love the brilliant blue and of Mary and her contemplative gaze in the Annunciation altarpiece by Ambrogio Lorenzetti. Lorenzetti was a Sienese painter in the first half of the 14th century and this work of his is presently housed in the Pinacoteca Nazionale in Siena, Italy. My version is tiny, only 6″ x 6″, but I’m looking for the contemplative quality he captures.

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Cover of Ruminate Magazine

Sound and Silence

By Press and Publications, Architecture, Art and Faith, Exhibits and Events, PaintingNo Comments

The theme of the winter issue of Ruminate magazine was “Sound and Silence”, and I was pleased that two of my prints and one of my paintings were chosen to as a visual representation of the theme. Sojourners Magazine’s Julie Polter recently said Ruminate has “staked a claim in the publishing borderlands where grit and religious devotion”.

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Finished Commission for Jamaica Plain Parish

By Painting, Architecture, CommissionsNo Comments

I am pleased to be able to share the completed painting for Saint Thomas Aquinas Parish in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts. I worked on this painting through the spring and finally finished in July. I love being able to share my love for church architecture with a living community. The painting has been printed into notecards for sale for the benefit of the parish.

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Sketchbook – Art Institute of Chicago

By Drawing, PaintingNo Comments

I visited the Art Institute of Chicago on Thursday during my vacation for their Target-sponsored Free Thursday evenings. What a wonderful a gift to the people of Chicago city to offer free admission from 5-8pm once a week – there was a line to enter at 5:00 and the museum was packed with people all evening. The new wing is huge, with the capacity to give their spectacular collection of 20th century art the viewing space it deserves.

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Our Lady of the Barren Tree

The Call to Beauty –

By Italy, Art and Faith, Painting, Virgin MaryNo Comments

Cardus has just published another of my paintings in their online journal Comment.

Our Lady of the Barren Tree is an image of hope: the strange beauty of winter, in which it requries faith to believe that trees and grass are only “sleeping” and will return with new life and growth.
The tree, the vine, the branches – these images evoke the memory of Eve in the garden of Eden whose disobedience eventually brought on the exile of humanity from paradise. Eve’s disobedience was eventually redeemed in the act of Mary’s obedient “May it be to me as you have said”.

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New Landscape Painting: Cemetery

By PaintingNo Comments

I am very excited about this new landscape painting from this beautiful summer day. The Cemetery is right on the Charles River and very beautiful. It is a very peaceful place to work — and attracts quite a bit of traffic as walkers from nearby offices take their lunch break. I hope to return to complete more paintings there as the year progresses.

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