O Christ, Our True Dawn

 

Ivan Vladimirov (1869-1947) was a Russian painter (contemporaneous with Fritz von Uhde) whose realist watercolors documented the sadness of the Russian Revolution (1917-1919). This painting is simply titled, The Funeral. It is winter. Snow is drifted up against a blacked-out, boarded up building, suggestive of a whole nation hollowed out by violence. A plain casket is being pulled along the icy road by an elderly vested priest and the dead man's veiled wife. The young son pushes the sled and casket from behind. There are no flowers, only a pine branch. 

Genre painting doesn't pretty things up. It's realistic — even sadly so. Genre painting depicts what takes place ordinarily — every day and every where. I am thinking of the Ukrainian man who was killed while attending to his bee hives. The other man who was blown up while feeding the stray dogs in his shell-shocked city. The hospitalized girl whose head is full of shrapnel — her mother and grandmother killed when the family car was riddled by bullets. The theatre blown to bits even though the word CHILDREN was printed on the roof and surrounding ground.

Vladimirov's painting depicted an early 20th century reality. And here we are, one hundred years later, still causing each other profound loss, sadness, fear and pain. We might wonder — are we even capable of change? 

O Christ, our true Dawn,

who has come to be with us,

to reveal to us the new human person —

in the first light of Sunday,

the Day of Resurrection Life,

from a praising, contrite, grateful heart,

I pray for the world, 

living in the night of doubt, 

suffering, error, ignorance, sin and unbelief.

Transform discord into love,

cruelty into kindness,

lies to your Truth.

Amen.

Man Putting on His Coat ~ 1885

 

Fritz von Uhde was thirty-seven when he painted this interesting picture, Man Putting on His Coat. I'm thinking this scene was not a figment of the artist's imagination, but the capturing of a moment in which the man, who may have sat as a model for the artist, got up to leave. Notice the heavily framed painting and other canvases and papers for sketches on the steps against the studio's windowed-wall. He is a poor man — his coat is frayed as is the underneath jacket he's already wearing. He's neither an old man nor a youngster, but he has a very distinctive face.

Notice the chair on the right behind the man. Maybe it's the chair the fellow had sat on as he modeled for the artist. It's the kind of chair we have seen in other von Uhde paintings, of lower class houses and apartments of the poor. It's the same kind of chair Vincent van Gogh painted a few years later in December of 1888: a rustic wooden straight-backed, armless chair, with a woven straw seat on a clay-tiled floor. Van Gogh intended his painting to be a kind of self-portrait. Even though he painted his chair in bright colors and sunlight, there is a sadness to the painting — he is absent having, left behind his pipe and tobacco pouch on the seat. So a chair of any kind can reflect a variety of feelings and senses.

 

During Lent we're on our way forward to Easter, but the Christian looks backward at the same time — looking back to Jesus in his desert fasting, back to the Last Supper, back to the way of Calvary and the cross, back to the myrrh bearing women of Easter Morning. Can I think back over my life to those moments which stand out, as if frozen. Moments which are particularly beautiful, or where I was being shown or taught something—moments which I would say in hind sight were meaningful. Perhaps they are moments in which God revealed something of himself to me, or when I realized something especially good or deeply human.

Perhaps in this frozen moment when the man put on his coat to leave, the artist may have felt a deep gratitude for this man's presence in his life. Maybe he had come to know the man's story in the long hours they spent together in the studio. Perhaps he had come to know his family and their struggle or sensed his goodness, helping him to become an artist whose paintings are heart felt.

Fishermen's Children in Zandvoort ~ 1882

 

This painting has an interesting title that may cause us to wonder. These are the children of fathers who are fishermen. Fishermen are often away for long stretches of time. Where are the boys? Are they out fishing with their fathers? Do only boys go to school? What of these young girls? 

It is said that this painting was Fritz von Uhde's experiment with plein air (outdoor) painting. The girls are sitting in what appears to be a little brick-paved courtyard. Except for the girl on the far right, who is mending a sock, the others appear to be just standing or sitting around. Have they been told, "Stand here and don't move until I come back," by the mothers who are hanging out the laundry at the end of the path?  Look at the heavy wooden shoes these girls have to drag around. The littlest one in the center looks especially  neglected. The only one smiling is the three-year-old at the far end of the group — she has her doll in a little stroller. Have the older girls on the left wall been punished?  Or have they been assigned to keep an eye on the others? Are they angry, upset, or sadly disconnected? They seem numb and bored.

Genre painting depicts people as they really are, even when they are poor or life is ugly and difficult. Perhaps Fritz von Uhde was making a statement — that the Christian ideal of the equality of persons had not been achieved in his country. Of course, the art "industry" of the day criticized him for depicting life so honestly. New ideas are always criticized, especially when they disturb consciences. 

Zandvoort was originally a quaint fishing village near Amsterdam, Netherlands, Now visitors from all over Europe flock to live on the beach during the summer months.

Looking at this photograph I'm reminded of what Dorothy said to her dog when the tornado dropped them in the land in Oz, "Toto I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."

In our longing for a simpler time, we can romanticize poverty. But poverty was (and is) hard and ugly. The girls in von Uhde's painting wouldn't think poverty is just a sweet and simpler time.