Category: Martyr - Cavanagh Art

St Andrew Dũng-Lạc, Vietnamese Martyr

25/11/2023

Drawn on 23 November 2023.

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

St Andrew Dũng-Lạc was a Vietnamese Catholic priest who was martyred under the Nguyễn dynasty in Việt Nam (Vietnam) with his fellow priest and countryman St Peter Phạm Truong Vǎn Thi by beheading.

They were both named among the 117 Vietnamese Martyrs who were canonised by Pope John Paul II on 19 June 1988.

Fuller histories of both St Andrew Dũng-Lạc and St Peter Thi can be found on the Santi e Beati website:
St Andrew Dũng-Lạc
St Peter Phạm Truong Vǎn Thi

The Memorial of St Andrew Dũng-Lạc and his companions, Vietnames martyrs, is on 24 November.

Vincent Cavanagh
25 Nov 2023

St Charles Lwanga, Ugandan Martyr

20/7/2023

Pencilled 17 Jul 2023.
Painted 18 Jul 2023.

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

St Charles Lwanga, one of the Ugandan Martyrs.
He was a strong protector of young men from sexual predation and advocate of chastity.

He was martyred at the age of 26 when he refused to renounce his faith in Christ Jesus, in the year 1886.

For a far more in-depth look at St Charles Lwanga than I could ever attempt, read this reflection by Bishop Robert Barron on Word on Fire here.

And for the histories other Martyrs of Uganda, visit the Basilica of the Ugandan Martyrs Catholic Shrine, Namugongo, website here.

Vincent Cavanagh
20 Jul 2023

St Augustine Zhao Rong

7/7/2023

Sketched 29 Jun 2023.
Painted 6 Jul 2023.

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

St Augustine Zhao Rong, a former prison guard from Wuchuan who was converted by the testimony of the missionaries and Chinese Christians that he guarded and escorted to trial before his baptism into the faith in 1776.

After this he became a diocesan priest on 10 May 1781 and went on to proclaim the gospel and life of Jesus Christ to his fellow countrymen in rural areas. He was later captured and tortured, dying in the coldest part of 1815.

He and his fellow Chinese martyrs from the period between 1648 to 1930 were canonized by Pope John Paul II on 1 October 2000.

For more details read this article from Society of Saints.

Vincent Cavanagh
7 Jul 2023

St Agatha of Sicily

29/5/2023

Artwork created 26–29 May 2023.

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

If there has been something that has intensified over the past year, it has been this gentle but firm pressure from above to represent particular saints. With St Agatha this pressure has been of unusual strength.

Way back at the end of April I had collected a series of reference images, which I left on my drawing desk day in and day out, but strangely couldn’t get much further with.

The impasse only changed after a deeper dive into the story of her life, and of how she has been represented in Rome and in Sicily. In doing so she went from being an important saint mentioned in Eucharistic Prayer 1 of the Church to being formidable and unforgettable.

A brief re-cap of her life would be useful. St Agatha was a native of Sicily, and a beautiful and rich young woman of a noble family who had given her life to Jesus as a consecrated virgin. To signify this consecration she wore a veil.

Detail of 'St Agatha' by Matteo di Giovanni, circa 1474.

Around the year 250 AD, the roman prefect Quintianus decided that Agatha was lovely, and her fortune desirable, so he started to woo her and got rejected. When he got rejected enough, he decided to resort to threats, and that didn’t work either. Then knowing that the persecution of Christians under Decius was underway, Quintianus firstly reported her as a Christian, and then set about devising deadly tortures for Agatha.

When the early tortures failed to move her determination, he then ordered that her breasts be torn off with the special type of tongs you see depicted and then rolled in hot coals. Neither managed to kill her, and she was returned to her prison cell where St Peter visited her. Next Quintianus decided to burn her at the stake, but an earthquake happened to prevent that happening. So she was returned to her prison cell where she died of her injuries.

'St Peter Healing St Agatha' by Giovanni Lanfranco, (Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons)

The lictor sliced off my breasts with doubled blows,
But no wound mar my nature.
For adorned by the colour of a red rose amid virgin snows
I have begun to be more beautiful.

— Agatha Virgo Vulneribus Decorata (The Virgin Agatha Graced with Wounds),
by Martha Marchina.

Due to the details of her martyrdom, St Agatha became the patron saint of breast cancer sufferers, of rape victims, of nurses, of bell-founders, of Sicily, and other patronages.

'St Agatha, by sculptor Giovanni Maria De Rossi, (via StPetersBasilica.info)

One of the images that helped was the statue of St Agatha above the colonnade at St Peter’s basilica in Rome. It told the story of her life without being unchaste. The other image that helped was the reliquary of St Agatha’s head kept in the Cathedral of Catania in Sicily.

Reliquary bust of St. Agatha by Giovani di Bartolo, ca. 1373

This reliquary is a master-work of silver and enamel. An online article about the relics of St Agatha can be viewed here.

If you are patient (depending on the device you are using), it is worth using the Google translate option if you (like me) are not fluent in Italian.

On either side of the bust representing St Agatha are two angels. She is crowned, and in one hand holds a crucifix and in the other she holds an inscription. The whole thing is covered with votive offerings, pectoral crosses from bishops, episcopal rings, jewels etc. According to tradition, the crown upon her head was put there by King Richard the Lionheart.

Also this reliquary is the origin of the decision for blonde hair rather than the black or brunette hair found more widely in popular culture imagery of St Agatha.

Below is the inscription, and a translation of it, that found all over the Cathedral of Catania where her reliquary–bust is kept, and that I have included underneath my depiction of St Agatha:

Mentem Sanctam Spontaneam Honorem Deo Et Patriae Liberationem
(Holy, generous soul, honour of God and liberator of her homeland.)

These are no idle words. Her veil, kept in a separate reliquary, has been successfully used several times to invoke God’s help when natural disasters threatened Sicily.

When invaders came to Sicily and rounded up the native inhabitants, the conqueror permitted them to have a last Mass at the shrine of St Agatha before being executed. When it came time for everyone to open up the hymn books, each and every page held the initials of a promise that St Agatha would always protect Sicily with her intercession. Needless to say, the inhabitants were saved, and the invaders exited in a hurry.

St Agatha, this holy martyr, has been given mighty intercessory power by God.
St Agatha, pray for us. Amen.

Catherine Cavanagh, (based on notes and with minor edits by Vincent Cavanagh).
~31 May 2023

Image Process 2023-05-27

27/5/2023

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

St Agatha of Sicily: Patron of breast cancer, bell–founders, Sicily, Catania, and nurses.

It's been a long time waiting for this image to finally arrive.

Vincent Cavanagh
~27 May 2023

First Holy Martyrs of Rome

27/4/2023

Artwork created 19–27 April 2023.

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

A divinely-inspired, Roman mosaic–styled depiction of a few of the many different ways in which the early Christians were martyred in Rome, under the persecution of emperor Nero in AD 64.

"Nero's Torches", Henry Siemiradzki, 1876

The top panel has much inspiration from the painting Nero’s Torches, by Henry Siemiradzki in 1876, showing both men and women being burnt alive after the Great Fire of Rome before the gaze of gathered the Roman elite.

Illumination of St Andrew, East Anglian missal, c. 1320

Panel two is informed by an image of St Andrew’s crucifixion found within an East Anglian missal, circa 1320.

And the final panel illustrates the Roman capital punishment of damnatio ad bestias (condemnation to beast), or what is more commonly referred to as “being thrown to the lions.”

I freely admit that the Christians before said lions are heavily referenced from Jean-Léon Gérôme’s The Christian Martyrs’ Last Prayer (1883).

The slowly circling beasts themselves are a synthesis of various depictions of lions found in extant Roman mosaic art.

"The Christian Martyrs' Last Prayer", Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1883

The memorial of the First Martyrs of the Church of Rome is held on June 30th, the day after the celebration of the Feast of St Peter and St Paul.

Vincent Cavanagh
~ 27 Apr 2023

Image Process 2023-04-26

26/4/2023

Oh, what a grisly pair these are.

Thankfully the "art style" used in Roman mosaics allows some leeway when it comes to depictions of various beasts and predators.

St Peter Chanel, S.M.

1/3/2023

Painted 23–24, 26 Feb 2023.

Vincent Cavanagh © 2023

St Peter Chanel is the Protomartyr of Oceania, and Patron of Wallis and Futuna.
He was a French Marist father and religious superior of seven fellow Marist missionaries sent out to the region, having left France on the 24th of December 1836.